AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH!

Late in the day Thursday I received an email that I had been selected for Room With A View, a half-day snow-machine trip to Mt. Erebus where you get just above the peninsula to see the open ocean beyond. Well, they had sent me the email close to the end of the day, last minute.

So I showed up to the SSC on Friday dressed in full ECW gear and ready for the trip, only to find that I was an alternate. This wasn't a bad thing, as I did not even know how my name got put on the list in the first place. Since all eight other participants had shown up, I as told that I would be guaranteed a spot on the next trip on Saturday.

I went back to work, checking my email through the rest of the evening. Nothing. I checked my email Saturday morning. Nothing. I sent an email, saying I was told I would be going but that I had not yet received a new notice of when to meet and that I did not know if I was still on the list.

I received a reply later on saying that I was on the list and that I should meet up in the SSC as last time. Gee, thanks for reminding me.

We rode a van down to where the snow machines were parked and got on, two to a machine except for the two who were too large to share. The experience was not bad, but I did not really see why everyone else gets so excited. The ride was a little bumpy and sometimes the machine tried to wander one way or another but otherwise it was just a ride.

It was a NICE ride, but still.

We drove 15 miles out of station and 1400ft up Mt Erebus. We were nowhere near the top, but we did have a better view of it, up close. I think I was told the peak of Mt Erebus is 23 miles out of McMurdo.

We hung around up there, enjoying the view for a while. It got a little dull just standing there killing time, but everyone with a camera took photos and we played with a football and several frisbees. I toyed with my camera and figured out how to make it take High-Speed photographs in rapid succession.

The view was great. From as high up as we were we could see even more endless sea ice than before. I could see up the arm of the Ross Peninsula back to Scott Base, down the Erebus Tongue Glacier, or up to the open ocean north of McMurdo.

Several of the earlier trips this season had cloudy weather, blocking any views.

On the way up I drove, but on the run back I rode as a passenger.

I have decided I NEVER want to be the passenger on a snow machine ever again.

The machine bounced around so much I was afraid I might go flying out of my seat (I almost slide backwards of it several times). It was white-knuckle all the way down the hill. It did not help that the driver would slow down to put some distance between us and the next machine, then floor it. When I was driving we never got past 30kph. With my partner we were getting up to 60kph on his 'catch-ups'. He also accelerated into bumps, trying to get air.

I kept trying to think of how would be the best 'crash position' to assume should I fall off, though the situation never presented itself and I was not crazy enough (yet) to jump off on my own.

I enjoyed the trip out but not the trip back, as it definitely scared the flying monkeys out of me.