Here at the South Pole we are in a bit of a pickle as far as time goes.  I’m not talking about the passage of time- it doesn’t go any faster or slower here, and our manager certainly finds plenty of it during the day to make us work- no, what I am talking about is the problem of what time it is, specifically, what time the clock shows.  Technically, the 24 meridians delineating the world’s time zones converge at the either end of the earth’s axis.  For us, the question of “what time is it?” is merely a matter of where you happen to be positioned relative to the South Pole.  If Kacey and I were to take a stroll out to the Pole marker for a photo, as we often do, and found ourselves standing to either side, with the Pole in between, I could wish her a pleasant morning, and in the same breath declare, in good conscience, that I was ready for my evening cocktail.  Living here gives a whole new meaning to the ol’ “It’s five o’clock somewhere” justification.

To solve this temporal dilemma, and to keep everyone at the station from getting sauced at all hours of the day, the South Pole has been officially designated the same time zone as New Zealand, which is conveniently in sync with McMurdo and the Antarctic Program’s base of operations in Christchurch.  This little fact normally does not carry too much significance for us, aside from trying to judge an appropriate time of day to call home, but on December 31^st, right about at 11:59pm, it happened to become very important, for we were poised, along with a small fraction of the world, to be the first to step into 2012 (It turns out that there are actually a few cheeky South Pacific island nations that have officially ’moved’ themselves from one side of the International Date Line to the other, thereby jumping from the back of the “bringing in the New Year” line to the front, and technically trumping our claim to be first by 1 hour.  But if everybody just went around redrawing time zones, the world would be a mess, so I for one choose to not acknowledge this most devious of publicity stunts).

Four fantastic bands played the night away

Being such a prestigious position to hold, leading humanity into the New Year and all, the station does its best to represent,  and throws a huge party, complete with a stage, strobe lights, four live bands, costumes of all sorts, decorations, and champagne.  Well, we actually had to buy the champagne from the store, but they did make a point of stocking the shelves with bubbley a few days before in preparation.

The party was a blast, and right at midnight, with champagne glasses chinking, people kissing all around, and the elated, ear deafening din of spinny noise makers, kazoos, and those funny rolled up blowers that remind me of an elephant’s nose, Kacey and I looked at each other with the same exact expression:  This is perfect, this is just how it is supposed to be, and we wouldn’t give this experience up for anything in the world.  And then, or I guess I should say now, it was 2012.  A few more hours of dancing, and then we ran out to the Pole to take a memorable first photo of the year.

Happy New Year's from the Pole

Aside from the party and celebration, New Year’s Eve was also the day of another “race around the world”, this one much longer though…  It is a tradition that the men’s and women’s winners of the real Race around the World, the one held on Christmas Eve, get a free trip to McMurdo to participate in their annual marathon.  But, last year, on the day before the marathon, when the winners were supposed to fly to McMurdo, an awful storm blew in and the flight had to be canceled.  Normally, this would have been only a moderate disappointment for the lucky two who were northward bound, but last year, the male winner was actually a professional runner, who had taken a job as a humble steward here at the South Pole, for the sole purpose of getting a chance to run a marathon in Antarctica.  I can imagine how distraught he must have been, seeing  his dreams slip away with the onset of the storm, especially knowing what he had had to sacrifice in the dish-pit merely as a means to an end for realizing his ambitions.

He was a resilient man though, and didn’t let misfortune in the form of a few snowflakes alter his destiny.  He cajoled a few of the station’s other runners into action, and together they organized the first ever South Pole Marathon.   Four runners completed the course that first year, with Ricky, the professional, setting the record at 4 hours and 2 minutes.  Now, that may seem slow for a man who regularly runs, and wins, marathons all over the world with sub 2:30 times, but here at the Pole, conditions are not all that conducive to running, let alone any activity outside.  To start, we are sitting at 9,300 feet above sea level, but due to the thinning of the atmosphere at this extreme latitude caused by the spin of the earth, the barometric altitude is somewhere closer to 10,500 feet.  Add to that the -15° F average January temperature, -35° F wind-chill, and crumbly snowpack course, and you can see reason for Ricky’s subpar finishing time.  All said though, he was the first person ever to complete a marathon at the South Pole.

And we made it! 26.2 miles at the coldest place on earth.

