Day 11: Howling Winds and Rough Terrain

Nov 21, 2006

Strong winds

Howling winds!

Sastrugi

Jenny writes:

T

he surface conditions today were much rougher. Instead of a relatively smooth and flat surface to ski on, we had a long and gradual uphill climb over rough bumps and a confusion of sastrugi. This was some of our highest sastrugi yet, up to 40 inches.

But we had a flawless blue sky with excellent visibility. In fact, the day was enjoyable, despite one other factor: the biting south wind. Throughout the morning it howled, up to 40 mph, sending a ground blizzard of snow swirling low across the surface.

Still smiling.

I skied beside Ray today, and as the hours wore on, I watched his face mask ice up until, from the nose down, it was a frozen mass of icicles. He could not drink from our water bottle, and he could barely pass a few thin salami pieces into his mouth. I tried to loosen the ice from around his mouth but it pulled painfully on his mustache and beard. But Ray is amazing; nothing ever bothers him. He just kept slogging along, oblivious to the cold and wind. In fact I once heard him laughing.

Jenny taking a wind reading.

Happy hour for me is when we stop to make camp after 9 hours of skiing. Setting up the tent and making the inside cozy with pads, quilt, clothing bags. Stove and food warms us both. I was pleased to see today that this took us only 50 minutes.

Transferring bags of food and camping gear from pulk to tent.

Evening camp: S 81° 37.024' W 82° 01.353'

Today's mileage: 11.5

Here is why that nunatak is usually visible at each camp.

Day 12: Sledging away from the Maritime Influence

Nov 22, 2006

As we get further from the "coast" with its maritime influence, and as the season progresses more into summer, the tent is getting much warmer at night due to solar heating. The down jackets and insulated pants have become permanent residents of the sleds, and our insulated jackets have become pillows. Whereas before we wore them all. Now we are quite comfortable sleeping in our two layers of skiing clothes under our Greenland quilt. This despite the freezing ground blizzard outside.

Last night's ground blizzard buried one of the sleds, so we are learning to park them in the lee of the tent.

The old SSW wind was back, blowing 25 knots.

This morning was cloudy but windless. The air was cold, but within half an hour of setting out we both overheated. Removing a layer of clothing is not as simple as it sounds. To take something off is to soon freeze. We almost wished for a little wind to cool off. Wish granted. By noon the old SSW wind was back, and blew 25 knots the rest of the day.

Up to now, we were always feeling like we were climbing uphill. Today the terrain leveled out, and for the first time we could see ahead for miles. We also noticed a bit more speed. We made more miles even though the terrain was quite rough. In all, we sledged 14.2 statute miles in 9.5 hours today.

Day 13: Rocking Out

Nov 23, 2006

Taking a wind reading.

Jenny's compass mounted on her forearm.

Good day today. We broke camp in 25 mph winds thinking today will be another windy one, but after sledging for half an hour the wind dropped to near zero. In another half hour it was back to 25. And so the day went, up and down. Note: Jenny carries a wind meter in her pocket.

With me in the lead, I tried to go around the worst of the sastrugi to the right because the route looked better over there. After I had done that, the route still looked much better to the right. That is when I realized the light was playing tricks, and the sastrugi was probably the same everywhere. So I headed straight through. This we did most of the day and it worked well, saving us innumerable detours.

Rocking out. We each carry our music players in two zip-locks hung on our backs. We are always bucking headwinds, and if we carried the players on our front sides, they would freeze and quit working. But our backs are more protected from the cold blast, so it is a warmer place to carry them.

The afternoon was a joy, with good weather, expansive scenery, and good speed and progress. The terrain never ceases to amaze us, with it's beautiful and infinite variations caused by, not water, but wind erosion. Every square meter is a sculpture.

The lifeless landscape reminds me of Mars. I had no part in Jenny's painting the name Spirit on my sled, and Opportunity on her sled. But these names sure fit now.

Finally getting away from that mountain. It's been on the horizon for a week.

Skiing over a patch of ice. The snow consistency is not uniform across the surface, but varies from place to place, from soft snow to hard ice. Its difficult to ski on hard ice, because the skis can't get a grip, even though we have skins on the underside of the skis. And its even more difficult to ski on soft slow, because the pulks drag even harder. Fortunately for us, the consistency has been about right, at least for skiing. When it comes time to make camp, we have to be very careful to pick the right spot. More on that later in the story.

Lunch stop, Jenny pulling out her insulated jacket.

At our lunch stop I've got my hood pulled down, in order to cool off. Just kidding. But it's difficult to eat with a face mask loaded with ice on the inside. The ice is from my breath.

Towards the end of the day we wandered into a valley with sastrugi so large that we could not maintain our heading without detouring every which way.

Once at the bottom of the valley, we had a long climb up the next hill. Then, once at the top we had super impressive views looking back.

