Ainley and his researchers had enclosed one breeding group, a subcolony, within an orange plastic fence. The members of this subcolony were only able to leave and return to their nests via a bridge encircled with an electronic hoop. Ainley had outfitted the penguins with passively interaged transponders (PITS). Invented for Bay Bridge commuters as a way to pay in advance but not yet put into use, these Rice Krispy-sized gizmos are inserted under the skin of the penguins’ backs with a syringe. Each time a penguin in the fenced colony went over the bridge and through the magnetic field of the hoop, it was automatically weighed and identified. A computer was stored in a mountain tent outside the breeding colony, near the bridge. Once a day the researchers downloaded the data.

As the data was being downloaded, new data couldn’t be gathered, so someone had to sit in the tent (where she would be as unobtrusive as possible) and visually track the departing and entering penguins, reading their tag numbers with a pair of binoculars. One particularly cold afternoon, Hester and Nevins gave me this job. I was thrilled to be stationed smack in the middle of the colony, just feet from the stone nests, parent penguins, and fuzzy butterball chicks.

A storm was coming in that day, and it was cold, even with the tent protecting me from the bitter wind. I wore expedition-weight long underwear, a full-length thick fleece suit over that, wind pants with bib, a fleece jacket, the biggest down parka, bunny boots, two hats, a fleece neck gaiter, and gloves. It began to snow and the temperature was dropping.

But mere cold didn’t keep Nevins or Hester from their long day of data-gathering. That evening I accompanied Hester to the top of a hill near camp where we gathered more data on foraging penguins, using telemetry.

At the top of the hill, Hester set up a crude-looking antenna that was attached to the center of a hand-drawn compass on a wooden disk. A few of the Adélies had tiny radio transmitters attached to them. Each morning and evening, the researchers used the antenna in an attempt to locate these penguins. Setting her radio to each individual transmitter-toting penguin’s "channel," Hester slowly swung the antenna 360 degrees in hopes of picking up a signal. When she got one, she would take a reading off the compass at the base of the antenna. Simultaneously, Ainley’s other researchers were doing the same thing at Cape Bird and Inclusion Hill. If other researchers got signals from the same birds, they could use triangulation to determine the birds’ exact locations.

This data helps Ainley discover where and how the Adélies forage. He is particularly interested in finding out how much the foraging areas of penguins from different colonies overlap. Is colony size regulated by how close the colonies are to one another? By the amount of food available during the chick-rearing period? So far, Ainley reports, "We’ve found there’s an overlap among smaller colonies, but not where the big colonies forage. It’s like the degree to which you want to stand in line shopping."

I had already accompanied Nevins and Hester to the top of Telemetry Hill several times, and my job was to record the data. When an Adélie was found, they read out the geographic location, the strength of the signal (which indicated how close the bird was), and whether or not the signal was broken (indicating that the bird was diving). Wearing my massive mittens, I couldn’t get a grip on the pencil stub; so for every entry in the data log, I had to pull off a glove and mitten, write, and then suit my hands right back up. Still, the view was worth every numb-fingered moment. I could see into the distance beyond the big crack in the sea ice, and all the way to the open water. On the day before, which had been clear, we had spotted the Polar Star, the Coast Guard icebreaker that was working its way toward McMurdo, clearing a path so that a resupply tanker could make it in before the end of the season.

But this evening was a little scary with its gusting winds, gray pallor, and engulfing cold. Even Hester seemed spooked by the time we finished gathering the data. To the south were two islands, Black Island and White Island, set like gemstones in the Ross Ice Shelf. The gap between them indicated due south. It is said that when you see a storm in this gap, the system will hit McMurdo in about twenty minutes. I gave it another twenty to reach Cape Royds. As we packed up, the gap between the two islands became totally white, filled with an incoming storm.

We hastened back to the tents a little nervously. It was very cold. By the time we reached the polar hut, it was gusting up to fifty knots at twenty below. I worried about all those penguin chicks, but did not mention such worries to the scientists. I do know that penguins are adapted to this climate. Still, I’m sure they’d rather not be blasted by frigid winds.

My tent was very noisy, shuddering and banging all night, but I was cozy inside with my expedition gear, including both insulite and thermarest pads, a heavyweight sleeping bag, a fleece liner, and many layers of clothes. At least if my tent blew down, finding my way to the polar hut would be easy in the Antarctic’s perennial daylight. In the morning, I awoke to see that although the tent still stood, the storm had blown out all of the sea ice north of the crack we had visited just a few days before.

All too soon, a helicopter arrived to take me back to McMurdo Station, where I would spend New Millennium’s Eve. There was a big party at Scott Base, the New Zealand station a few kilometers away, and the carpenters’ shop in McMurdo was also throwing a smaller party. These parties, I later learned, made most of the major television networks around the world, but I didn’t attend either one. Instead, I took off on skis at about 9:00 p.m. with my friends Robbie and Peggy, bound for Castle Rock.

We arrived at the base of the huge rock at about 11:30 and climbed into the new millennium to the music of a didgeridoo being played by a Search and Rescue employee atop the rock. At midnight the handful of us kissed and cheered with the Antarctic continent spread out around us. It was a perfect night, and as we skied home, there was a hint of a sunset with tinges of pink and yellow in the powder-blue sky. A few devastatingly beautiful clouds floated in the west, with three horizontal clouds hovering in front of Mount Erebus, casting lovely shadows on the mountain’s glaciers. Our route home took us near Scott Base, so Peggy, Robbie, and I stopped, hoping to catch the tail end of the party. But we seemed to be the only revelers still awake. I fell into bed at 4:00 a.m. thinking that I couldn’t have dreamt up a better way to celebrate.

In town, everyone was talking about the arrival of the icebreaker, which I had glimpsed from Telemetry Hill at Cape Royds. McMurdo is hemmed in by ice, occasionally year-round. The Polar Star cuts a path from the open sea into Winter Quarters Bay so that the resupply vessel, the Greenwave, can make it to the continent later in the season, as can the National Science Foundation research vessel, the Nathaniel B. Palmer, affectionately known as the Natty P.

Commander Steve Wheeler, from Alameda, is in charge of overseeing the operations of all vessels coming to the American station. I volunteered to be a member of his line-handling crew so I could get a firsthand view of the big ships when they arrived. First, though, a lot more ice had to blow out. "I’m the only guy in town who welcomes bad weather," Wheeler told me. "Storms blow out the ice, and that’s a good thing for the vessels." The one storm that had struck while I was at Cape Royds blew out seventeen miles of sea ice.

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