Now, the reason I am relating all of this is to give background and credence to my next statement… that Kacey and I are now two of only eleven people to ever run a marathon at the South Pole!   The 2^nd annual South Pole Marathon was officially held on the morning of New Year’s Eve, with four more hearty Polies completing the 26.2 mile course.  Unfortunately, Kacey and I had to work that day.  But, like Ricky, we were resilient.  Knowing that we couldn’t run with everyone else, our first plan was actually to run the marathon on Christmas Eve, following the Race around the World, but as you can tell from the video included with that post on Christmas, the conditions were truly appalling, so after about eight miles we decided to bag it, and try another day.  Well, that day came last Saturday, on January 7^th, when we were both given the day off as a replacement for working New Year’s, and along with our fellow kitchen mate, Jase the cook, we set off on our own “galley version” of the South Pole Marathon.

The scenery doesn't change much running up and down the skiway 5 times

There are not actually that many places where the snow is packed enough to comfortably run outside here at the Pole, so to accumulate 26.2 miles, we basically ran up and down the 2 mile long skiway a bunch of times.  But don’t be mislead by my use of the word “comfortably”-  yes, the skiway is groomed regularly to accommodate the frequent planes, but even on the hardest packed sections, it is more akin to running on a sandy beach, rather than terra firma.  At one end of the skiway, our awesome scientist and runner friend Sara (who was the women’s winner for both the Race around the World and the SP Marathon), placed a duffle bag full of warm drinks and caloric goodies to keep us energized and motivated.  The three of us ran at our own paces, but routinely regrouped so that we would finish together, which we did, hand-in-hand at the Geographic South Pole, where we promptly collapsed in exhaustion.

Christmas, like Thanksgiving, was another long awaited-for break in the monotony of work here at the South Pole.  Because they didn’t want to detract from the Centennial celebration and the visit of the Norwegian Prime Minister, we were forced to wait till about a week before Christmas before any decorations were put up.  Normally, back home, we are subject to the Christmas season barrage starting right after Thanksgiving, so this was a refreshing delay to the onslaught.  Even so, it was slightly disorienting, and I have to admit a bit disappointing to hear the first holiday song on the galley stereo and realize that Christmas was only a week away.  Usually I am annoyed by the month long bombardment of commercialized holiday cheer, and would welcome reducing it to a mere week, but here it is different, and perhaps exactly because there is no commercialization, and the holiday is purely one of fellowship and thanksgiving, I could have gone for a bit lengthier build up to the celebration.  Either way, Christmas was upon us before we knew it.

The galley was decorated with lights, wreaths, garland, and of course a tree.  Christmas music could be heard from speakers all over the station.  And Kacey and I were tasked with the weeklong project of ironing dozens of table cloths and hundreds of white linen napkins.  We also were lucky enough to find two extra wreaths in Skua, so we adorned the front door of our jamesway with one, and used the other as our own little Christmas tree substitute in our room, under which we arranged the modest collection of gifts and packages we had accumulated.

It took all of Kacey's self constraint not to open them early

Before we left Colorado, we had made a point of going Christmas shopping for each other (not an easy mode to fall into so many months out), and diligently hid our assortment of gifts for one another in various nooks and crannies of our luggage until a few days before the holiday, when under obviously false pretenses, we both took our turns sneaking away to the arts and craft room to wrap them all up.   These ended up beneath our make shift wreath-tree, along with some others from family we had carried with us from home, and yet more that had miraculously arrived in the mail at the last minute, even though some had been sent more than a month ahead of time.

It's tradition to dress up in some funny outfit or costume for the race

Christmas Eve morning started off with a famous South Pole tradition- The Race around the World.  Every year a 2 to 3 mile course is laid out which encompasses a good portion of the station area and by necessity circles the Geographic South Pole, giving justification to the race’s name.  This year the 2.3 mile path started at the Pole, rounded the back of the station, crossed the ice-runway, or skiway, went out to the futuristic looking South Pole Telescope, made a loop through the tourist camp, past the visitor center, and returned to the South Pole.  Unfortunately, this scenic circuit of the station was made meaningless by the awful weather that arrived the night before- it was freezing cold and blowing something terrible, causing zero visibility and covering the up-until-then nicely groomed race course with vast snow drifts, which were invisible against the monotone white of the ground and sky, and frustratingly sluggish to run across and through.

