Journals Dec 3rd - Dec 9th

[scotiapl...@gmail.com]

December 3, 2007
Location:64° 46' S, 64° 03' W
Samples Collected: 1

Dave Gombosi, University of South Carolina

Today was our second stop at Palmer Station. We were due to arrive
~8:00AM, however the meeting before we were allowed to disembark the
boat was slightly later. Kendra, Willy and I stayed on the boat for a
while after that checking our email, sending photos home, etc... with
our newly gained internet connection.

At 11:00 the palmer staff opened up the store for an hour. The station
runs a small one-room store, which sells T-shirts, calendars and other
souvenir items to the tour ships which stop by fairly regularly. Most
of the crew loaded up on holiday shopping for souvenirs for those back
home. In addition to the tourist items since we were an NSF affiliated
group the back room which had all the beer and liquor was opened up
for us. While the Gould is a dry ship, none of the US stations are.

We grabbed a quick lunch back on the Gould and then were free for the
rest of the afternoon while the crew of the Gould unloaded the ship's
cargo. A few people went walking, around the station. There is a
glacier in back of the station with a nice walk to the summit, but
being a warm day and a bit slushy I don't believe anyone took
advantage of it. The station has two primary buildings and a number of
smaller ancillary facilities scattered around the perimeter. The
living situation is really quite comfortable, and it didn't appear the
station was anywhere near their capacity. In the afternoon Kendra,
Willy, and I went out and collected one sample of tonalite from the
back of the station for thermochronology.

We had a great dinner at the station ~5:30, consisting of pizza and
calzones followed an hour later by a variety show. The variety show
was a wonderful assortment of poems, musical numbers, stupid human
tricks, etc... including one musical number composed by Barbeau based
around the events of our cruise.

After the talent show there was drinking and general socializing as
people slowly drifted home until ~1:00AM. Shortly after our chief mate
Joe showed up, Barbeau, Kendra, and I decided to go for a traditional
dunk into the Antarctic Ocean. We got Willy from the ship and he
agreed to come as well. By 1:30AM under the Antarctic twilight we all
ran down to the ocean dunked ourselves under the sub-freezing water,
and ran immediately back to the waiting hot tub on the side of the
station. We finally decided to head into bed by 2:30AM, just as the
sun was starting to come up over the horizon.
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December 5, 2007
Location: 64 39.103 S 062 11.562 W
Wind Speed: 2 knots
Sea Surface Temperature: -1.2 C
Samples Collected: 8
Number of glaciers we heard calving: at least 4

Kendra Murray, Carleton College

We woke up this morning to a cloudless sky and smooth blue water in
Andvord Bay, a large fjord about 60 miles northwest of Palmer Station.
Hardly believing our good luck in weather, we piled into a zodiac
after breakfast for a morning of sample collection and gratuitous
picture taking. Our first stop was an outcrop of granite, which we
sampled for thermochronology. A small group of Gentoo penguins swam
around just offshore as we took notes and collected our samples,
occasionally surfacing just feet away to check us out. The water here
is some of the clearest in the world, and if your eyes can keep up it
is possible to follow the penguins' speedy progress below the surface.

Our next stop was at the very back of the bay, where the Trinity
Peninsula Group of metamorphosed sediments is exposed. There were able
to land the zodiac on a rocky beach, so everyone including Meghan and
Brian, our marine techs, was able to get out of the boat to enjoy some
time onshore. We sampled a quartzite and related mudstones, and spent
some time exploring the beach. And watching Gentoos. Two of them
climbed up onto some rocks in the tidal pools right next to our
zodiac, appearing to contemplate going for a joyride. We would also
occasionally hear long low rumbles from glaciers calving around the
bay. We never saw it happen, but on such a warm, sunny day we are
particularly grateful for the experience of our support staff as we
zip around amongst huge pieces of ice and along snowy coastlines.

