Stunning Antarctic Photos on Flikr

Some great shots here, brought to my attention (as most great items are) by The Dark Lord Warren Ellis.

I was asked recently why I have this amazing fascination with Antarctica. Why my novel (still in rewrites, be patient with me) is set there. Why I have so much interest in our planet's floor-level freezer.

The answer is that I have no freaking idea whatsoever. It's the same reason why I love Tibet and the Himalayas. Perhaps it's because I know that I will never be able to see it firsthand myself, and I've always wanted to. The time for that would have been in my twenties, which feel like they were an entire lifetime ago now (and I'm not even forty yet).

There's just something appealing to me about a place where humans should not be able to go, yet they do, and accomplish amazing things. Something unspoiled and majestic about massive wonders of nature that no matter what we do, we can barely leave a scratch on the surface.

Say what you will about global warming and what it's doing to the Western Ice Sheets...but the continent is still going to be there, in one form or another, long after human beings are turning to carbon deep in the earth...