Back in Rochester! Also lots of travelling.

Howdy folks! My phone is low on battery and has all of my notes of the things we did since entering Vernal, so once that's charged those will come in two post editions (one for Uinta Basin in Eastern Utah, and one for Hanna Basin in Southern Central Wyoming).

I will, however, go over the "travel days" since leaving the Hanna Basin!

Our last day in the Hanna Basin was August 4th, which we celebrated with steak night in the local town of Elmo/Hanna. Very small town duo, and unsurprisingly we ran into the Palms, who own the land that Penny did her Ph.D research on and where we did our last three days of field work! They were very interested in what we had found (mostly a lot of fragments of bone and teeth, which Garrett's gonna use in research).

After steak night, we drove to Laramie, WY, which is one of the three largest town/cities in Wyoming with about 30,000 people in it. We spent the 5th touring around, going to Atmosphere Mountaineering Goods and awe-ing at all the cool stuff they have there. We also went to University of Wyoming and toured around the two (TWO!!!!) buildings they have reserved for geology. One of the buildings ties in directly with a geological museum, which had an AR sandbox that we all adored. We then went on an impromptu tour of the department and ran into some of Penny's friends from her graduate days, and managed to see the awesome new imaging technology used in the collections. Penny and I cried, it was wonderful. It was also then that both Garrett and I vowed to at least attempt to apply to UWyo, because TWO BUILDINGS DEDICATED TO GEOLOGY, Y'ALL.

We had lunch and dinner with two of Penny's friends from the UWyo geo department, which was awesome because dinner was a good 3 hour long conversation about life in Laramie, the scene of the geology department, and I decided then and there that UWyo was gonna be a place I definitely applied to, and if I didn't make it in I would move to Laramie at some point in my life. So uh, yeah, I love Wyoming now.

The 6th we drove from Laramie to Des Moines to visit Julie from Natural Trap and the collection she has there. Nothing too big happened.

The 7th we actually got to go to Des Moines University and look at the fossils, as well as tour the cadaver labs. I learned that I actually really like cadaver labs and anatomy, which isn't that surprising. We also had a really great grill dinner with Cory, Julie's postdoc who was at Natural Trap for a little while.

The 8th was a LOT of driving from Des Moines to Rochester, and I managed to play the entirety of In The Heights and Fun Home during my driving chunk at night. We made it back to Rochester around 11:30 or so, and Penny dropped me and Garrett off at my place, where Garrett's family was waiting to pick him up.

So yeah, that was the last leg of the trip. I'll be posting about everything between getting to Vernal and getting back to Rochester in the next day or so, I just need to sift through it all.

Caves Day 15, 16, 17, 18, and MORE TRAVEL! Also, important update announcement.

Yikes, sorry guys for not updating this blog since Sunday. I've had a wave of exhaustion over the entire week, and honestly not too much has happened. So I'll post a quick rundown of things that might be interesting to people based on Cave Days, since that's where I've been mostly (other than today).

15: finished excavating out the bison jaw, kept working on the same wall.

16: more of the wall, nothing really big was found. Moved to another part of the cave to work with Matt (one of the new people, we get along remarkably well) and exposed him to a majority of Hamilton.

17: again, more digging around, finished Hamilton. I did fall asleep at the top of the cave before I went in, though (like, on top of the limestone. I was That Tired). I also painted a set of crystals onto Garrett's helmet and "NTC16" on one of the visiting caver's helmet. There was also a small scorpion (maybe 3/4ths of an inch long) that everyone was gawking over, and I wanted to hold it but didn't since smaller scorpions mess you up more than the big ones do.

18: Penny said I should stay topside given my exhaustion the day before, so I slept in and helped some other people sift through sediment. I also painted a jumping spider onto another caver's helmet. I then packed up things to make packing the truck easier.

So now that I've run down the whole week, I'll discuss today.

Today was a bit sad, since we left Natural Trap Cave in order to go to the Uinta Basin. There were tears shed and bags packed, and we managed to ride Truckie down Ball Bearing and John Blue (the roughest sections of the road from the cave into town) without disaster. We all took showers and reveled in our glorious cleanliness after about two weeks with no real showering. Field work is sometimes really disgusting, y'all.

We drove to Lander, where Juan recommended we stop for lunch, and had some EXCELLENT sandwiches. If you're ever in Lander, Wyoming, the Lander Bar and Grill is top-notch. We got back on the road again and got stuck behind a long caravan going through construction for a good 30-45 minutes, which was frustrating. Not much really happened on the road, since we were all tired and just letting ourselves experience cleanliness and air conditioning.