My new favorite word of polar terminology is "bergy bit": a piece of
floating ice that is less than 5 meter above sea level and no more
than 10 meters across. Anything larger is an ice berg. Anything
smaller could be a growler, or brash ice (accumulation of ice less
than 2 meters across). Most of the ice we encounter in zodiacs are
bergy bits or smaller; we often push through brash ice on our rides
between the Gould and our target ourcrops.

In the afternoon today the sun was still shining bright as we entered
Wilhelmina Bay. Our zodiac ride out to Pelseneer Island was absolutely
beautiful. The water was smooth as glass and chock full of ice -
everything from slushy brash to sculpted or puckered bergy bits. We
sampled another quartzite of the Trinity Peninsula Group from an
outcrop that was only exposed for about half a meter above the
waterline. A snowfield covers the rest of the island, and a flock of
shags looked on as we sampled.

For the rest of the evening it was hard to leave the deck of the
Gould. We are spending the night in the bay, and the low sun on the
horizon brings a splash of color to the mountains, glaciers, sea ice,
and snowfields that surround us.
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December 7, 2007
Location:63 deg 31.573' S, 59 deg 3.90' W, offshore of Cape
Roquemaurel

David Barbeau, University of South Carolina

Today's entry comes from Bobby Loglisci, the kind, capable and
generous man whose crew keeps us well-fed with simply amazing food
that I never thought possible on any research vessel, let alone one
trolling the Southern Ocean, hundreds of miles from the nearest arable
land. What is more amazing is that Bobby & the boys do so while
accommodating the Rock Hunters' (the nickname given us by the crew)
unpredictable schedule that would justifiably infuriate lesser
persons. From the Captain , Chief Mate and Marine Projects Coordinator
on down, the entire crew of the LMG lives by the credo that science
comes first (well, actually: it's a close second to safety), which is
a wonderful environment to do research within. This allows me and my
team to focus on finding and retrieving our target samples while the
LMG crew does the rest to the greatest extent that weather, waves, ice
conditions and glaciers will allow. I've said it before and I will say
it long after -- the success of this research cruise is a direct
result of the indomitable spirit, generosity, professionalism and hard
work of the LMG crew. We scientists have the easy part as far as I am
concerned. Until tomorrow, Dave

My name is Bobby Loglisci. I am the chief steward aboard the LMG, one
of the two US ice breaking research and support vessels that service
the National Science Foundation and Antarctica. Chief Steward is a
fancy name for boat cook. Think: fat, bald, middle aged guy in a t-
shirt with an anchor tattoo and a cigarette dangling from the corner
of his mouth. I first came to Antarctica in 2003 after a divorce. I
spent a year at McMurdo Station. When I left, I swore I would never
come back! After a few months back in NYC, I realized I missed the
continent like you would miss a harsh but passionate lover. It should
be mentioned here that you are only allowed to stay in Antarctica for
no longer than 13 months at a time. Reason is: the cold, dark,
isolation and the magnetic pull of the pole do strange things to your
mind. Much like a harsh but passionate lover. For too many reasons to
mention, I could not go back to McMurdo. I had a job offer at Rothera
(the British station) but could not get a working visa. So, I found
out what is needed to become a cook on one of the Icebreakers. They
had no positions in the Antarctic division but they did have an
opening aboard a Navy vessel in the Sea of Japan. I took that job
hoping an Ice job would open up. A year later, one did.

Now here I am crossing arguably the world's most treacherous body of
water, The Dreaded Drake Passage! It is where the Atlantic, Pacific
and Antarctic waters converge in a no holds barred ship smack down! 65
foot rogue waves are not unheard of. In fact, just last week a cruise
ship with 150 passengers hit an iceberg and sank! The boat lunges back
and forth, side to side and up & down at angles that make it
impossible to stand. Let alone cook! Imagine trying to prepare 3 meals
a day in a kitchen that moves and spins like a carnival ride! Why do I
want to do this? Because when I look out of my porthole window, I see
Icebergs, penguins and seals! Without sounding like a drooling
holistic spiritual putz, Antarctica gets under your skin and into your
soul. It is a harsh and unforgiving place filled with mystery and
beauty.You meet the most incredible, brilliant people in the world.
Also, there are no kids, dogs, bugs, traffic, or telemarketers! Do
yourself a favor, come down here. Not on a cruise ship but as a
worker, support staff, or scientist. Cruise ships and the discovery of
oil will be the death of this pristine place!
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December 8, 2007
Location:63 deg 8' S, 60 deg 12' W, in transit to Byers Peninsula from
Cape Roquemaurel to pick up the MacPhee group

