Friday January 11: Life in USH

Last night I managed to connect with No-Neck, the other guy who was trying to hitchhike his way to Antarctica. Sadly, he didn't make it, and he is giving up for now. We went out to dinner, where he shared his plan to apply for the artist-in-residence grants that most Antarctic research stations offer. Might be a good strategy. But for now, Antarctica is off his radar, and he's focusing on what's next. If my beef-overdosed mind recalls correctly, he's headed to Brazil or Peru. And that can't be bad.

Some nice big bruises are showing up on my thighs, right at "table height." When the seas are even a little high in the Drake Passage, you get tossed around a lot. And if the tossing isn't too bad, you usually stop when your thighs run into a desk, table or counter. Still, we seem to be getting off very easily, weather-wise.

I also have multiple nice cuts on my shins, thanks to the one-foot high bases across the bottom of the Shokalskiy's waterproof doors ("hatches," to the sailors out there). You would think I would learn to take the hatches slowly, but no, it doesn't seem to work that way. They could at least vary the bottoms of the hatches from deck to deck, so I wouldn't keep thrashing the exact same spot on each shin....

One of my shipmates claims that she was bounced up in the air right out of her bed 2 nights ago, and landed cleanly on the adjacent desk, where she awoke. Impressive!

Javier and his girlfriend Elsa whipped up a traditional Argentinian parrilla (BBQ) today, for all the guests of the Martin Fierro B&B.



The amount of meat and wine was astounding. Nearly a full bottle of wine per person. And more meat than you need to eat in a month! Still, at one point one of the other B&B guests leaned over to me and said, "This is awesome!!" And he is right, it was. It may take me 3 days to digest all that meat. But it will take longer than that to forget the warm, friendly vibe and the good conversation around Javier's dining room table. Good stuff!