Miraculously, Penny, Garrett, and I didn't immediately burst into flames when we crossed into Utah while driving through Flaming Gorge. We're currently staying in a hotel near the Field House Museum in Vernal, which we're hoping to go to tomorrow. It is the weekend of the Days of 47, though, so we might be visiting alongside many young families amped up on sugar and fireworks.

Anyways, that was my work week. It's going to be weird not entering a cave every day from now on. Maybe I'll take up caving, like Garrett has. Maybe. Hope you all had a good Friday, and for those of you celebrating Days of 47, stay safe and don't eat fireworks!

ALSO: I will have much less reliable data and cell service from tomorrow evening to when I get back to Rochester, most likely. I will be posting updates in batches when I can't access everything very well. I'm not dead, unless the news says otherwise.

Speaking of news, here are two articles about the caving experience written by the news people that came by last week: Here's the one about the science and here's one focusing on one of our volunteers and general caving. And yes, Penny is my professor. She's awesome.

Caves Day 14!

Today was awesome and exciting!

While the first few hours in the cave were fairly uneventful aside from bringing in New people into the cave, right before lunchtime I stumbled across what we think is a bison jaw. It took a majority of the rest of the time to finish excavating it, and there were pathologies and crooked teeth and risk of rock fall damaging the fossil and everything. It was AWESOME!

That's really the main thing that happened today. Someone was playing a mix of various songs from the 60's to maaaaaybe late 80's, which made for awesome singalongs when Queen or Michael Jackson came on. We also had tacos for dinner.

The Australians are leaving tomorrow, which we're all a bit sad about. They were really nice to all of us and took really pretty footage. Hopefully at some point soon we'll see the video thing they're making in its full glory.

Hope you all had a good Sunday!

Caves Day 13: Topside!

Today I stayed topside with Penny because I woke up with congestion and some dizziness. We both made sure we drank plenty of fluids as we hand-washed our laundry, which the Australians recorded to capture the more human aspects of doing science.

We tried to do screen washing, but the canopy got bent in the wind and we mixed up the sediment bags on accident. Thankfully only a handful of bones got into the bag we were putting our findings in, but it was still a really stressful mess. We gave up around dinner time and made chili for the camp.

It's funny how last week there were 5 people in camp, and now we have 15. It's a lot of mouths to feed, and a lot of conversations to have. But it's still pretty cool.

Hope you all had a good Saturday!

Caves Day 12!

Today was filled with surveying and recording the fossils we found over the past few days while the surveying equipment was down. There was a lot of sketching, levelling, and general technological confusion. The Australians did a few interviews and had us do a goofy congo line, which was fun.

I think the cat litter we use as part of the bathroom system down in the cave gives me headaches though. I went to the bathroom and I was immediately assaulted with slight pain, exhaustion, and the inability to focus, so I had to take a good 30-45 minute break from helping out with the fossil surveying, which stunk. But I did get back on track eventually, thankfully.

Penny and I made Mac and cheese with chicken and bacon for dinner, and everyone was pretty dang happy. And then we played Cards Against Humanity with the entire camp until the thunderstorm that's currently rolling over us came in.

I will probably stay topside tomorrow so I can do some much needed laundry and sift through the sediment we keep bringing up. I like the cave, but all my warm layers got drenched in hot chocolate today, which isn't exactly great when you're working on the cave. Stuff gets cold and unpleasant there.

My Friday was a fair amount of busy. Hope your Friday went well!

Caves Day 11: screen washing!

I slept in today, which was fine because we couldn't go down into the cave because Julie wasn't there. I went to help with screen washing, which was actually really fun because Penny, Jen (a fossil preparator that's with us this week), and I found several small fossil bits of mice, snake, rabbits, and such in the matrix that we brought up a few days ago. The Australians filmed us during the process, which was cool too.

While Garrett was making our dinner (garbage plates, a Rochester favorite), I painted a tarantula onto my helmet, which I am super proud of. When I have actual internet, I promise I'll post pictures of all the things.

There isn't really anything else to report other than Julie coming back. We'll be in the cave again tomorrow, though, so that will be fun!

Hope you all had a good Thursday!

Caves Day 10!

