Wednesday, July 25, 2007

Coast Guard and Whales, Amorita heads out

One more month left and I will be back home! I will clearly have to bribe my little dog back into her good graces... treats and climbing (walks). I hope that she will still remember me and still like me! Aaaah, one month left, I should not be counting down, BUT I am starting to think about all things that I am going to do when I get back... like: Super heated, long baths! Climbing! Sleeping in! Doing nothing! Playing with my fox-dog! Eating home cooked meals! Shaving my beard! Aaaaah! Well, I need to get my mind off that and get ready for the next few weeks which are going to be very hard indeed. We will have to wrap up our research, which means getting in a bunch of extra field days that we would normally not be doing, and inventorying everything for the trip back... and sometime in between, shopping for local crafts ($$$). So it has been more days in the field...


Picture above, we had to round up the UTEP crew to make a trail using these rubber matted strips, which we had to carry for a mile or so, to a new research area. I had never felt so dumb on this whole trip until this day. Some people had hard-frame backpacks, others dragged a small pile with a rope, and Sandra and I used bikes (the worse idea ever). It was crazy! The bike was going all over the place, the weight on the back was causing the front wheel to pop straight up into the air, which would then cause the pile to topple over (plus we didn't have enough rope to properly tie everything down). We could not ride the bike due to this, and walking it was just as bad, I was completely wasted after this and I killed my knee. When I told Amorita about this she told me "it could be worse", at which point I nearly lost it! Not what I needed to hear at that point. I was not happy, nor was Sandra. We lived and I hope that we won't be doing that ever again. A few days later Amorita, Dave and Craig were getting ready to leave for their main field research that would be taking them to various places in Alaska! It was going to be very hard work, camping out and working with the elements with no retreat to an shelter other than the tents. So Amorita and I escaped (alone! for once) to a nice dinner at our favorite Japanese restaurant... Osaka!

Amorita heading out for her trip.

Waiting for their flight

A quick meal at Osaka

Amorita caught me sleeping.

The fridge pictures of Dave.

In the distance there is a caribou!


A sail boat off the coast.

A presentation given by John K. from SDSU, where I was pictured.


Field work.

Cotton

Endless boardwalk with amazing sky.

New students from the local high schools.

Sandra and Alex showing the new students measurements.

Group picture with teacher and students.

The Shore Crew picking us up to take us to the SHIP!

Canadian Coast Guard Ship, small (large) ice breaker with helicopter

Backside of the ship as we went to board.

Mid section and boarding latter.

Rescue boat.
Sir Wilfrid Laurier (ship name).

Control Panels.

Throttle


Alarm bell.

View to the front of the ship.

The loading dock of the ship (front).

Controls for the loading equipment.

Helicopter landing pad.

The ship going final destination.

The store room where we all got t-shirts.

The shirts that we got. (mines the blue, Amorita got the white).

View to the coast line from the ship deck.

Getting back to shore.

On the return trip we saw a whale swimming along the coast (5 feet from the shore!!)

It was a medium size Gray Whale cleaning itself in the shore sand.

It drew quite the crowd for hours! Now... back to the field! Had to keep this short sorry!

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