Happy Freakin' Camper

Current Temp Ambient:   14    Windchill:      7
Windspeed (knots):            4
Next Sunset:                      Feb 16 2012

For today's entry you get to hear all about my recent "Happy" Camper experience.  Happy Camper is an overnight snow school/survival course that everyone who is going out to the field is required to endure.  I took Happy Camper my first season, and after that we are just required to do a 4 hour lecture "push" or refresher course...unless you have been out of the program for 5+ years.  Yours truly falls into that 5+ years out of the program category, so I couldn't get away with just the push course.  Trust me, I tried!

Truth be told, I learned a lot in Happy Camper the first time around, things that have helped me enjoy regular camping and outdoor winter activities much more than I had in the past.  If nothing else, I learned this time around that I indeed retained that valuable knowledge.  Here are a few things I re-tained/learned:

1. Cotton is soft and lovely against your skin, like the 780 thread count Egyptian cotton sheets that I ordered on August 3rd and have yet to receive, for example.  But in the cold, especially if you are active, cotton is your enemy. Because it retains moisture, your sweat creates a nice cooling layer right against your skin.  This can lead to discomfort at best and hypothermia at worst.  So remember folks, go poly or wool.  Silk is better than cotton, but not by much in extreme cold.  
2. Don't be a complete idiot when your life is at risk.  Stop, take your time, and think about how to get yourself to safety as quickly as possible.  Think about the resources you have at your disposal and use them wisely.  Consult others in your group for good ideas and expertise.
3. Camping in the cold sucks and I have no idea why anyone would willingly do that to themselves.
4. Group scenario activities are a drag.
5. Just because someone has a Ph.D doesn't necessarily mean they have any common sense or will be useful in a crisis situation.  Trust the electrician.

Anyway, we got really lucky on the weather, so I actually had a great time shovelling, making snow blocks for our wall that we used to block the non-existent wind, melting snow to make water, and being in an absolutely beautiful place.

Here is a pic of where we were on the ice shefl, that's Mt. Erebus, our 12k ft volcano:

Here I am with Mt. Erebus in the background, proof that I was there:

This is the snow wall we built by sawing blocks out of the show on the ice shelf, popping them out with a shovel, and stacking them to about 3/4 the height of our mountaineering tents.  It took is several hours to get this done, there were 20 of us:

Here is the dining room (which, BTW, I designed, thank you very much, coming soon to Interior Designer's  Digest) and we all built together out of the remnants of our ice wall block quarry, complete with centerpiece flags and a sculpture that Justin made.  Notice the U shaped bench and the table in the middle where we ate our delicious MREs for dinner:

That is about it, I'll post more pics if anything awesome shows up from the other folks in the group.

Zisman warm, inside and OUT