This ice moves about 20 inches per year, so this hill and valley is probably caused by the tip of a mountain buried a short ways below the surface, and the ice flowing around it. Like a large rock out in the middle of a slow moving river causing a massive slow wave.

At the bottom of the valley we crossed our second degree, so tonight's camp is 82 and counting. That means we have eight more degrees of latitude to reach the South Pole at 90 °.

Writing the evening update. In the tent it's much warmer than outside, by as much as 50 degrees or more. The reason our tent is so warm, is first, because the air, here, is so much drier than it was near the coast, where the humidity made the cold extremely penetrating. Secondly, we have learned, through a great deal of trial and error, to manage our warmth. We pitch the tent with the doors on each end facing the wind; then we un-zip each door part-way, to let in just the right amount of ventilation to permit using the stove inside the tent without the fumes causing asphyxiation, and to prevent the steam from building inside. The wind is usually blowing hard outside. Without the wind, we could not use a stove inside. And finally, and most importantly, our tent is dark green in color to maximize solar heating. The sun stays above the horizon, so the solar warmth comes through all "night." The dark green color is also much easier on the eyes.

As I write this in the tent, we are enjoying our third cuppa and a large pot of oatmeal. Outside, it is blowing 25 knots again, and the temp is well below freezing, as usual. One unexpected advantage of my modification to this tent is it does not shake and rattle in the wind. So it is quiet inside.

Today's mileage: 14.7

Day 14: Frozen Face Mask

Nov 24, 2006

Sastrugi

Somewhere behind the ice is a smile.

WEvery expedition seems to have a few days like this. Our third day was like that. Extremely cold and windy, and we were on the move for 12 hours.

Today was windy (25 - 35 mph) all day, very cold, the terrain was rough and uphill most of the day. After the first hour I was thinking we should have taken a rest day in such weather. Jenny would likely have agreed. But we kept going, and by keeping our rest stops brief, nothing over a minute, we kept warm. Although Jenny wore her insulated jacket from start to finish.

My jacket zipper and face mask froze with so much ice that I could not pass food or water into my mouth. Comically, Jenny fed me small candies through a slit between the icicles.

We skied for 9.5 hours yesterday, but only eight hours today. We called it quits, pitched the tent and crawled into our wonderfully warm abode, and with the help of the warming stove made three big cuppas each before dinner.

Today's mileage: 11

Day 15: Coldest and Windiest Place on Earth

Nov 25, 2006

Welcome to Antarctica - coldest and windiest place on Earth.

Sledging in very strong headwinds

The winds are katabatic and flow down and away from the pole. Today the wind is especially strong, and the wind chill is off the charts. Base Camp is reporting gusts of 55 knots.

The ground blizzard consists of blowing ice crystals, not snow. These crystals are quite heavy, compared to snow, so they don't rise above the surface more than a few inches. They make the ground look blurry. And the horizon too.

Notice the wake behind my sled and Jenny's.

Partly cloudy, cold, and 10 knots more wind than we had yesterday. Welcome to Antarctica - the coldest and windiest place on Earth.

We bundled up in second shirts and pants, and set off at 8:30, half an hour later than usual. In the strong winds, packing up camp takes us longer.

In wind this strong Jenny prefers to ski alongside me. This helps me too, because it means the leader can keep much better tabs on the other person without having to turn around frequently, which in high winds is more difficult than it sounds.

Also it is much safer that way, because we can render help to the other at short notice when needed. In wind chill this low, our margins run pretty thin. So we keep a close eye on each other. A few times a day one of us will need help immediately, for example where the face mask is iced and pressing against the nose, or cold air is getting in around the neck. The other person can identify and fix the problem quickly.

All was proceeding slowly until we reached the hill. It did not look like much, and in good weather it is probably not. But as the hours passed, it started to feel like Everest to us. We had been skiing on iced sastrugi all morning, but this was iced sastrugi on an incline. And not only that, but the fierce wind was doing its best to try and blow us back down the hill. It was very hard work for not much progress.

Finally with our energy starting to flag, and no end of the hill in sight, we started looking for a place to camp. In the morning we had passed plenty of good places to camp - flat, level, and hard snow, not ice. But here on the hill, we had just the opposite. Finally we found a suitable spot.

Jenny has unzipped her ski jacket to get at the wind meter.

We have stopped to make camp. Time to put on the insulated jacket because the body is no longer generating enough metabolic warmth when not sledging.

Taking a wind reading.

We prefer to camp on hard snow because with our snow shovel we can cover the tent's snow skirt with hefty chunks of snow. And we can chop pot-size chunks of snow for melting.

After safely pitching the tent, it took us another 45 minutes to sweep out the snow and ice from the tent, brush the spindrift from our gear bags, and make the tent comfortable inside.

Finally a hot cuppa, and it sure tasted good.

Note: PH is reporting gusts of 55 knots.

Hours traveled: 8.5, today's mileage: 10.3.

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