January 3-4, 2011... South Pole to Christchurch

The day we were planned to leave South Pole, January 3rd, 2011 was the worst day I had seen so far in terms of weather. It was overcast and really you could not make out the difference between the land (snow) and the sky.. Horizon was totally missing.. I was kind of skeptical if we would even get out. Anyway, after the ARO visit, a hasty lunch and loads of quick bye-byes, I came to my room to wrap up the bedding and keep it outside for cleaning. Every person needs to clean the room and make it ready for the next one. I had done my job nicely the previous night in spite of all the packed schedule.

Right after lunch, we got a call to be ready at the runway for the flight. We took our bags and set out. The flight was on time. LC130 was waiting for us.

I was so drained out that I instantly fell asleep right after we took off, even though it was crazy noisy inside.

We reached McMurdo. The thought of eating peacefully going to our rooms and dozing off happily kept us going through all that waiting at the Pegasus "terminal" and that slow and long "Terra" bus ride from the Pegasus runway to the McMurdo station.

It was 6.00 pm by the time we reached McMurdo. We had to rush for dinner. Just when were were leisurely walking back to the store to do some final shopping, one of us found out that we had to take our bags "bag drag" right then (it was 7.00 pm already and we just had another hour) for a flight that early morning. We were moved a day earlier to fly out to Christchurch. Sure enough our emails said so. Then there was no time to relax, we had to pack our left over things at McMurdo, get everything ready at the check in bag drop place, all we were left with were our carry on luggage. A bigger bummer was that we had to be at that place again at 2.00 am, provided the flight leaves on time from Christchurch. Which means, we had to keep checking the status online till 11.30 pm and then, if things look right, come back prepared, all layered up at 2.00 am. We did fly off at 5.30 am. I don't want to recall our bus travel from McMurdo to the runway and then the wait time.. It was pretty bad considering, we were all so terribly drained out. The flight was smooth and I again slept like a baby.. C17 soon (5 hrs) brought us to Christchurch and we were back on the Earth!

The rest of the day we just relaxed in our hotel rooms, ate Thai food for lunch and a pizza (classic pepperoni flavored for Joseph and Tandoori Chicken flavored for me) for dinner. :)