>> Well, when I first heard
about the trip
was through Mr. Botella,
>> Chileans have been sending
students to Antarctica
over 10 years,
and they want to share
this experience and they invited
the United States.
>> Just like the thought of
going to Antarctica was totally
like, mind boggling.
>> The National Science
Foundation gets involved
in trying to send us down there.
>> One of the flights, I just,
all of a sudden, I was like, oh,
my gosh, we're going to Chile.
When I wake up,
there's gonna be mountains.
I think the first thing
that maybe hit me was that all
of the signs were in Spanish.
>> Yeah, we're in a different
part of the world now.
>> I think it was arriving in
Santiago when Spanish exploded
all around them, I think that's
when it actually hit them.
>> We ran into some of
the students that we were
going to be working with.
In Chile, you greet people
by kissing them on the cheek.
It definitely startled me when
these students came up to me
and started kissing me.
>> It's just like, whoa, really
close contact really fast.
>> I can't even, like, even
believe how far south we are.
We got into Punta Arenas
in the evening.
>> The very southern-most tip
of Chile.
Every meal we'd all be
pretty much at the same table.
>> That was, I think the moment
for me, when it really hit
like Oh, we're here
and we are going to be doing
cool stuff,
and these are the cool people
that we're going to be
hanging out with.
>> It was funny, because Anna
is much better at understanding
other people talk,
and I'm a little bit better
at speaking, so we were like
the perfect team.
>> Big, fat, mama llama.
[laughter]
>> Somebody would say something,
and I would tell Claire
what it would mean,
and then she would respond.
>> So, I'm a Girl Scout.
[translating]
I brought down a case of cookies
to share with them,
because I thought that'd be fun.
>> Oh!
>> They were so excited.
They thought, you know, they
had this image of girl scouts
in uniforms selling cookies,
and they thought that
only existed in movies.
They were like,"You're real?
This is awesome!"
>> I want to be a girl scout!
[laughter]
>> Right away, we were really
busy with going to different
events...
>> The goal was to go
to Antarctica and have them
do science along with
real researchers.
>> So, we did some lab work
at INOCH, which is the
Chilean Antarctic Institute,
which was supposed to be
in preparation for what we were
going to do in Antarctica,
so that was some protein work
with plants.
That was an interesting
experience, too, just because
it was all in Spanish.
>> You could tell, even though
there was a language barrier,
our interest kind of gapped
that area.
>> The day we were in the lab,
was the day people
started getting sick.
>> When I first got sick,
it was just like, dang,
I better get better
before we go the next day.
>> I didn't think it was
a problem, because I thought
you know, an American stomach
in a foreign country, it's okay.
We're just going to hydrate
him, and he's going to be fine.
>> Multiple other girls
were starting to get sick,
and we had to go to
a hospital there.
Because we were sick,
we couldn't endanger
the researchers there,
so we had to be...
They wouldn't let us go
to Antarctica, pretty much.
>> We were--
I was really disappointed.
>> It was pretty devastating.
>> After a couple hours,
I was like, oh, we're gonna
have a good time anyway.
>> They said, well, since you
might not be coming back,
we should make a Plan B
for you guys to still have
a great time.
>> We went to Torres del Pine
National Park.
>> It has these crazy jagged
mountains with like waterfalls,
and stuff.
>> It was really windy.
>> Like the windiest
I've ever felt.
We we were leaning
into the wind,
and it was pushing us back.
>> We spent an entire day there.
It was gorgeous.
>> I think I saw 30-40
new types of birds.
I'm really into birds.
>> We went to a penguin colony
on an island
in the Strait of Magellan.
>> Obviously, it wasn't
our main goal for the trip,
but we were all thinking,
you know, we can't go home
with out seeing penguins.
>> That's like the symbol of
the trip, like seeing penguins,
so when we saw that,
it was like,
we still saw penguins.
[laughs]
>> It was super cool.
>> The penguins were adorable.
I took so many videos
of them walking,
just their little...
>> As the trip was wrapping up,
we kind of did
a little bit of a look back
on the trip.
>> We were able to definitely
turn it around and have
a great view of what we did
accomplish on the trip.
>> They learned
about themselves.
They learned about science.
They learned
about different cultures.
>> So, yeah, it was definitely
kind of eye opening,
like this is sort of what
I want to do when I am older.
>> We did learn a bit
of science.
We learned about culture.
And it was really awesome.
>> We were at the National Park
and I was telling Juan,
as far as school field trips go,
A-plus!