Merry Christmas

Greetings my friends. Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays.

Things are good. I am good. My tooth is all better. I had to get a root canal. But I was AMAZED.. it did not hurt one bit and it was over in about 25 min. and it cost me only $62.00 HA! When they did the conversion for me on the calculator I thought it was $620.00 and thought that was not to bad. But she smiled and said NO.. only $62.00. I was thrilled and could not believe it. I had a wonderful Christmas dinner last night. Rebecca came in with a whole bunch of others and we had a GREAT time together. They had rented out this hall with an open fire/grill inside. We BBQ'd lamb and chicken and steak. It was really good and really fun. Today is a beautiful day in Punta Arenas and a couple of us are going to the spa at the hotel and get pedicures and a massage. What a treat. Then a dip in the beautiful pool and a carpet picnic in Rebecca's suite. :) I am treating my self by staying in the Dream hotel. We get a discounted price through Raytheon and I just can't get enough of that pool :)http://www.mundodreams.com/puntaarenas/hotel.html

So it seems that I get to fly to Ushia on the 27th of December and get on the National Geographic Explorer. http://www.nationalgeographicexpeditions.com/home YIPEEE! I am so excited I can't stand it. I also found out that Buzz Aldrin will be on the ship. How amazing. Me meeting two men that have been to the moon and back. I am so very lucky.

I hope your Christmas day is filled with much laughter and hugs and cookies and really good food.

Thanks also for all of your wonderful kind emails you sent me and well wishes for my tooth. They worked. It was the cheapest and most painless procedure I think I have ever had.

Computer time and availability is kind of limited. I am at the office right now down at the pier but there is a nice long line awaiting to get on the two computers. I assume that there will be Internet access on the Explorer so I will send you an update from there of how things are going. Here's the cutest picture of my friends dog. Just to make you smile.

Have a wonderful blessed day.

Big hugs

stace

Tooth- OUCH!!

I am departing Palmer tonight on the LMG to go back to Punta Arenas to get a broken tooth fixed. I have been in pain over the past 4 days and trying to "will" the pain to go away. I was in contact with our Doctor here and we where just waiting to see what would happen. Thankfully, The LMG came in today and is leaving tonight. And my tooth flared up and I am in much pain. Even with my tooth all numbed up, it's still hurting. :( So hopefully, I will arrive back in Punta Arenas, get my tooth fixed, relax for a day and turn around and come back on the Vandamn Cruise ship. (one of those huge big ones) And be back here at Palmer on the 29th of December.
More later.. :)

Is it Christmas Time already???

Hello friends.
Happy Holidays.
I hope that this finds you all in good spirits, rested from a great weekend and WARM. I was going to say "that's for you NW folks, but as I have been reading in the news, it's just plain COLD everywhere in the US." Much colder, I am just a bit embarrassed to say, than here in Antarctica. The past three days have seen VERY warm weather. 36 to 39 degrees F. The snow is melting so fast it sounds like rain out my window. It also brings much calving of the glacier ( when large pieces of ice drop off) hence why the past couple of days our pier here at Palmer Station has been iced in. Also there is a HUGE iceberg just set off station. As exciting as it is to see such an amazing chunk of ice,(see photo attached) we are a bit worried that it will get into the shipping lane here for Palmer Station, which can create a whole other bag of trouble. Not only the LMG (the big orange ship that brings folks and freshies and cargo to us) but the numerous cruise ships and yachts that are scheduled to stop by and visit Palmer. So far so good, it's keeping it's distance.. Let's just hope it stays that way. :)
This week brings crazy busy to Palmer Station. Two cruise ships, a yacht full of 13 students and a couple of teachers and the LMG. The first cruise ship is 200 people.The Minerva.
http://www.abercrombiekent.com/travel_interests/adventure_cruising/Minerva_Adventure_Cruising.cfm
 Most of the tours are 70 to 130 folks.. but not this one. Yippeee. Add to that a mini-film fest, band practice, science lectures,Christmas cookie decorating, Christmas decor of station and tree decorating, off load of cargo from the LMG, cross town pizza with the LMG(crew of 56) and everyday life.. It's going to be a fun week. :)
This week marked my 1/2 way point of my time here at Palmer Station. Amazing how quickly 3.5 months can go. This next part of the season will bring more science and variety of people in and out.
I have to admit I am just a bit homesick for the Holidays. This is the first year of my many years away from home that I long for the tree decorating we use to do growing up. The thousands of lights my dad and I put up on the Christmas tree. ( really..it's 10's of thousands:) but the few hundred we have here with our beautiful fake tree will have to do.. It will add some nice Holiday Spirit to Station.
Yesterday we did do a "Plunge" Jason, one of the journalist here from NPR wanted to do the polar plunge and so we gathered folks and made it happen. It was pretty fun. And from the photos on Flickr you can see the huge iceberg that was in the harbor. Ad's just a bit more "Antarctic" feel to the 30 degree water.
Not much else going on here. The "daily-grind" has set in, which is not a bad thing. Oh, Neil Armstrong did e-mail station and gave us a big "Thank You" and sent us a picture of him and his wife standing by the photo we gave to him. That was kind of fun. He said he had a great time here at Palmer and was fun to meet like minded people. (I keep having to pinch myself that I got to meet him and talk to him.. this guy has stepped foot on the moon.. WOW)  What a guy :) Well on that note I will bid you all a good night. Thanks again, as always, for your continued support and love and smiles. It allows me to make it down here. New pictures up on Flickr as well.
Have a blessed Holiday Season my friends.
Big hugs,
stace
http://www.flickr.com/photos/8448893@N05/

