The South Pole Telescope!!! Note the new backing frame on the back of the telescope; we are adding a ~1 meter wide guard ring around the telescope this season for SPTpol.

At Pegasus airfield (on Ross Sea Ice Shelf) waiting for my plane to South Pole. 

The toilet was behind a few pallets of cargo, so the ladies on the plane had to scale it to go to the bathroom.  Men had a funnel up front that they could pee into. 

There was some important cargo on the plane to Pole: an old Nintendo 8-bit game console!

Here is a broader picture of the plane, note the cargo netting seats on the side.

Half-way through installing the guard ring backing/supports on the telescope. 

See the guy climbing around in the guard ring backing/supports, our very own John Carlstrom, perilously hanging dozens of feet off the ground.  

A closeup of the guard ring backing/supports.

I've arrived at the South Pole!  I've been here for 3 nights and 4 days, but havent had much time to blog.  We've been very busy doing some final tests with the SPT-SZ receiver, mainly trying to get the SPTpol readout and telescope control software / interface working better.  At night Carlstrom has been working with a team of iron-workers to install the new guard ring on SPT, its coming along well but probably wont be completely finished until ~Jan 1st.  We've also been unpacking and assembling the SPTpol focal plane, more pictures of that coming soon, need to stop now before the satellite goes down!