Just back from New Zealand, where I attended the 2012 Annual Workshop of the Snow and Ice Research Group (NZ) held in Twizel, New Zealand. What a trip! (See the forthcoming report in ICE for more details.) This means that during the first year of my term as IGS president, I've attended meetings in La Jolla, California, Cambridge, UK, Oslo, Norway, Grenoble, France and now Twizel, New Zealand. The things I've learned at these meetings would have made my head spin, if it were not already spinning from the jet lag.

On my way to and from Twizel (located in the shadow of Aoraki/Mt. Cook), I passed through Christchurch. It was very disturbing to see the damage and suffering that the residents of Christchurch went through as a result of the recent earthquakes. However, I was delighted to have a "flat white" and a bit of shopping at the "container mall" on Cashel Street.

A free day at the end of the trip allowed me to see the blue penguins at the Antarctic Centre in the outskirts of Christchurch. Photos and a video are attached.

Doug MacAyeal

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Just attended the 16th Alpine Glaciology Meeting in Zurich. These meetings are so productive and informative. The AGM is based on the same concept as the Northwest Glaciologists meetings in the US and Canada. As a young student at University of Washington in Seattle, under Charlie Raymond, we used to travel to Vancouver and Tacoma for those meetings every year, different venue every year. 
It was a great opportunity to meet up with fellow students and the famous names in glaciology like Barclay Kamb, Garry Clarke and Mark Meier and many others. It was a great opportunity for students to practise their presentation skills and learn how to answer probing questions from such greats as Barclay. Once you leaned how to respond to a question from Barclay Kamb you could handle anything. 30 years later these meetings are just as vibrant and stimulating and the students are still taking their first steps in the demanding world of public speaking.

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