- Show quoted text -

Starbucks love project....

Hey y'all
Just wanted to let you know we had a fun event yesterday. We got this random phone call from England asking us if we wanted to participate in the "love project sing along"  We quickly gathered and uploaded our video. It was poorly sung, but much fun. You can't really see us in the video that is now on, so I am sending our out take... kind of funny really. Thought it would be a fun laugh on a Tuesday morning.
Cheers :)
http://www.starbucksloveproject.com/#/main/
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Thankfulness

Hello There..
Well I hope that y'all had a wonderful Thanksgiving. Filled with lots of friends and family and turkey and PIE! We had a wonderful Thanksgiving. We celebrated on Saturday so that we could have a day off on Sunday. Wednesday found the kitchen full with people baking pies. We have 36 people on Station and baked 31 pies. It was wonderful fun. Dinner went without a hitch and Brock did an amazing job carving the turkey.
The Humpback Whales are HERE! We went out a couple of nights ago and had a fantastic time with two hummpies. They came and checked us out and showed us a lot of tail and the water was like glass and it was almost 30 degrees outside. So beautiful. Summer in Antarctica.. can't beat it.
Well this weekend brings us two days off. We where suppose to have it over Thanksgiving, but the LMG came in and gave us 5 journalist for Thanksgiving and dropped off some fuel for a field camp. It's quiet fun to have these folks around. They will be here for 3 weeks. They come from all sorts of different back grounds, but they all write or produce science related items. One guy, Jason,  http://www.npr.org/blogs/pictureshow/freeze_frame/  works for NPR and National Geographic as a photo journalist. It's been so fun to talk to him and hear his stories. He has done some amazing things. Don't think I will be throwing THAT business card away soon. :) Angela is from Columbia http://blogs.sciencemag.org/sciencecareers/  but now lives in Miami and writes for a science magazine and also is an author of young teen related science mysteries. She is fun. A bundle of energy and love. If you click on the link above and scroll down... you can see a pic of me ( not a good one but still... :)
Scott is from St. Louise and does mostly international coverage, has been all over the world and has a very "down to earth..normal guy" approach to writing. He's funny.
The NBP (Nathanial B. Palmer) came by yesterday and picked up their fuel for the field camps and stayed for about 5 hours. It was fun to see and hug some old friends. It is always a constant reminder just how small this world is.
This weekend I am going to go camp at Old Palmer over night. It will be fun to be "farther" away from station and camping. Old Palmer is the first original sight of the station when the Navy came down here in 1965     http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Palmer_Station    It is a beautiful spot and has a whole new view and outlook to Anvers Island. :)
I can't believe that it is already December and Christmas is just around the corner. I'm trying to sneak in a few Christmas songs here and there in my IPod mix.. See if anyone notices. :)
I do have bad news.... My nice Canon camera died... It gave me a ERR 99. Which in Canon talk means "there is so much going on right now that is broken I am going to send you just ONE overall ERROR message." OUCH! So I am going to send it back to Canon and see what happens. Luckily I have my canon powershot and other folks on station with nice camera's are going to let me use theirs. I want to make sure I get my beloved Skua's...
As I am writing this, I can hear Dan in the kitchen talking about his beer. I don't know if I told y'all that we have an "official" beer maker on station. That is his job. He has gone to school for this. He is just down here with his girlfriend Maggie as science support, but otherwise.. he makes beer. He brought all of his stuff and he turns out some AMAZING BEER! He has been making a batch every weekend. We are up to 3 beers now in the bar and 2 more coming out for Christmas. What a treat. Today is Pale Ale day.. I've attached a few photos of him rolling the barley.
OK, so this is dragging on so I will let you go. I've put some new photos up of whales and icebergs and penguins and lots and lots of ice and snow. :) Also Thanksgiving pics.
I hope that this finds you all happy and wearing DUCK GREEN  If you don't know what that means.. The University of Oregon  DUCKS won last night over the Oregon State Beavers and are heading to the Rose Bowl... Wahhhooo! Plus a picture of the BEAUTIFUL carrot cake Diane made last night for Maggie's Birthday. She is so good... :)
Thank you again for allowing me to share this adventure with y'all and for all your support and encouragement. What a blessing y 'all are.
Have a great weekend.
Stace
http://www.flickr.com/photos/8448893@N05/

