A warm welcome

Returning from the Antarctic, Peter Vosotas had to wait to find out the Bucs had won the Super Bowl.

By BRUCE LOWITT, Times Staff Writer
© St. Petersburg Times
published January 29, 2003

Call it Bucs luck. The old version, when the most absurd possibility was guaranteed to become reality. Peter Vosotas, after suffering through, and occasionally celebrating, about 450 Bucs games, was on an icebreaker in the Antarctic when he learned the Bucs were in the Super Bowl.

The game wasn't on television on the Akademik Ioffe, 7,350 miles south-southwest of San Diego.

Vosotas, 61, is president and chairman of Nicholas Financial, a Clearwater-based lending company, and a seasoned traveler. About four years ago, "when I could begin to see the physical remainder of my life in somewhat more finite terms, I thought of this, such an outrageous thing to do, to see if I can step on every continent," he said. Seeing the IMAX film Shackelton's Antarctic Adventure and reading about it established his destination.

The trip -- flights from Clearwater to Miami, then to Buenos Aires and to Ushuaia, Argentina, the southernmost city in the world -- began Jan.17, two days before the Bucs beat the Eagles in the NFC Championship Game. By kickoff he was aboard the Akademik Ioffe and basically incommunicado. He sent a few e-mails but received none.

And with phone calls costing about $20 a minute, he kept short the one he made home to his wife, Paula. The conversation, he said, went something like this:

"Hello?"

"The Bucs beat Philadelphia!"

"Okay. I love you, dear. I miss you terribly. Goodbye."

When he got to the ship's bar, he said, the few people who cared asked him who Tampa Bay would be playing. He didn't know. Most of them figured it wouldn't be Oakland.

The Russian crew on the Akademik Ioffe, few of whom understood English, didn't know what to make of him. Neither did most of the people on the tour. All but seven were from somewhere on the other side of the globe.

"They thought I was nuts," he said. "They didn't even know what the Super Bowl was."

One thing he did plan: When he got there, the whale, seal and penguin population at the Antarctic peninsula was going to know about the Bucs. He brought along a red scarf given out at a home game. He raised it on one of the ship's halyards and carried it across glaciers.

Paula was at a Super Bowl party Sunday.

"I don't think Peter ever thought of this when he planned this trip. He'd been planning it for most of last year. Who'd have ever dreamed ... ?"

During the return flight Monday from Ushuaia to Buenos Aires, Vosotas finally found out the Bucs were -- winning. A couple had been watching the game in Argentina and had fallen asleep with Tampa Bay ahead 34-3 in the third quarter. Vosotas did the math. Being a longtime fan, he wasn't positive the Bucs had won.

When he got to Buenos Aires, he paid $4 for Monday's International Herald Tribune, went to the sports section and read a pregame feature. The game had ended after deadline.

When he did get the final score, he said, "I was overwhelmed. I had no idea. ... The suspense was fun."