Some of my favorite quotes

“It is easier to be forgiven than to get permission.” (Always)

“Courage is not the absence of fear but the mastery of it.” (The absence of fear is stupidity)

“Momentum cures all ills.” (But it may also be the death of me)

“It takes more certainty than talent to be a leader.” (Hmmm, not sure what that says, but I still think it’s true)

“Whether you think you’re a winner or you think you’re a loser, you’re right.” (Enough said, yes?)

“It is easier to be forgiven than to get permission.” (Really, always)

Share some of your favorite quotes below.

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Missy Park
Founder

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All is great here at CTAM

All is great here at CTAM [Central Transantarctic Mountains, a single-season large camp focused on research]. My first week here we were scrambling to get ready for scientists to arrive. The first groups flew in and then we had a beautiful three day ground blizzard. Winds tore through our little camp, bringing snow from the south to collect in winding drifts around every tent/pallet/snow machine. This whole time the skies were perfectly blue and clear. It was a good reminder that I am in Antarctica, despite the galley full of various foods and new movies projected on pull down screens.

Glimpse of CTAM

The storm cleared and we are racing to make up for lost time. Our helicopters and Twin Otter are busy shuttling scientists to various sites nearby for day or two week long studies. A C-130 comes daily from McMurdo, bearing new guests, fresh food, mail and resupply cargo.

As a general assistant I spend time organizing cargo, reforming snow steps to buildings, unloading and loading aircraft, tracking who’s where in tent city, unfreezing drain pipes, shuttling cargo around on sleds, placing signs in camp, shoveling snow from the snow mine to the galley’s snow melter, and various tasks that come up. We generally work 11 hour days with Sundays off. On Sunday we head for the mountains closest to camp for hiking or skiing. The views are splendid and almost unreal. Towering mountains in all directions rising to blue sky. Snow and glaciers lap and swirl at their bases and the sun is always bright overhead. The silence is expansive and the crunch of your footsteps on the dry snow carries for a long way.

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It’s Good to be Bad Recipe Contest – Winners!

After an epic tasting party, a few food comas and much deliberation we’ve tallied up the votes. Congratulations to our 9 winners and thank you for all the entries!


Kristin – Anacortes, WA – Decadent Chocolate Macaroon Bars

Terral – Great Falls, MT – Chocolate Croissant Pudding

Deb – South Hampton, NJ – Spinach Pie

Rene – Hancock, MI – Pepperoni Pizza Dip

Christine – Lakewood, CO – Pumpkin Roll

Lydia – Tucson, AZ – Mango Raspberry Cobbler

Joal – Poynette, WI – Eggnog Pound Cake with Rum Glaze

Monika – Fremont, CA – 7 Layer Fudge

Nancy – Rochester Hills, MI – Chocolate Bark



Thanks to these fine folks for the prize baskets:

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Croon Us a Tune

Sing us a tune or get into the holiday spirit with your original 3-line haiku. When you place your order online, by phone or shop at our stores, we’ll include an extra surprise gift for you in exchange for your tune or poem.








*You’ll be prompted to submit your haiku online as soon as you place your order.

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I am off…

CTAM (Central Trans Antarctic Mountains) - A camp on the Beardmore Glacier.

I am off to camp tomorrow……I hope. The last several weeks we’ve been told we would be leaving before the end of the week. I think it is real this time though. I have been keeping busy in town. Trying to find work since I don’t really have a job here. I’ve shipped ice off pipes for plumbers, tested gear for the field camp gear issue, updated Excel spreadsheets and population graphs for other field camps, and put in countless bamboo flags and road markers on the ice roads outside of town. With a light wind loose snow blows over the roads surface and makes it almost impossible to see where the road is. Heavy equipments drivers compact the roads regularly and there is a never ending job of picking up dirt from the surface that falls off in clumps from town vehicles. Small rocks and dirt melt out large potholes in the 24 hour sunlight and ruin the surface of the snow roads. It has been a fun department to work with and has allowed me to get out of town for the past week. Lunch on those days is at the NASA balloon launch site and conversations are great.

We celebrated Thanksgiving on Saturday and we all had two days off which has been great, a chance everyone needed to go out or to rest. The galley fed us in four shifts and the meal was truly wonderful. Fresh fruit from New Zealand and desserts covered every inch of tables that did not already host turkeys carved by volunteers from all over town, gravy pots, various stuffings, crab legs, beans, stuffed peppers, cheese and vegetable platters, rolls and so much more. The tables were spread with white tablecloths and we were allowed to bring drinks in. Wine and Scotch (very popular throughout history in Antarctica) drinkers laughed and shared stories and we all left full and happy. It felt very much like a holiday and games and bands played into the night.

C-130 in action.

Today I will ‘bag drag’, take all my gear up to cargo to be weighed in for my flight on a C-130 to camp in the morning. My list of last minute tasks is growing: laundry, one more hot shower, phone calls, emails, packing, sending gifts home for the holidays, saying good bye to friends in town, and who knows what else. Once I get to camp I will not have internet or phone until early February when we brake the camp down and return to McMurdo. I will have a text only email at one-third the speed of dial up. I will still blog when I can. Until then I wish everyone the best of holidays and fun filled winters.

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