The first time, you go for the adventure. The second time, you go for the money. The third time, you go because you don’t fit in anywhere else.

My first Antarctic adventure fell neatly between settling in Colorado and starting university there as an in-state student (and, of course, it provided a bit of tuition money). The second time was for a longer deployment, which also paid better than the engineering job I had in Christchurch at the time (still, it felt quite adventuresome due to the commitment of a South Pole winter). When I applied for my current role with Antarctica New Zealand, I was on the way out the door from a tech job that I had held for about 7 years and felt entirely burned out by; a few months later when the offer came through, I wasn’t doing much other than training for a climbing project and a bit of volunteer trapping. Whether being an aspirational climbing bum is fitting in, I guess is a fair question!

Over the years, I’ve come to appreciate that these sort of big trips often change priorities, so there’s some risk of disappointment if they’re approached with too much of a plan for what will come after. This deployment will only be for a couple months, and while it will definitely be an adventure with plenty of new challenges and things to learn, and it will provide me with a bit of income, at this stage I feel like a plan for afterward might be a good idea. For now though, there’s more immediate stuff to do - I’m writing this on the way to Christchurch for a few days of training!