So today we only spent half of the day in the cave since Julie had to go present a talk on some of the research we are doing up here, which was exciting. I got down into the cave fairly quickly, with very little actual fear attached, which I was proud of. I helped Penny and Julie set up the surveying device while the Australian camera crew and a local(ish) reporter duo recorded and took pictures of what we were doing.

Topside, we lounged about a bit during the heat of the day, but Garrett and I eventually got to setting up the screen washing station that we will be using tomorrow. It was a pain to put up the canopy, of course, and securing it so that the wind wouldn't blow it away was annoying since the station is on a very rocky surface, but we eventually got it done.

Another caver arrived, which is great because Garrett was helping Juan with the belay system when he could have been in the cave digging up fossils. Although, then again, we didn't have a whole lot of time to dig up stuff today.

The sunsets out here are beautiful and make me miss the West. I might one day move back out here, probably to Montana since there's great paleontology, awesome winters, amazing scenery, and it's also less smoggy. But that's far into the future. :P

Hope you all had a good Wednesday!

Caves Day 9: Back in!

Today was a busy and productive day. We got to go back into the cave and dig up more fossils. I didn't cry going on this time! I did cry when Penny was using the small shovel, though. She was moving some matrix that we're going to sift through for microfossils into a new bag and the shovel was maybe 2 feet long and small things make me weep. I also held a mole cricket! They're small, rotund, and curl up into balls when frightened, and they're ADORABLE.

Because we didn't have the surveying device ready to use, doing fossil collection was hard because we had to keep the fossils in place and still quarry for more at the same time. I found quite a few bones I had to work around, which became a predicament after finding three bones I had to keep afloat in the wall of the hole I was working in.

The Australian film crew also did a lot of filming and interviewing of the actual paleontology work, so that was fun to witness. Another local reporter and photographer came by when we were all topside and they're staying the night to go into the caves with us tomorrow. I also made another spider friend, a baby wolf spider this time. I'm getting really good at making the small arthropod friends.

I should head to bed since we're doing a very early day tomorrow. Hope you all had a good Tuesday!

Caves Day 8: Good news!

We're going back in the cave!

After a morning hike with the remaining people in camp, Julie (the head person in charge) managed to get the BLM to come check us out and clear us for further science. Within the span of a few hours in the afternoon, we had six new people in camp (mostly scientists). There is a small film crew from an Australian education start-up here filming our work, so that's exciting too!

I also made a small spider friend. I'm not sure what species, but I do know it was a jumping spider. I let it crawl on me for about 30 minutes, but then let it go.

So tomorrow will bring actual science updates! Our wait has ended. Hope you all had an excellent Monday!

Caves Day 7: A lot more nothing

Really didn't do much today. Read Chetnow's synopsis of The Federalist Papers, though. There was also a lot of rain, my sneakers got soaked because I left them outside, womp. Still waiting for news about whether or kot we can go into the cave.

We did go on a very pretty hike though. I'll post pictures soon.

Hope everyone had a restful Sunday!

Caves Day 6: Laundry

Kim (a paleontologist from California), Penny, and I went down into Cody today and swiped a free shower and did laundry. But before the laundry part, we went to the Heart Mountain internment camp museum.

It's quite the experience, seeing the displays up and reading first-hand experiences and copied files from the Japanese Americans imprisoned there. My need for the Allegiance soundtrack increased a lot, and the reminder that my heritage as a Chinese descendant is close enough to my grandpa's emigration to the United States that, if history were to repeat itself, would land me in an internment camp.

While we were waiting for laundry to finish, we took some photos and samples from a geologic outcrop on the edge of Cody at this place called Colters Hell. The geyser area in Yellowstone is also called Colters Hell, but the one on the edge of Cody is the original one and has interesting views of angular unconformities (when the land tilts, then erodes, then has more deposited rock on top of it) and some active hot springs and sulfur staining. It's pretty awesome.

Then some really intense wind tore my tent's rainfly when we got back to camp. So I gotta go fix that.

Hope you all had a good Saturday!

Caves Day 5: A Whole Lotta Nothin'

Not much to talk about today. Since we're not able to do science, we had a calm day in camp lounging around and listening to Juan stories. I did read a chapter transcript for a textbook that Penny is helping with, though. So that was productive.

I just honestly feel so tired. I decided to splurge on my data and see what was going on with Facebook and I had to shut off the app and the notifications because there was just so much going on about the shootings. It's not like I can do anything or say anything to help anyone especially since I'm so far away from... Everyone, really.

