READERS ON THE ROAD: Biologist voyages around southern continent
A two-week sea cruise usually conjures images of sunny, tropical skies and warm nights sipping rum drinks by the pool.
That wasn't Alicia Burtner's experience at all.
The Butler native returned March 13 — just before the United States went on lockdown — from a voyage around Antarctica.
The southern continent was filled with rock, ice and penguins, not palm trees and cabanas.
Burtner, a fish biologist with the federal Department of Energy in Maryland, is a 2004 graduate of Butler Area Senior High School and the daughter of Darrell and Paula Burtner of Butler.“I wanted to go. It was on my bucket list of things to do. Time and opportunity lined up and I took it,” Burtner said.“It just worked out that I could do this and I had a chance to do this,” she said. “For some reason people didn't understand why I would do this.”Burtner said she went alone because it was hard to find a travel buddy willing to commit that much time and money for a trip to the bottom of the world.<i>This is an excerpt from a larger article that appeared in Sunday's Butler Eagle. Subscribe online or in print to read the full article and learn more about Burtner's trip.</i>
