A much more productive day. The bottleneck had been getting cargo off the ship and onto the ice, so I took over the coordination of that today, and it really helped to have a scientific liaison to the crew to facilitate this process. The ship’s crew is great at their job, and can lift heavy loads with their huge cranes with high precision…. But they don’t necessarily know what needs to be moved and where. So with me effectively taking on the role of deckhand, we got tons of equipment and supplies put down on the ice to supply the working hands for the coming days. Then this evening the mom and cub showed up again. Meandering across the ice and right through Met City where we had been about 20 minutes prior. They walked the power line and messed with an ice sensor. Then across camp and over to examine one of our power boxes. They hung out right next to the ship, providing amazing photo opportunities… the cub still grunting all the time as it had before. These are the same bears that have been around both ships for the past week. And as cute as they are, we let them get too close and too comfortable with our presence….