Standing on the Shoulders of Giants (Leaves Me Cold) Dave Barbeau,
University of South Carolina

On this day in 1939, a baby girl named Geraldine was born to Grace
Houghton and Jerome Gallant in Hyannis, Massachusetts, not far from
what would become the Kennedy compound. A day shy of two years later,
the Japanese dropped bombs over Wai Momi, and off to War went Jerry
with the Navy while Grace, her three daughters and one son rationed
food and fuel and raw goods with the rest of the U.S. of A. Jerry
returned from War to his family and Massachusetts, and opened a
village post-office / grocery-store in Green Harbor and scraped
together just enough pennies to keep the lights on. Geraldine, then an
adolescent, spent her summers barefoot, walking to, from, and around
the beaches of Green Harbor and Brant Rock with her sisters.

The post-war years weren't very fruitful for the blue-collar South
Shore, so when Geraldine graduated from Marshfield High School in
1957, off to the convent she went for an education and a career,
amongst other things. A decade later she approached Mother Superior
with a request to be released from her vows, thinking that God's will
was for her to be a wife and mother. Among her first matters of
business upon being sprung was to have her ears pierced at the local
hairdresser's. There Eva Barbeau (née Nangle) was getting herself a
new 'do. Geraldine, then approaching her thirtieth year, had her first
date with David Longfellow Barbeau on the night Neil Armstrong stepped
onto the Moon. Although David was no Austrian naval commander --
rather a good-natured, 'hell-raising' mechanic who had been crippled
by polio as a teenager a single cruel year after the epidemic -- it
was fitting that his favorite movie was The Sound of Music.

David opened his own service station -- Dave's ARCO -- above the banks
of the South River in Marshfield. Within a year Geraldine and he were
married, and they set about having kids. Three miscarriages and four
years later, Viola MacDonald (née Girardi) drove Geraldine into the
Boston Lying-In Hospital once a week for a shot that would help her
thirty-four-year-old uterus bring a child to term. With lots of good
luck and the keen work of her Jewish doctor, David Jr. was born on a
Wednesday afternoon at precisely three PM ("And I'm still waiting for
the first coming of Christ!" the Doc exclaimed, certainly implying
more about the nature of David Jr.'s birth than his nature itself).
Geraldine quit her job as a schoolteacher to raise David Jr. -- the
first of many such sacrifices for the young boy -- and with her Kodak
Brownie took a photograph of him every Wednesday for the first year of
his life.

When David Sr. got sick and had to close his service station in 1980,
Geraldine, then pushing fifty, returned to the classroom as a
substitute teacher for $25 a day. For the next eight years David Sr.
cycled in and out of hospitals while Geraldine learned how to pay
bills, file insurance claims, maintain sanity and plan for the future,
amongst many other things. Slowly losing his vision, hard-fought
mobility and dignity, at age 50 David Sr. finally succumbed to
complications from adult-onset Type I diabetes, also amongst many
other things, leaving Geraldine to raise a less-than-gracious,
rebellious, stubborn (just like his dad), adolescent David Jr. by her
lonesome.

Now the sole breadwinner, Geraldine returned to the classroom full-
time on her way to amassing more than thirty years of experience
empowering schoolchildren of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts.
Despite her paltry public school wages, through great thriftiness
Geraldine saved enough money to send her son to a small Midwestern
college where the ratio of students to faculty was low and the focus
was on teaching (and where the cost of a year's tuition was close to
her greatest annual salary).