"That's one small step for man, one giant leap for mankind."

Hello Friends...
I hope this finds you all well, warm and with as big a smile on your face as I do now. :) So the fun news that was just announced today was on November 20, 2009... Mr. Neil Armstrong will be coming to station for dinner and a talk. He is arriving on the National Geographic Explorer. Everyone is so VERY excited. We can't take any pictures "with" him and post them, all these rules he has, but I will try and get some of him.. :)
The Explorer was here last week and took Rebecca with it. ( Rebecca is our Station Manager) and dropped off Bob. Changing of the guards really. She is so very lucky, she got to ride in luxury back to Argentina. The room they put her in usually goes for $20,000.00/PP for a 10 day cruise. Nice balcony room service, SO FUN. She deserves it!!!
We had the Explorer folks over for a little food and adult beverages and dancing. Also about 35 lbs of shrimp. The DEVOURED it! They can't have shrimp due to some questionable techniques people use to capture them. So I believe the last Explorer person left station at around 4:30am. Then had to turn around and give tours all day the next day.. I got to bed by two, but I did not have to smile and talk to the tourist!!! Lucky me.
I had a wonderful day on Sunday. The weather was BREATHTAKING and a group of us went out and hopped from one iceberg to the other. The water was so calm and so clear you could see the reflection of the ice below. What beauty God displays!!
So I need to run, in the middle of making Greek dinner, but so wanted to share the fun news. I've posted some new pics on Flicker. Hope you enjoy them.
As always, thank you for sharing this with me and allowing me to share this amazingly fun place with you. What a blessing y'all are to me.
Ciao!!!
Stace
http://www.flickr.com/photos/8448893@N05/

Penguins and Icebergs

Happy Friday.
I hope this finds you all happy, healthy and having wonderful fun plans for the weekend. This past week has been full of fun things here at Palmer Station. On Tuesday, we had a fly by from NASA. They are doing "Operation Ice Bridge"  http://www.nasa.gov/topics/earth/features/ice_bridge/index.html
They are finding out some pretty incredible things about what is going on under the ice. We had about an 8 min. warning that they where going to do a fly by so we ran out and where trying to figure out some way of saying "HI" there was not enough people to lay down and write it so we ran and got our float coats ( those orange huge coats we have to wear when we are around or in the water) and spelled out HI for them. They sent us a picture from the plane. It's pretty cool. Then the birders found a new Gentoo colony. There is over 150 of them about 3 miles from Station. They where not there last year. Over the past few years, the Gentoo population has increased as the Adele's , once the main penguin breed in this area, decrease every year. The birders where so excited about seeing so many Gentoos they bought us all a beer. :) The weather has also been so beautiful that I have been able to go out after work and tour around in the boat. This seems to be the season of icebergs as well. There are at least 5 large ones that are within our boating limits and a dozen more outside of them (which we can't go to..at least 4 miles out) but they look so close... we always "will them in" it has not worked. ... YET! I also was able to go over the Island with all the penguins. It still just makes me smile to see them all. It never gets old. They are in the fighting stage right now. There is only so many mates and so many rocks exposed right now to start a nest, so competition is fierce. I uploaded a video I took to youtube that shows quiet the fighting. Also it has the fly by of the DC-8. It's pretty fun... :)
 It continues to amaze me just how beautiful rock and snow can be. God did some amazing work in this remote part of the world. Even in the icebergs ... they are works of art.. My tent is up as well. Today was so pretty that I finished digging and putting it up. I can't tell you how excited I am to be able to sleep out now every night. There is nothing quiet like the sound of the water and the elephant seals and the glacier. I feel so very blessed to be able to have the privelage of sleeping under the stars in such a beautiful place. I'm going to break the 20 month mark for sleeping outside in Antarctica... Yippeeee!! I'll take some photos and send them out this weekend of my tent.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QVBYyYOjWTQ     
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qN3F-cpI8xg.
http://www.flickr.com/photos/8448893@N05/


