Explorer bound for home at last

On my last morning in Antarctica I put on my well-worn gear for the final time – the parka, insulated overalls, boots and other extreme cold weather gear all must be returned to the United States Antarctic Program center in Christchurch, New Zealand. I have grown so accustomed to wearing these bulky clothes everywhere I go that they feel more like a second skin to me now, and I can hardly imagine walking around outside without them.

Most normal station activity halts as everyone, winter-overs and those of us flying out alike, prepares for the arrival of the C-17. We gather on the highest end of town and watch for the aircraft. We have only a small window of daylight for its arrival, and timing is critical. When it appears, we cheer, its small form seeming both tiny and striking as it slices through the dull pink light that dusts the mountains. “What happens if they really need to fly in during the winter, when there is no light at all?” I ask. “What if there’s some emergency?”

“There was a planned midwinter flight in 1967 for the purpose of bringing in a scientist,” one old Antarctic explorer and Bangor Daily News reader tells me. “We made runway lights by placing 55-gallon drums of gas along the prepared skyway and set them on fire.” For the sake of the winter-overs, I hope such measures do not have to happen.

The 90 of us who are leaving load onto a large terra bus, and we shuttle to the runway where the C-17 has landed. Here on the ice I am treated to the same wide, mesmerizing view of frozen mountains that I saw when I first landed at McMurdo Station half a year ago. This time, though, the expanse is colored in sunset.

I linger outside the plane, trying to soak up as much of it with my eyes as I can. I do not know whether I will be back again or not, but regardless, this picture will stay forever etched in my memory. I give my winter-over friends final hugs before climbing into the cargo hold, and a member of the Air Guard closes the door behind me – I am the last person to board the plane.

The close of a great adventure is always bittersweet. While I am sad to be leaving Antarctica, the joys of returning to a more hospitable land take on Alice-in-Wonderland-like proportions. When I step off the plane in New Zealand, I am accosted first and foremost by the moisture: I have been living at nearly zero humidity for six months, and I never realized that I had been missing the taste and smell of water in the air.

New smells, too, assail me. I had grown accustomed to nothing more than the frozen smell of ice, broken only by the odd waft of diesel or food cooking, and in the absence of anything else my senses have been sharpened. After my arrival in Christchurch, I go for a morning run in the city’s extensive botanical gardens. The smells of damp earth and thawed soil, of trees and grass and flowers, come welcome to my nose.

A light drizzle falls from the sky, rain slides on my bare forearms, and I realize that for the first time in many months, I do not have to worry about frostbite. Everything, the sounds of rain on windowpanes, traffic in the streets, the taste of fresh dairy, the feel of a T-shirt, seems fresh and new to me. These are things that I had forgotten to miss. Crisp, ripe apples have never tasted so good.

In a few days, I will be back in Maine. Though I have never been so far away, I have never felt closer to my home state than during these past six months in sharing my experiences with you every Friday. I went to Antarctica for the adventure of it, and adventure was exactly what I got. And, while such things are worthwhile completely in and of themselves, they gain something in the sharing. Here’s to the spirit of exploration and to curiosity about the world, and of course, to learning just how much we are all capable of achieving. Every day can be an adventure, when we take the time to discover and experience new things.

Meg Adams, who grew up in Holden and graduated from John Bapst Memorial High School in Bangor, has shared her Antarctic experiences with readers each Friday. For more about her adventure, information about Antarctica and to e-mail questions to her, go to the BDN Web site: bangordailynews.com