Wow, this time machine sucked. 18,000 BC is 20,000 years ago.
So, first off, I've been sent off to an ice age. You want climate change baby, I've got it in spades.
This period of time, referred to by geologists as the Quarternary Glaciation, was an ice age lasting from about 110,000 to 12,000 years ago. In fact, about 20,000 years ago is precisely when (give or take a few hundred years) scientists have put for the "Last Glacial Maximum"). For where I will go -- I will choose an equatorial location because much of the northern hemisphere is covered in ice for long periods. It is estimated that in the winter, the ocean would be iced to south of Los Angeles on the West Coast, and to the Carolinas on the East Coast. (image below). Because so much water is locked up in ice (mainly in North America, Europe and Asia), sea levels are much lower -- like an estimated 280 feet lower. Rainfall is also scarcer, and desert areas much larger.
Average temperatures worldwide are an estimated 10 degrees cooler Celsius. Which is, errr, more in Fahrenheit.
Homo sapiens do exist, having evolved approximately 200,000 years ago. Neanderthals also exist, of course, durign this timeframe. They live primarily in Europe, Africa, Asia and Australia, but only the southern regions of Europe and Asia being habitable.
We are in the stone age. People can make tools and weapons out of stone, bone, animal hide and plant fiber. Fire does exist, but the locals dont' seem able to make pots out of clay or otherwise use the fire to heat and shape other materials.
Writing is not yet invented. While people shape objects using knives, and write pictures on the cave walls, there isn't much else going on. It's pure subsistence living here folks.
There is also "megafauna" at this point in time. Very large versions of certain animals we know now were still alive, up until about 10,000 BC. Megafauna include things like Glyptodon, a 1 **TON** version of an armadillo, mammoths and mastadons, the "short faced bear", which when on all fours would look a man in teh eye, and when "standing" could reach up to 12 feet tall, and weighed a ton, as well as giant beavers, camels, sloths, and an assortment of other animals.
I come back as soon as possible from this frigid, awful, internet=free existence seeking a refund....or another trip to someplace "sooner."
