Early this morning I got a call from Raytheon. I went to get fitted for all my gear today, instead of tomorrow. Looks like there will be some weather issues with leaving on Jan. 3rd so I have been bumped up to leave on the 2nd. That means about 9am tomorrow I will be headed down to McMurdo Station.

McMurdo is on the coast of Antarctica and is the major base for the United States Antarctic Program (USAP). Over a 1000 people are stationed there this time of year. I should only be at McMurdo for a few days, but it will still be exciting. There are several labs to tour and I might even see some penguins.

2009 has arrived in New Zealand. It is weird to think that most people still have a whole day left of 2008 at home. I’ll have pictures and updates about Christchurch tomorrow, but right now its time to get some sleep.

Happy New Year!

Just arrived at the hotel in Christchurch, New Zealand. I left Boston at 10:00am Dec. 28th and arrived here at 10:30am Dec. 30th. Quite the journey, but it went pretty smoothly, no major issues. I should definitely give a shout out to Qantas airlines. Hands down it was the most comfortable flight I have ever taken. The 13+ hours went by pretty quick.

Its 85 deg and sunny here in Christchurch. Pretty warm compared to the -6 deg at the pole. The next few days should be pretty relaxed, just exploring Christchurch and getting issued my cold weather gear. Over New Years I have arranged to meet up with some people from couchsurfing.com It will be my first experience with other couch surfers, but hopefully it works out.

I have also added a travel map at the very top of the web page. This map will show all the places I have been. Give it a look here

Thanks to everyone that has subscribed over the last week or so. The site is almost completely up and running. Just a few more bugs to work out. There will be some cool new features as well. One of which will be a page with a Google map that shows every place I have been in my journey.

Hopefully starting later this week I will get to start posting on a daily basis about my experiences. If there is something you want me to talk about, just leave a comment. In a few weeks I will try and write a couple of posts on the science behind IceCube and what we are actually doing at the South Pole.

In the meantime, I am graduating college tomorrow. Those of you who have talked to me over the last couple of days know it was a little touch and go near the end, but everything has been worked out and I will actually be graduating tomorrow. After graduation I am going back to Boston until I leave for New Zealand on Dec. 28th. Look forward to more posts soon!