Observation Hill

Shaped like a nearly perfect pyramid, Observation Hill (Ob Hill) stands 800' tall on the very western tip of Ross Island.

High-altitude nacreous clouds from the shoulder of Ob Hill.  The clouds had the trademark pearlescent hue, but I was unable to capture it shooting directly into the sun.

Looking east, over Castle Rock (center) towards Mt. Erebus.  Scott's men used the pass along the base of Castle Rock in their expeditions on Ross Island to reach Cape Crozier, about 40 miles away on the eastern point of the island.

The crest of Ob Hill, looking south - the direction from which Scott and his polar exploration team were expected to return.  Members of Scott's Ross Island party would climb Observation Hill (so named) each day in an anxious attempt to spot their return. 

When it was learned in November, 1912, that Scott and his team of 4 men had died on the ice shelve 8 months prior, the Ross Island party erected this cross in the memory of  Edward Wilson, Henry Bowers, Lawrence Oates and Edgar Evans.  Still faintly visible are the men's names and the words from Tennyson's Ulysses  "To strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield".   (As I write this post, 100 years ago today, on December 14, Roald Amundsen and his team of Norwegian explorers were the first to successfully reach The Pole, beating Scott and his men to the prize by 5 weeks.)

Across McMurdo Sound to the north:  the Asgard Range, Commonwealth Glacier, and its icebergs frozen in the sea ice.

McMurdo Station.  Faintly visible on the small finger of land at top left is Hut Point and Scott's hut from his Discovery expedition.

The Ob Hill trail had been covered with deep ice and snow, obscuring its path down the steep slope.  As I was contemplating the best route down, to my right was this open slope down to the base of the hill.  Before you begin to think to yourself...  yes...   I did...  Shortly after this picture and a few ill-conceived steps were taken, I began my uncontrollable slide to the rock field below.

Thankfully (miraculously...) I stopped short just a few feet short of the volcanic rocks in the center of the hill (those are my footsteps the rest of the way down).  It was a about this time I saw a fire truck slowly coming up the pass towards me.  I later learned a number of people in town saw my slide and had called the fire department, telling them someone fell off Ob Hill.  I guess seeing me no worse for wear, they turned back around.

"Well... It seemed like a good idea at the time..."

Looking back.  It took me over 30 minutes to climb up, and about 3 minutes to come down.

"Ten Feet Tall and Bullet Proof"