We'll get an update about the BLM stuff tonight or tomorrow, I'll likely get it tomorrow since I'm going ahead and going to bed. Truckie should be ready as well. Maybe my sunburns are making me tired, I dunno.

Hope y'all had a productive and safe Thursday!

Caves Day 4: Maybe Some Good News?

So, the current plan with the cave is that the head PI of the project (Julie, who I've heard is awesome) is going to try to appeal to the BLM on Monday or Tuesday to see if we can get back into the cave. We have to retrain people to use one of the more crucial pieces of equipment if we do get down there again, and if that happens then we will science there Until when Julie leaves. It's still a really crappy situation since we're stuck in limbo essentially, but at least we have some potential plans.

 

Truckie is currently probably in the process of being fixed, we'll check in on it tomorrow.

 

Today we went on an outing to Yellowstone since someone had an annual pass and Garrett had never gone before. I got a lot of pictures, and also some minor sunburn on my arms. Uploading photos is hard due to lack of proper internet, so those will be uploaded at some point.

 

I've only just recently become aware of the shootings in Louisiana, Minnesota, and Texas, and I really hope that all of you have been taking care of yourselves. These events are stressful, regardless of your position on it, and it's important that you're taking care of your needs. I hope you all had a safe Thursday.

Caves Day 3: Darn the BLM to Heck

Well, that was short-lived.

The BLM came in and shut down our project for the foreseeable future because an individual that was here before we got here climbed into a part of the cave that the BLM didn't want us touching. It also doesn't help that there is a BLM agent that has been giving the project an immense amount of trouble because we are having actual cavers help us and we're essentially stuck in a personality fight with this agent, so right now we're all topside with no matrix to shift through.

So today we mostly hung out while some of the more adulty adults went to check on Truckie (Penny's truck that got parked in the juniper trees) and spent a lot of time talking about psychology and college experiences. Then we opened up a watermelon that was bad and we rolled it down one of the cliffs nearby, followed by this AMAZING chicken and rice dish Juan made.

In terms of Truckie, after the truck got towed out it was deemed to be a wreck because of rusting from New York winters rusting through the frame (which was dented in the junipers). But a local person related to one of the head paleontologists said they might be able to fix it, so we're all crossing our fingers.

So until Truckie is either fixed or replaced, we're stuck here with very little science to do since our next stop doesn't start up their field season until the 20th. Which is a shame, but at least we have continued to learn that bureaucracy will always aggravate paleontology over petty things. So that's frustrating.

Tomorrow a few of us are going on a day trip to Yellowstone, which I am really excited about. There will definitely be an attempt at photos.

Hope you all had a good Wednesday!

Caves Day 2!

I made it into the caves today! It took a lot of positive reinforcement and support (and I won't say I didn't cry, because I did), but it happened, slowly.

I spent the day digging up dirt (with the occasional fossil) and found a bird bone (unsure what kind, likely a wing bone?), a vertebra of some small animal, and "the distal phalanx of an airiodactyl ungulate" (basically, probably a bison toe). I also helped extract more of this bison's foot and was the main fossil sketch artist for a catalogue of fossils found and then surveyed with this awesome prism-light thing. I was really good at keeping the receiver balanced, which was awesome.

Getting out of the cave was strenuous, though. I was struggling with keeping my feet underneath me enough for the "frogging" (essentially pushing yourself up the rope with your legs) to work. So that was exhausting.

Not much else happened, we're taking a day off tomorrow so that some people can go caving in Bighorn. I'll probably stay behind and read or start knitting Penny a Jayne hat.

Hope you all had a great Tuesday!

Caves Day 1

Today was the first day that we got to (try to) go into the caves. I woke up at a record-breaking 6:45 in the morning (local time, so more like 8:45 in Rochester) and was extremely excited to go.

After a few hours of waiting for the cavers to set up, we began training. We had to learn how to repel and climb a vertical rope and switch between the two while on the rope in case of an emergency. I had significant troubles due to my harnesses being a bit too big initially and not trusting the ropes. Which, I mean, I logically know they're safe, but fear is a powerful enemy.

I didn't manage to actually get into the caves because I freaked out at the "oh, I'm looking into a 65-foot pit" part. So I spent some time socializing with another paleontologist who was topside (not in the cave) and discussing paleontology, California, and several other things.

We all played Cards Against Humanity once everyone got out of the cave, at least until we heard fireworks from the nearby towns. As the sun set, we all watched from the top part of our hill (which lies at the edge of a valley, so we were high up) as 4-5 towns about 20 or so miles away fired off their fireworks.

