Ob Hill

I finally climbed Ob(servation) Hill three days ago. It was a beautiful day. The summit of Ob Hill is notoriously windy, but when we made it up there, the wind was calm and the air peaceful.

The hike itself is a strenuous 30-40 minute climb. There's loose rock that curmbles beneath your feet as you climb. At times I had to grab onto the rock to make sure I wouldn't fall. I'm sure that there are much more dangerous trails out there, but I haven't hiked many of them and so my vertigo would come and go as we went up.

Me towering over Mt. Erebus

From the peak, you can see everything there is to see: Mt. Erebus, the Transantarctic Mountains, Willie Field, LDB, Pegagus, the new Phoneix landing site, Black Island, and White Island. We looked down onto McMurdo and could even see distant black hills past Discovery Hut.

McMurdo from Ob Hill

I am perpetually amazed by how much the sea ice really looks like an ocean with turbulent waves being lit up by the sun. Off in the distance, we could also see a line of sea ice starting to break up and the cyan water beneath it starting to emerge. As summer continues, much of the sea ice in the Ross ice shelf will break up, allowing ships to land at McMurdo.

Ross Sea from Ob Hill