Polar Plunge

So every year over at the Kiwi base around midwinter time they have a little tradition.  They break out the chain saws, cut a hole in the ice, and people jump in.  It sounds insane because it IS! hahaha.   There is a little bit of safety built in. You have to wear a harness so they can attach a rope to you so if you croak they can drag you out I guess. The fire department was there with an ambulance just in case. Luckily nothing bad happened to anyone though. 

There were 2 different times to go over, 9am & 1pm.  I wanted to sleep in so I picked the later time to go and I payed the price. Apparently the morning wasn't too bad, but when I went over the wind was blowing like crazy.  I was getting harnessed up and the girl doing it said the wind was really picking up so we might be the last group to go before they shut it down.  "The wind is really picking up", is not something I was hoping to hear, but I was already ready to go so fuck it.  Stepping outside that little warming hut in nothing but tennis shoes and swim trunks was a whole new experience.  The water itself is way warmer than the temp outside so it didn't feel all that bad. Then you had to get the hell out! Holy shit! I walked over got a blanket wrapped around me and the stood there for about a month while the guy unhooked my harness. WOW!  Of course it wasn't your standard carabiner, it was one of the ones with the little nut that you tighten so it won't open, so it took him approximately weeks to undo that damn thing!  I got back inside the warming hut and oh my god, I was not too happy for a while.  I think I have poor circulation anyway because my hands and feet get cold pretty easily, then add that with what I had just done and wowzer!  My feet were so damn cold, I went and stood by the stove with the blanket around me but it didn't seem like it was doing any good.  After a few minutes my feet started going numb I think because they stopped hurting, but my fingers started hurt quite a bit.  Every now and then when it's cold I'll lose some circulation in a finger and it'll turn white. Normally it's not a big deal because it all goes back to normal pretty quickly.  This time I had 4 fingers at once do it, I've never seen or felt anything like it.   After a while I was able to get dried off and start getting dressed.  It took me a half hour to totally feel all my fingers again and close to an hour to get my feet back to normal.  I'm glad I did it so I can say I did it, but I'm never doing that shit again!  It makes me think of that sea ice runway I'll be departing from in several months. If that plane broke through, that would be the most excruciating death of all time! Fingers crossed!

Water Temp = 28
Air Temp = -18
Wind = 24mph
Windchill = -48!!

The hole of turture...

 The "warming hut"...

This is me taking my jump in.  I got someone in the warming hut to record me so it's not exactly the best video since it's being taken through a window.  It was freakin ridiculous! 

I took these pics probably 10 or so minutes after the dunk but my fingers were still white and hurt...

 My pointer finger had just turned pink again before I took this pic...