SUUUPERRRR SUMMER

I am back in San Diego now, writing from my swanky ocean view apartment in UCSD's International House. It's a strange and quick transition from life in the mountains, but I really have no complaints. It was a truly amazing summer and an experience that I will always remember. I could not have asked for a better summer job.

I've really liked putting up these blog posts to share at least some of my summer adventures, and thanks to everyone for reading it.

It's great being back with my San Diego amigos, making new amigos, and gettin down to Blacks beach for some surfin. It's gonna be a great year, with tons of challenges and a whole bunch more fun.

Lots o' love to all,

-Teo

A few shots of an awesome, summer-ending trip

Last trip of an amazing summer

Tomorrow morning Tom and I will be heading out for 7 days to wrap up the work we've done this field season. We'll be going to our sites in LeConte Canyon and the Barrett Lakes basin, taking many, many algae samples and removing the experiment's exclosures from the lake bottom. It's gonna be an intense way to finish the summer, not only because of the number of miles we'll be covering, but because we checked the NOAA report this morning and thunderstorms are likely for everyday we'll be out there!!! For elevations around 12,000 feet, where we'll be most of the time, snow is also a pretty sure thing. I'm just grateful I've got a 0 degree sleeping bag.....

A belated update on life in the eastern sierra

It's been a little while since I put something up on here. So sorry. Since my last post, I've been doing a fair amount. About two weeks ago I offered to help out Andrea, one of the other grad students here at SNARL, because she was removing water from several lakes that would then be used in an experiment with frogs back at the lab at UCSB. There were five us in all on the trip, and that was very necessary because hauling about 160 pounds of water out of the backcountry is borderline insane with any less people to help out. But we made it, with no casualties, and no hernias.

Then I got a visit from Mom and Pops, and we had a great time. We camped out at a lake above the town of Mammoth Lakes, and I took them to the thursday night get-together at the lee Vining Mobil Mart gas station which has surprisingly good food and live music once a week. We also checked out the Devil's Postpile Monument, and ended both nights they were here at the natural hot tubs that are scattered in the Owens Valley, just a 5 minute drive from SNARL.

Last Saturday I went with two girls who are living here, one a grad student and the other her assistant, to the Bishop Rodeo. It was a pretty sweet slice of America, with typical bull riding, lots of calf lassoing, barrel races, and intermission entertainment from a midget. The parking lot could have been mistaken for a Ford Truck and trailer dealership. And now I can actually say, "This ain't my first rodeo".

And finally, Tom and I just returned from a two night trip into Center Basin where we spent a full day taking algae samples at the lake and then removing the exclosures. It was a great trip. Going over Kearsarge Pass and up into Center Basin is definitely one of my favorite spots we have trekked through this summer. The picture of the peaks with the dark foreground I believe is Mount Gardner, named after my great, great grandfather who was on a USGS expedition in the 1860s surveying much of the Sierra Nevada area.

Floatin' around Marmot Lake

"I've gotta ask"...... This is the question Tom and I got way too many times on our way up to Marmot Lake which is in Humphreys Basin, just north of the Sequoia/Kings NP border. Tom had six sections of PVC pipe strapped to his pack, over 8 meters of piping in all, that were part of an elaborate gadget to take sediment core samples from the lake bottom. As you can see in the picture, it's not exactly typical backcountry gear. We joked that it was for a teepee. We had gotten a late start so we got into camp in the basin after sun down. We were up early the next morning taking algae samples from Marmot Lake for a couple of hours, and then we began setting up the contraption. We blew up a float tube, which is meant for sitting in to fish from, put on some stylin' waders, and kicked out to the center of the lake (we went one at a time :). The enormous sections of pipe were pretty tricky to maneuver, especially because it was windy and all we had were dinky flippers to control the tube. Once it was upright and sunk to the lake bottom, we would push the end down into the sediment, pull up on a cord that created a vacuum in the tube, and then haul the whole thing up to the surface, cap it, and struggle back to the shore. Falling off of the float tube definitely crossed my mind. Many times.

The whole operation was actually really fun, and totally worth dragging 8 miles up into the basin. The fat and furry namesake of the lake also made an appearance.

After sleeping off my Gado Gado backcountry pasta (an intense peanut sauce pasta dish), doing some more algae survey work this morning, and capturing and euthanizing some tadpoles to be taken back to the lab, we packed up and headed out under a quickly darkening sky. The rain began to hit us harder and harder, then came the hail, and then the thunder and lightning, some even splashing off of the peaks overhead. I actually love hiking in the rain, and most importantly, we made it back to the car safe and sound.

A minor setback...

On sunday we started the BIG hike again, intending to do 17 miles by going over Bishop Pass, then heading down Dusey Basin and then north into LeConte Canyon to our basecamp. But, I mistook pain in my left leg simply as soreness from the trip that we had just returned from on friday. I pulled my quad muscle, not terribly at all, but enough to make it hurt so that Tom and I decided I shouldn't continue down the 100 switchback section of trail and make the injury way worse than it already was. So, I gave my portion of the research gear to Tom and hobbled my way back up the basin, over Bishop Pass, and back to the car. It sucked hiking on, but I made it, and it sucked even more to have to leave Tom like that. So, for the past couple of days I've been doing some work that Tom laid out for me in the lab at SNARL and taking care of my leg by going out to the natural hot springs a couple of nights with some other grad students. The muscle is feeling better and better everyday, which is great, and I have no doubt that I will be fine for the rest of the trips we have planned. I'm going to pick Tom up at the trailhead on Thursday afternoon....

It's a long time to be up here all summer, and I miss all my friends and family terribly. These last four weeks will go by quickly though, and I will be able to see at least some of you then!!

(the picture is of the house I'm living in here at SNARL)

Sample, Sample, Sample

For the past four nights, Tom and I were basecamped in the Barrett Lakes Basin taking three days worth of nutrient samples from two separate lakes. We've been having great luck with the weather, without a single cloud in the sky, but part of me also wishes for some intense, alpine thunderstorms with lightning crashing on the surrounding peaks. As we get later into the summer, my wish may actually come true. In all honesty, taking this enormous amount of nutrient samples is tedious work, but this is just a part of research that comes with the job. In one of these pictures you can see a brown lake bottom with little side by side circles that make a large V. These are the exclosures that prevent the tadpoles (which are the little black things scattered everywhere) from grazing on the algae, and it's from each of the exclosures such as these that we sample.

Working amongst amazing (although freezing) lakes and great climbing rocks is something I have no complaints about at all, and in my free time I can take full advantage. The lake that is next to where we set up camp has a decent cliffside that we could jump off of after work.

Our food situation is pretty decent, and although I'm sick of trailmix being my staple, our dinners, such as the one in the picture, are scrumptious.