The Ancients should've froze to death

[Bhousden]

When the Ancients abandoned Atlantis during the wraith war it's reasonably certain they came through the gate in Antarctica, since Ra wouldn't have been on earth yet. If Ra was on earth and the Ancients showed up his door step they would've certainly been captured by him. So after several million of the Ancients being in Pegasus the outpost in Antarctica would've certainly been buried under ice, so why didn't they all freeze to death?

[garhkal]

Maybe they took some puddle jumpers through, so they could fly it to where another close by gate was...?

[Bhousden]

Maybe they took some puddle jumpers through, so they could fly it to where another close by gate was...?

If they took jumpers with them we would've seen them in Before I sleep, at least one would think. Better yet there would at least some trace of them in the Milky Way, which there aren't. Except for the time machine that Janus rebuilt.

[garhkal]

Who's to say they have not been destroyed over the 10k years..

[VampyreWraith]

When Sam and Jack got stuck there during season 1 the gate didn't really seem to be buried that deep under the ice. They also didn't show every single ancient passing through the gate and what the brought with them in Before I Sleep. Janus' jumper looked just like the Atlantis' jumpers, with some modifications for time travel, so they could have brought a jumper or two along to travel to warmer parts of Earth (or they could have built some when they got there). They could have dialed to the Antarctica gate and then as soon as their people finished coming through, dialed out to somewhere else. They also could have brought the ancient equivalent to generators and portable heaters with them or maybe they all used personal shields to keep the cold out. They most likely knew what the weather conditions were probably going to be like and prepared themselves.

[Bhousden]

When Sam and Jack got stuck there during season 1 the gate didn't really seem to be buried that deep under the ice. They also didn't show every single ancient passing through the gate and what the brought with them in Before I Sleep. Janus' jumper looked just like the Atlantis' jumpers, with some modifications for time travel, so they could have brought a jumper or two along to travel to warmer parts of Earth (or they could have built some when they got there). They could have dialed to the Antarctica gate and then as soon as their people finished coming through, dialed out to somewhere else. They also could have brought the ancient equivalent to generators and portable heaters with them or maybe they all used personal shields to keep the cold out. They most likely knew what the weather conditions were probably going to be like and prepared themselves.

Perhaps....

[Xaeden]

If they took jumpers with them we would've seen them in Before I sleep, at least one would think.

Why? They only showed brief moments from the evacuation. And adding shots involving jumpers would have cost more money.

Better yet there would at least some trace of them in the Milky Way, which there aren't. Except for the time machine that Janus rebuilt.

Well...

"When we first abandoned Atlantis all those millennia ago, the Earth was so harsh, its people so primitive by comparison, there was no hope of living among them as Lantians or rebuilding our society. So, instead we spread out to many lands, some of us planting a few small seeds of civilization among the first tribes of man. Others making their way to the Stargate at your southern pole. Still others choosing to live the remainder of our lives in seclusion and meditation. Merlin and I both chose the latter path."

-The Pegasus Project

So the Ancients who stayed on Earth either spent their lives meditating in hopes of ascending or mixing with the human population. Without much need for technology, it was likely those who chose to "make their way" to Antarctica who took the bulk of their resources, with anything that remained being in a position to be found by Ra, including perhaps that ZPM of his (although, obviously, it could have just as easily come from another planet). Plus, the line suggests they all left the continent of Antarctica for a time before deciding to split up and getting back there would have been just as difficult without jumpers as getting from there would have been.

Now, of those who went through the gate, we know what happened to Janus. What about the others? Well, Thor once told Sg-1 that the Ancients left this part of the universe. For a long time we all assumed he was referring to the group of Ancients that left for the Pegasus galaxy. However, season 5 of Atlantis established that the Asgard had a 100,000 year old civilization and the Ancients left the Milky Way for the Pegasus Galaxy 5-10 million years ago, meaning it was likely this third group who formed the alliance of four before leaving. If that's the case, they likely took their things with them.

However, if some or all of them settled somewhere in the Milky Way before dying out/ascending as well, there's no reason to assume their tech would have been found by Earth. There are thousands of planets out there still waiting to be explored, with who knows how many no longer reachable by gate. Plus, there were other aliens running around who could have found and taken their technology over the course of 10,000 years, including one of the other four races, the Goa'uld, various human groups, etc.

[DigiFluid]

Ayana didn't freeze to death. Why would any of the rest?