We ran our third successful profiling misison yesterday and decided to take Sunday off. We saw a movie last night and woke up late today. Chris and Kristof made a great breakfast of pancakes, eggs, sausage and biscuits. We drove to lake Bonney camp – a stunningly beautiful 20 min drive by ATV.
Lake Bonney camp is a much nicer camp than ours – there is plenty of room to sit, even a couch, and lots of nice food. We will be taking solar showers today – our first shower in more than two weeks. The idea is to fill a big bag that has a tap with water, hang it from somewhere in a big tent, stand in a polymer tub and “shower”, and then dump the water from the tub into the big grey-water drum.
It is great to sit back and relax after so many eventful days!
Getting ready to drive to Bonney camp. Leah (in the back), Bill (in driver's seat), Maciej (standing).
Mountain seen on the way to Bonney camp.
Approaching Bonney camp.
Kristof digging up the lake ice to obtain water for shower.
Bill making pies.
Chris and Kristof pointing to the shower bag. This bag is hung upside down and has a tap.
Maciej.
Maciej, Leah, Bill and Kristof.
Where do you guys and girls go to the bathroom?
There is no way to put this euphemistically, so here it goes. The idea here is to not leave anything behind, and that includes human waste. So we pee in pee-bottles that are emptied into a big drum that will later be shipped off Antarctica. At the end of our stay, we will wash our pee-bottles in a basin at the field center in McMurdo and return the bottles (we have 2 bottles each). We poo in a pseudo-toilet in a Scott tent. The toilet is essentially a big trash bag that has to be emptied periodically into another big drum. Kristof says that he has pictures to show you when he gets back. It sounds strange, but one quickly gets used to it.
Thanks Shilpa, for your answer and Kristof did show me photos of the set up. After all, these are things that need to be included in the planning of an expedition like yours. 🙂 I enjoyed reading all of your blogs. They reassured me that all was well and my boy was in no danger but rather doing great research with a group of wonderful people.
Maria