And we're off...
I'm on wireless at the International Departures Terminal in the Cape Town Airport. We board the IL76-D2 in an hour or so, and we'll be on our way to Antarctica!
Our flight is listed 4th from the top! It's the only flight I've seen that lists a continent as the destination.
Here are the team members flying with me:
And here is the check in line:
It's a great mix of people (mostly men).
When I went through passport control, the officer was more interested in learning about our flight than in my passport. He asked how many countries were represented by my group, and I explained that there were actually quite a few different groups on the flight. My group only represents 3 countries, and only 2 on our flight. He was also interested in why there were so many Russians. I explained that the company organizing the flights was mostly Russian and that we will be landing very close to the Russian and Indian bases. I think he had a particularly large number of Russians in his line.
There are also people headed to Europe in the terminal. And just now, I got asked by a tourism survey-taker where I was headed. When I said "Antarctica", she said, "You're not on our list. We just noticed the flight once we got here." The survey is about the airport shops. I guess those of us headed to Antarctica probably aren't big shoppers for carved giraffes!
Our flight is listed 4th from the top! It's the only flight I've seen that lists a continent as the destination.
Here are the team members flying with me:
Valery, Vladimir, and Chris from left to right.
And here is the check in line:
It's a great mix of people (mostly men).
When I went through passport control, the officer was more interested in learning about our flight than in my passport. He asked how many countries were represented by my group, and I explained that there were actually quite a few different groups on the flight. My group only represents 3 countries, and only 2 on our flight. He was also interested in why there were so many Russians. I explained that the company organizing the flights was mostly Russian and that we will be landing very close to the Russian and Indian bases. I think he had a particularly large number of Russians in his line.
There are also people headed to Europe in the terminal. And just now, I got asked by a tourism survey-taker where I was headed. When I said "Antarctica", she said, "You're not on our list. We just noticed the flight once we got here." The survey is about the airport shops. I guess those of us headed to Antarctica probably aren't big shoppers for carved giraffes!