The 2.5 mile course starts and finishes at the Geographic South Pole

Notwithstanding the bad conditions, almost 50 people turned out to run the race, along with a bunch of cross-country skiers, a whole regiment of snowmobiles, trucks and tractors, some pulling hilarious trailers or floats, and even one bicyclist.  Besides being a lot of fun, the big incentive for participants, at least for the runners, was that the men’s and women’s winners got a free trip to McMurdo for their annual Antarctic marathon.  This year, two astrophysicists- Jamie and Sarah- claimed the titles, thus making it, in their own words, a “beaker sweep”.  Kacey ended up taking the women’s bronze which won her a $50 Amazon gift card!  I came in 8^th for the men’s, with no reward except the satisfaction of completion- but I attribute my slothful finish to the fact that I was a little distracted taking a series of action packed photos and videos during the race, one of which almost lead to a devastating pileup between me and an overzealous camera craving skier.

That afternoon, we started off the festivities by attending a small, but exclusive, cocktail hour in the room of some polie friends who have been coming down for quite a few years (one of whom was actually that very same crazy skier).  This was definitely not their first ro-de-o…  In their double sized room, they had elevated their bed high above the floor, and transformed the area beneath into a surprisingly posh and complete bar, with a row of nice spirits lined up in front of a mirror-backed display, a variety of glasses to correctly accommodate whichever type of drink you might order- be it a highball, martini, wine or shot- all embossed with a matching South Pole logo, in addition to any mixer you might request, along with fresh limes and mint (real rarities here) for garnish, all the necessary bar apparatuses from muddler to martini shaker, ice on hand for cocktails, and even a mini-fridge to keep the beers cold.  In a word, a fully equipped bar, with seating for 12, under a bed, at the South Pole.  We were very impressed.

Everyone is ready to eat

After a few gin-and-tonicas, it was time to move on to the next cocktail hour- this one put on by the kitchen, with a spread of appetizers from shrimp cocktail to gourmet cheese platters to little crackers adorned with blobs of duck confit (quite the delicacy I am told, but not something I would personally make a habit of trying).   We where soon ushered into the dining room, which like Thanksgiving, was done up to the nines.  Dinner was over the top once again, this time with beef wellington and lobster tail headlining the menu.  A dance party followed and we didn’t return to our jamesway till very late in the morning.

Finally Christmas morning was here and we got to open our presents

On Christmas day, Kacey and I slept in for probably the first times in our lives.  I don’t know if it is because we are getting older, or if it was just the knowledge that it would be our only chance to sleep in that week, but somehow we were able to curb our enthusiasm in favor of slumber.  It couldn’t last for long though, and once we did finally open our eyes, we were all business.  I doled out the presents from under our “tree” and we took turns quietly tearing open each package so as not to disturb our neighbors. This year was the Christmas-of-Socks for me.  Word must have gotten out that I needed some, and I ended up with seven new pairs- all very cool argyle patterns, which are my favorite.  Kacey was most excited about her new pageboy hat and English hot water bottle, and we both were overwhelmed by the bounty of “stocking stuffers” we received in the mail- as soon my eyes landed on a long, greasy, pepperoni stick that had been carefully bent in half to fit in the box, I couldn’t help myself- I tore open the wrapper like some pepperoni deprived beast, and that was Christmas breakfast.

Another little oddity of the South Pole… on the outskirts of the station, in a desolate area aptly referred to as the End of the World, there is a huge, monolithic arrangement of empty cable spools.  They call the creation Spoolhenge for a good reason.

Spoolhenge

The spools came from the host of science experiments operating around the station that required hundreds and thousands of feet of electrical cable during construction.  For example, one current experiment called IceCube has installed thousands of neutrino detectors down in the ice to a depth of 1 kilometer, over an area of 1 square kilometer, thus constructing a neutrino “telescope” that is one cubic kilometer in size.  I’ll write more about IceCube and neutrinos later, but suffice it to say that IceCube alone used well over 100 kilometers of cable.

Each spool is more than 6 feet tall

The cable comes wrapped up on these massive spools, each one taller than me, which are flown down on the big C-130 Hercules’s.  Flying the spent spools back out would be a huge drain on resources, so what to do with the spools?  Some creative polie with too much time on their hands started playing around with the front-end loader and came up with the rather unexpected sight of Spoolhenge.