Today we hopped on an A-Star helicopter in McMurdo and took a 45 minute flight to the Cape Crozier Hut. The hut is a 18 by 10 foot building equipped with a propane heater, a propane stove, solar panels, a wind generator, 4 bunks, a food pantry, and a small sitting area. There is also two small lean-tos on the side of the hut, one for the "toilet", which is a bucket with a seat over it, and one for the "freezer", where frozen or mostly frozen food can be stored. The hut is located about 1km away and out of site of the penguin colony, to reduce disturbance.
At the helo pad we were greeted by Jeff Wilson and Mark Smith, two wildlife film guys who are working for the BBC filming the Icy Planet series.
Once we had unloaded the helecopter of 3 months worth of food, our tents, our own gear, and the penguin weigh-bridge, we began making camp. This involved digging out level ground for our tents and setting them up. We had a choice between a North Face Mountain Tent and a Scott Tent. I chose a Scott Tent.
We got done at about 8pm and ate a quick dinner. After our spaghetti, Scott, Grant, myself, and the BBC hiked to the penguin colony to finally get a look at some penguins! We first hiked to the top of Pat's Peak, a crest of volcanic rock that is overlooks the colony and the Ross Sea Ice Shelf from the South. I'm not sure how to go about describing the awesomeness of my first glimpse of 300,000 breeding penguins. Needless to say it was one of the more striking scenes I've witnessed. Also, when walking up to the peak from the back side, where the hut is located, we couldn't hear anything but the wind and the South Polar Skuas calling. Then, just when we got near the top, we began to be able to differentiate thousands of faint penguins calls filtering up towards us.
We walked down the face of Pat's Peak, through the Adelie Penguin colony, and out onto the fast ice where lines of Adelie penguins were arriving at the colony from sea. Grant gave up a quick rundown on penguin behavior and sea ice safety. Cape Crozier is also home to an Emperor Penguin colony. We were followed by 4 very curious Emperor Penguins as we walked around on the sea ice. In addition, we were treated to a flyby by several Snow Petrels, likely drawn to the colony by the strong odor of Crystal krill. At about 1am we were getting very tired, despite the constant daylight, and headed back to the hut for some much needed rest.
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