Well, that's about it for me... I've uploaded some more photos as well to flickr. As always thank you for sharing this with me and emailing what is going on in your life. It does tend to become a bubble down here. Time goes by differently yet the same.?? OK enough thinking, I must be tired, off to the tent.
Good night my friends.
Stace

October 23, 2009

Hello. Hello. Hello! :)
So the Summer Season at Palmer Station has officially began. The big orange boat has come and gone. Taking with it the remainder of the Winter-Over crew and bringing  us 12 Summer folks. The feel on Station has changed for sure. Having Science here brings a whole new energy. The Birders ( two girls that are documenting the penguins and the giant peterals around a 3 mile area of station) are out in the boat everyday, the Krillers (three grad-students that are documenting the krill pattern. Everything down here eats the krill- Krill are tiny like shrimp)  Are all set and building their boat down on the pier getting ready to head out on the water as well. Lots more radio traffic and lots more hungry people. Diane also is here. She is the 2nd cook. What a blessing she is. Not only is she an amazing women, but she is an excellent baker and makes me feel like I do  nothing all day long. She has TONS of energy! :) She started cooking breakfast and lunch on Wednesday. It frees me up greatly to do "manager" type stuff. I think I spent $6,000.00 yesterday replacing all our old equipment. Of course it won't be here until the month before I depart, but hey, at least I get to see it. The weather has been so beautiful. Clear cold sunny days. have been able to get out in the back yard ( the area from station to the glacier) and snow shoe around, see some penguins and seals. Slowly the wildlife is coming back for summer. The snow is melting ( it does that here on the peninsula, it is wetter here than other parts of the Continent and warmer as well) we have had a couple days of rain which speeds up the melting. This is an important part, to have rocks exposed so that the birds can start their nesting. The Giant Peteral and the variety of penguins we have here make their nest out of rock. So if it is covered in snow???? No babies. We are a total of 30 people on Station now. It will stay that way until December. It's a nice way to ease into the Season. Our first cruise ship comes November 16th. Crazy. It's our favorite one though. National Geographic Explorer http://www.nationalgeographicexpeditions.com/home
We have a great relationship with them and their crew. They take a couple of us out with them to tour the area for the day and we get to enjoy their ship and crew and be spoiled rotten. It's quiet lovely. :) And they always come over to our bar (the crew) and we have a little party and snacks.
Well this is getting a bit long so I will let you all go. I have uploaded new pictures on flickr.
I hope you enjoy. And I also hope that this email finds you looking forward to a very fun and "FALL-type" day where ever you are.
Again, Thanks for sharing this adventure with me and sharing your life as well.
Cheers,
Stace

Settling in

Oct 4th 2009
Greetings!

I think I am finally settled in. Yeah! The boat departed with the winter crew on Thursday. So we are just down to 25 of us. It will once again return on the 20th of October with the remainder of our Summer crew and some science http://www.norbertwu.com/galleries/Antarctica.html Norbert Wu is coming, he is an underwater photographer. It will be pretty wonderful to see his stuff and talk to him. We met last time I was here, but it was only for a couple of weeks. This time he will be here for almost 2 months. I am the lone cook for a couple of weeks so we are not fixing a hot breakfast but I'm trying my darnedest to fatten um up with cinnamon rolls and cookies. Lots and lots of cookies. Diane, my counterpart, comes in on the next boat. She is fantastic. She will cook breakfast/lunch and I will do dinner and lots of paper work. My favorite. Have had the chance to go up the glacier a couple of times and see a week old Elephant Seal. Amazing. It's still so fuzzy and little. Over the next 3-4 weeks more wildlife will be migrating this way for mating and hopefully lots and lots of whales.

So we have been in on/off safety stand down due to wind. That is when we have to stay where we are and not go outside. We have been having guest of 80mph. Aahh. it makes the whole building shake. Amazing what power the wind has.. Today is my day off, Sunday's as a rule unless the boat comes in and I am getting ready to go out boating. The winds have died down to about 15 knots so we are going to try and go for it. Hopefully we will see some penguins. :) Not much more going on here. We are settling in to our jobs and routines as a group and getting to know each other. The crew over all is fantastic. I feel very blessed to be surrounded by such great people that have done so many wonderful things and traveled so many parts of the world. Of course we played poker in the bar last night and I very shortly afterward was sitting at the bar watching the rest play.. oh well. :) I have uploaded some photos of time when the ship was here and a couple from the glacier and seals. Hopefully I will have more upon my return from boating. Well that is all for now my friends. Just wanted to share that all is well and I am settled and looking so forward to this season. Thanks in advance for sharing it with me and all your encouragements and e-mails and love. I am so very thankful for you all and count it a privilege to share this journey with you.