Her selfless life goal accomplished (memories of the convent fresh in
her mind, forty years later), Geraldine retired from the Marshfield
School System and moved to western Mass. where she tends the most
beautiful flower gardens in the eastern United States, dresses up like
Emily Dickinson to recite poetry to local school groups, and runs an
18th century reenactment summer camp for kids of the Pioneer Valley.
During a visit to see David Jr. in Tucson, Arizona, she was surprised
by a card he presented her at dinner -- he was being hired as an
assistant professor at the University of South Carolina. From that day
forward, she has slept a little easier at night. Today, five years
later, he's the chief scientist on a research vessel steaming towards
Livingston Island, just off the coast of Antarctica. It's the least I
can do for her.

If you enjoy reading about our Antarctic journey, send my Mom a
birthday wish at gbarbeau04 (at) aol.com. Without her (most important
amongst many other things) there would be no such journey.
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December 9, 2007
To: Tom Wagner, National Science Foundation's Office of Polar Programs
Re: December 9, 2007 Cruise Report: LMG 07-17

Dear Tom,

This letter constitutes the cruise report for our second week of work
associated with cruise LMG 07-17. Our good luck has not yet run out as
we have spent the past week acquiring a high density of valuable
samples from the northern half of the peninsula. The MacPhee group is
back aboard the LMG a week ahead of schedule due to challenging
camping conditions and deep snows that have not thinned as rapidly as
hoped. After some more reconnaissance of western Livingston Island,
they are joining us on our sampling of the northern tip of the
Peninsula before we tackle common targets of the Seymour / Vega /
James Ross Island group at the end of our cruise, weather and ice
willing.

Following our sampling of the Pauling Islands and aborted attempts on
Laird Island and the nearby peninsula proper at the end of last week,
we headed north in order to pick up Bob Marshall from his VLF antenna
installation/adjustment project at Vernadsky base. While one Zodiac
party collected Bob, my team headed east a comparable distance to
collect an unplanned sample of the magmatic arc rocks of Cape Tuxen.
These tasks completed, we steamed northwestward towards Palmer Station
for LMG 07-17's official port call. With a few hours to spare before
our arrival at Palmer, we took advantage of our schedule to sample
more arc rocks on Py Point of Wiencke Island. During our 1.5 day port
call at Palmer Station, my team sampled the local granitoid adjacent
to a sculpture installation by Artists & Writers Program participant
Kim Baranowski. We also enjoyed the great camaraderie and hospitality
of Rebecca Shoop and her Palmer crew who put together a Variety Show
coincident with our visit. A good time was had by all.

Departing Palmer Station on the afternoon of December 4, LMG 07-17
fully dedicated itself to the research needs of our team as we strung
together a dense sampling routine through Paradise, Andvord and
Wilhelmina Bays. From these targets we collected arc and
metasedimentary sample suites from eleven different localities in a
mere two days, and were shut out but once by uncooperative ice
conditions. Upon completion of these tasks, we received a satellite
phone request from the MacPhee group for an early extraction of their
camp from Byers Peninsula, which we were able to complete yesterday
after adding samples from the Cayley Glacier area and Cape Roquemaurel
and upon completing another rocky transit across Bransfield Strait.
Winds racing to 40+ knots inhibited our access to the Byers Peninsula
camp yesterday morning, but an afternoon of fast and hard work got the
team and their gear aboard in time for a much deserved dinner from
Chief Steward extraordinaire Bobby Loglisci and his capable crew.

It has been a joy working with the crews and teams of LMG 07-17 who
continue to amaze me with their dedication and commitment to this
exciting science.

Until next week, best regards.

Dave Barbeau
University of South Carolina
PI, NSF-ANT 0732995, an International Polar Year Project
Co-Chief Scientist Cruise LMG 07-17, Project G-432-E
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