Approaching the hut:
We'll come back to the hut in a bit. First, we continued walking past the hut up to Vince's Cross.Here are some of the views from that portion:
Here I am, with Scott's Discovery Hut behind, and McMurdo Station further behind that.
And finally, the view from Vince's cross.
Pretty pretty, no? Back down at the hut, we found something they left behind.
That is a seal. A dead seal. A dead 100 YEAR OLD SEAL! Wow. Just wow. But wait! There's more. Before entering the hut, we had to clean our shoes off really well so we didn't track in salt and dirt and such. The lock on the door was giving us a hard time, but Chicago winters have prepared me for such a thing, and we eventually got the door unlocked. Entering the hut was incredible. There is snow everywhere in it, and it is dark. We had these sub-par flashlights (boy, could we have used some X-Files flashlights) and really could only see things by taking a picture, and looking on our LCD screens which, amazingly, hadn't frozen by this point. I know people have been there before, but I felt like Carter discovering Tut's tomb.
Their food and gear has all been left behind. Even their stove is ready for cooking:
It was very cold and very dark inside. It smelled pretty bad, I'm sure we all breathed in some fairly foul stuff. And, there was snow everywhere:
It must have been truly horrendous for these men who had to survive here. One last picture. I haven't edited any of these yet, but I love this one. I think I'll call it "Closing the Hut":
7 comments:
This post is unbelievable. Their food is still in the pan, petrified. It is like taking a walk back, way back, in time. There is still unused cocoa in its box. I never saw a live seal, let alone a 100-year-old dead one. You can almost feel the spirits of those men while looking at the Discovery Hut. Thank you for sharing this remarkable experience, Leslie.
Love, Pat
Leslie, I hear the fresh food situation is getting sparse over there due to the re-supply delays. However desperate it gets over there, don't eat your sled dogs' livers! That's what did in the Mawson/Mertz expedition of 1913!
Brr! I wouldn't want to camp there even for a night. Too bad you'd be destroying historical evidence if you stole something from the hut. I would have really loved the cocoa box as an antarctic souvenir!
P.S. -- What do you think they camped in while they were building their hut? Man! Kudos to them! ~Nikki
That was truly an incredible post. Your pictures are amazing. Although, I sat, looking perplexed for about 3 minutes at the picture of the seal before I went back and read what it actually was. Agreeing with Nikki's post, too bad you can't take a little antarctic souvenir of one of those boxes. Thanks for sharing your pictures. They are so wonderful. You need to thank your mom for giving you such great talent!
Dana! How did the runnin' go?
Leslie,We love this. We are so proud of you, we show this to everyone. Have fun and we hope you find more exciting sites. P.S. greg will be on the uss florida have a wonderful time. Love Jackie
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