Have a blessed Sunday,

cheers,

Stace

Arrived at Palmer Station

September 28, 2009
Greetings to my dear family and friends!!!

So I finally arrived at Palmer Station Antarctica.. It was a long journey. 15 day's-11 day crossing and 6 of those days in the Drake.... But we saw some beautiful, beautiful things, got a lot of Science done and bonded as a Summer Crew. The last being most important. I count it such a blessing that 3/4 of our Summer crew is down at Palmer Station and it is FANTASTIC!. We have 5 FNG's (Pronounced=Fingees) New people to the program :) And they are hooked. One guy actually left a "REAL" job as an Engineer to come down. Of course he is 25 years old, so... "NO Problem" as he says... I can just go back and get another job... Yeah right... I said that 7 years ago.

We are having a long port call/change over. Six days. Enough to get to know the Winter crew and hear stories of what their time held for them. Eric, the Winter cook, is great. Gental Giant they call him. He is about 6'3 and 240... And he LOVES food. It's so fun to cook along side of him and we chat and laugh and put out some fun food for station. We are having a "Fancy-Dancy" end of season, sit down, meal on Tuesday. We are going all out. Once we decide on the menu (yeah... I know it's tomorrow...we want to allow for our creative juices to flow ) teee heee  heee. I'll send pics.

Have been still living on the boat. Tomorrow we change over ( winter crew moves onto ship/ Summer crew moves onto station) I can not tell you  how excited I will be to get off this ship. I don't get sea sick ... but boy do I go stir crazy. I want solid ground under my feet. Guess I will never be a "ship cook". There is still lots of snow and ice on the ground. I am guessing it will be about 3-4 weeks before I can get my tent up. But no worries. I am still planning on sleeping in my tent. Have to add to my current 13 months of sleeping outside in Antarctica! :)

There is a baby Elephant Seal out at Bonaparte Point, a group of us are heading out this afternoon to see if we can find it.(If the wind's die down..they have been at about 30knots all night???) I have put some photos of the crossing up and "Cross-Town Pizza" ( we,Palmer Station, invite the boat and everyone over to eat pizza on station and then have a big party up in the bar-It's a lot of pizza, this year we had some wonderful volunteers from the ship come and help out. What fun, I made Chocolate Martini's as a "THANK YOU" .)

I will write more later. Everything is in kind of a daze and confusing right now... give me a couple of days to get settled and I'll upload some more pictures. I also did a brief video picture of the journey South on Youtube. I had it perfectly timed with "Southern Cross" and youtube will not let me use it due to "legal stuff" ect... so they assigned some random song... but most of the photo's are on flickr... ( sorry...long explanation...I need to go outside :)

http://www.flickr.com/photos/8448893@N05/

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cwg8GCnjn4E

Thank you again my dear friends for letting me share this with you. 

As ALWAYS.... I LOVE to hear how life is for you... what FALL ( my favorite time of year) is holding for you and your family? What fun things you are doing ect ect....

let me know.

hugs

stace

“Our battered suitcases were piled on the sidewalk again; we had longer ways to go. But no matter, the road is life.” - Jack Kerouac

September 12th, 2009

Well it seems the time has come once again for me to pack my suitcase and hit the road. I sit in my hotel room in Denver after several days of training in the Raytheon office, watching Anthony Bordanies "No Reservations" and thinking.... "Why did I pack so much?" But isn't that always the case? One would think that after doing this for so many years I would have it down. Not the case. Ooops!

I am not sure what this blog is going to look like. Should it deal with my travel and experiences? Or cooking and recipes? Or both? I have had so many people tell me that I need to do a blog that I finally decided to give it a try. I am not much of a writer, but I will try my best to share with y'all what I am experiencing during my time at Palmer Station, Antarctica and the amazing things I get to experience. Any suggestions I welcome with an open heart. I want to try and transport you to the place that I am. :)

We depart Denver Sunday morning, fly to Dallas and then on to Punta Arena's Chile. We will board the LMG http://www.nsf.gov/od/opp/support/gould.jsp and begin our eleven day cruise south. A normal cruise is only five days, however there is a science group that will be doing water sampling at different depths throughout the Drake Passage.http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Drake_Passage It will give us all a nice long ride to get to know each other. Hopefully it will be good weather. My crew that I will be working with seems great. We have a couple of people that have not gone to the Ice before and that is always fun. It is fun to be near them when they see their first iceberg. Or when they glimps the first sight of the station. I still get butterflies when we turn that corner and you can see just a glimps of it. Makes me smile just to think of it.