My whole adventure started with a phone call on a Saturday morning. I was planning my thesis defense for the next Tuesday, when I saw that my cousin David had left a message for me. David is a professional mountain guide who travels the world each year to guide in Antarctica, Alaska, and the Himalayas. A year ago he had been asked by Adventure Network International, the company he guided for on Vinson Massif in Antarctica, if he would like to join them on a first-ever “climb cruise” to the Antarctic peninsula. This area of the continent has literally a jillion mountains that are accessible during the austral summer by sea, and ANI thought that it’d be a unique opportunity to get some first ascents in a truly beautiful place. David said he’d give it some thought, but the next day Alex Lowe, with whom he’d recently climbed in Antarctica, called him and said he was going to be head guide, and he’d really like David there. David, like everyone else, loved Alex, and so it didn’t take much thought to make the decision to go. Sadly, Alex was killed this past autumn in an avalanche on Shishapangma. In fact, the only thing I’d actually heard about this trip before that Saturday morning phone call was that it was something David had really been looking forward to until Alex’s death.

Not knowing the gift he was about to present to me, my conversation with David went something like, “How are you, how was Vinson this year, when’s that cruise starting…” and he slips it in like he’s not saying something really amazing, “say, if you want to come, there’s room on the ship. It’d be free, you’d just have to get to Ushuaia by Wednesday night….” I had a brief moment of insanity where I thought, “But I just bought a ticket to go to New York next week, too bad…” before I came to my senses and heard an inner voice (I’m pretty sure) say “GO TO ANTARCTICA AT ALL COSTS.” The only problem was that for me to be there Wednesday night, I had to leave on Tuesday at noon, which was the exact same time I was supposed to be defending my thesis. My thesis? What’s that? I can move that! I started scheming a way to convince my committee that coming in and letting me defend at 9 am was a great idea, but it turned out I didn’t need to go that far, because I came home from brunch on Sunday morning to learn that David had called and said getting there Thursday night would be fine. And that was it! Minutes later I was out buying GoreTex and fleece and polypro sock liners (not things you need in LA very often), splurging on things like polarized sunglasses and a new zoom lens for my camera. Credit be damned! I’m going to Antarctica!

Antarctica? my committee said. As they signed my documentation and shook my hand on Tuesday afternoon, one member handed me back his copy of my dissertation and said, “Here, take this to the South Pole.” It was heartening to know that he liked it so much, he wanted me to take it to the other side of Earth! “Get this thing away from me!” No, I’M going to get away from IT. And off I went!

The flight down to Buenos Aires was smooth, and I had plenty of time to sit and do nothing in the regional airport while I waited for my flight to Ushuaia. David had said to look out for some of his guiding friends who’d be on the flight, and here came they came, unmistakable from their wiry frames, windburned faces, and bizarre senses of humor. These were to be the guides who would help David support the clients who came on the ship to climb. Following closely on their heels were more people who we’d be cruising with, a team of seven who were going to film themselves skiing and snowboarding virgin Antarctic territory. They definitely made an impression right away, starting a chin-up contest on the shuttle to the airplane which almost ended with a broken rail and a few angry Argentines. This is going to be fun, I said to myself.

We arrived in Ushuaia on time, and I followed the guys (and one woman, Natalie, who was accompanying the ski group with her brother, Doug) down to baggage, where I learned I should never again be self-conscious about packing too much, as I watched these people pull several thousand kilos of bags and skis and gear off the belt and try to cram it into this poor van that ANI had brought down for them. I was traveling light, comparatively, so when my uncle Ron, David’s father, who was also coming on the cruise, arrived to claim me, we threw my stuff in a cab and took off for the Hotel Canal Beagle. Our first meeting as a group of people going on this cruise started a few hours later at the Cap Polonio, nearby (everything’s nearby in Ushuaia). Over vino tinto and finger snacks we learned about the ship we’d be traveling on, the Akademik Shuleykin, and about some of the people who’d be organizing our trip for us in the next few weeks.