April 13 - Settling into Palmer

Got up around 7:30 and had to hurry up to catch breakfast. Except, there was no breakfast. On days when the LMG is at the pier, it is "serve-your-own-breakfast" -- there is no hot breakfast, just bread, cereals, milk and coffee.  Actually that is not a big deal for me since cereal or bread is what I have for breakfast anyway.

After breakfast, we starting unpacking our equipment into our designated laboratory space and generally setting up shop in the lab. The weather was really cold and windy with some rain, hail and snow all mixed together. The sun did peak out for a few minutes and I took some pictures of PS from the top of the hill.

View of PS from the top of the hill

PS galley

 A large iceberg that drifted in overnight and blocked the inlet to PS!

Got done at the lab by around 5 PM, had dinner and headed back to my room. The plan was to get together with people in the lounge and the bar later in the night.  Had bought a bottle of Macallan from Santiago airport, which I promptly deposited at the bar. Saw a very nice french movie "The Intouchables" -- a must see if you have not seen it -- and hung out with folks at the bar.

A view of my room.

Interestingly, the bar in PS gives new meaning to scotch on the rocks. They go down to the water and get a chunk of floating glacier ice -- some of it might be thousands of years old and might have fallen as snow when mammoths roamed in North America! Well, they put a big block of this ice on the balcony of the bar and when you need some, you just go out and break off a chunk with a icepick.  12 year Macallan with glacial ice!

Macallan with Glacier Ice