Hopefully tomorrow I'll be able to get into the cave after they change out one of my harnesses for something smaller. Then the real fun will begin.

Happy Independence Day! No Hamilton facts, but a reminder that July 4th, 1776 was when the final signatures were placed on the Declaration of Independence, and that the war formally started after this date and didn't end until 1783 (or 4, I need to look that up at some point). Hope you all had a fun and safe Monday!

Camp arrival!

So today was a... Wild time.

We left for Lovell, WY after acquiring a lot of perishable goods, which we had to tetris into the back of the truck alongside our stuff. I acquired yarn and knitting needles to make Jayne Cobb hats for me, Penny, and Garrett.

We then get to Lovell, stock up on water, and head on up the mountain on this dirt-path road that feels like being rattled around inside a pinball machine. About halfway up, our transmission stops. And in the process of trying to see what was going on and having people up at camp help us, it... Went into neutral and rolled backwards into a juniper tree.

Everyone was out of the car, thankfully, and only one person got hurt (Juan, the caver-fixer-handyman of the camp, was under the car when it rolled and got a bit dragged, but nothing broke). But we did lose a water tank and a few food items. Nothing else was really damaged, except for the truck.

Don't really have any Hamilton-related anecdotes, but I can say that sunsets in Wyoming are really pretty. I'll set a photo I took of tonight's sunset when I have more reliable internet access.

I'll post this when I get service, which I hope might be soon. I hope you all had a good, safe Sunday!

Travel Day 3 (Photos To Be Added)

Howdy from Gillette, Wyoming! Today we drove through the rest of Minnesota and through South Dakota. The shift from deciduous trees and corn to evergreens and sagebrush was very exciting for all of us in the car, and a bit mind-blowing for Garrett, who hasn't really car-tripped out west before. Before we got into South Dakota, we stopped to get gas and both Penny and I ended up making a friend. We stopped by Badlands National Park, and I picked up a few post cards, a sticker, and a spider guide book (because I love spiders, and I'm probably going to end up being the bug person at camp). I also took a metric crapton of photos, some of which I'll post here and some of which I'll just paste a link to.

We're going to end up at the camp site tomorrow evening, which will mean that I'll be in the land of no-more-showers and very-little-laptop activity. So that will be fun, yay for data.

I also spent a fair amount of today working through Ron Chernow's Alexander Hamilton, which I got for Christmas and only got to the end of the Revolutionary War in. It's been interesting reading about the unfolding of events between the end of the war and the Constitutional Convention from the Hamilton perspective, especially because it gives a lot more insight into the kind of person that Hamilton was, especially with regards to how much he is somewhat characterized as a "monarchist" even though the only thing that really suggested monarchism was a lifelong term. Although he also didn't trust people at all whatsoever, but had a deep belief in the potential for the American system so long as oppression of all sorts (whether it be from the masses or the aristocracy) was mitigated. The one problem with that is that you can't really trust in a system that depends on people shifting it. But he also worked with money which has a life of its own, so...

Anyways. Oh, we also finished going through the Cards Against Humanity deck that we started on Thursday, and we started coming up with our own Cards Against Geology game, which we'll probably be refining while we're out and about. I'm gonna head out for the night, but I hope you all had a good Saturday!

Travel Day 2

Hey there from Fairmont, Minnesota! Not much to report for today, just some more driving. We got held up in construction traffic in Chicago and somewhere at the front end of Wisconsin, and I exposed Penny to Hamilton (which, while entertaining, was hard to get all the words over the sound of the freeway sometimes).

We'll hopefully traverse the majority of South Dakota tomorrow, and we're supposedly taking a route through the badlands. So that will be fun and scenic, expect photos. :)

Sleep well, y'all, and I hope you had a good Friday!

Travel Day 1

Hey there from Indiana! Most of these travel posts will be fairly short, since we spend a lot of time driving, mostly. Garrett (a fellow undergrad) and I exposed Penny (our professor) to the wonder that is Cards Against Humanity. And then we all cussed at the harsh right angles in I-90 in Cleveland. We're currently stopped in a hotel in Fremont/Angola area, and plan on driving some more tomorrow. And doing some more Cards Against Humanity.

I just had some really EXCELLENT macaroni and cheese, which has so far been a pretty big highlight of our travels. But this is only the first day of a 40 day excursion, so there will almost certainly be more.

Will keep you all posted, and I hope that you all had a nice Thursday!