Ob Hill Race

Danny came in first, running up this mountain in about 6 minutes. He is a guide on Mt. Everest in the summertime and taught both Scott and me survival skills at Happy Camper school.

I was glad to see that he wan't having fun either (these are someone else's pics).

It took me about 12 minutes to get to the top. I hate running up hills. Weird picture, huh?

This guy was way too cheerful

All the racers (13 of us :-)

The starting line

The view of McMurdo from Ob Hill.

Wow, it was kind of fun to have a year off from Christmas. No buying, no hustle and bustle, no pressure. Ahhhh. But I really missed family that day :(

It has been so warm here lately that all the roads on the ice are in terrible shape. We have to drive the big vehicles through enormous puddles and very soupy snow (I'll try to take a picture although it will be tough because you never want to stop the vehicle going through that stuff). Several times a day we get stuck and have to have Fleet Ops come out with tractors to pull us out. It is a wild and bumpy ride every time I go out there and pretty stressful. Tempers are flaring. Tonight I stopped on the the ice road in one of the Big Deltas to try and figure out how to get through a giant sink hole and I had the road maintenance guys go ballistic on me on the radio - "don't you turn your Delta around on MY road!" Of course I wasn't going to turn around on the skinny road, but I remained courteous on the radio because the whole station listens to everything. I was mad though. It's never dull around here.

On the flip side, suddenly everyone is thinking about traveling after getting off the ice. People jump off from here and go all over the place for months at a time (Thailand, China, Fiji, Australia, etc.). I'm super excited about just going to New Zealand for a few weeks!

Elizabeth and Ben made it across the U.S. and are having a wild ride of their own out east. I miss them!

Scott says he is sending out some pics soon. I know you all want to hear from him :) I get to see him in three weeks! Yay!