old rocks, crocs, a year with a new leg, and housing hell

xunantunich mayan temple

the latest trip to belize started off with three days in the western part of the country a stones throw away from guatemala. i stayed in san ignacio town and largely explored the mayan sites in the area. i made it out to caracol (the largest site in belize) - which included a military escort to and from the site, xunantunich (second largest in belize), and cahal pech - a small site just outside san ignacio. it was neat to see the sites and to learn about how they were built and why they were abandoned. like most ancient societies, the amount of labor they used to build their cities is incomprehensible. and i have to say that the stone slabs for beds looked a little uncomfortable... :)

12 foot crocodile named jack - he lives behind the field station

after three days of exploring, i met up with sadie and collin in belize city and we headed out to turneffe atoll for a week of research. we had a bit of a rocky start with a puncture wound to sadie's foot (stupid mangroves) and some rough weather that prevented us from diving. we did, however, get many opportunities to see the resident crocodiles (jack and jill) that live behind the field station. we didn't see them in july, but this trip they were pretty active. they are big...and ancient looking...and scary. actually seeing them added a whole new level of terror to crawling around in the mangroves. both collin and i were pretty happy when we finished our last mangrove monitoring site and made it safely back to the boat. despite the rough start, we did manage to complete most of the research. we couldn't complete everything at a couple of the sites due to bad visibility. that site also seemed to have been hardest hit by the hurricanes that blew through the area earlier in the summer. one of the sites was unrecognizable to any of us...it looked like someone had dropped a bomb under water and left nothing but coral rubble. this adventure was sadie's last monitoring and collection trip for her master's thesis. it is unfortunate that the logistics associated with this project are difficult as it would have been great to keep the project going...

miss cassie mae

in other news, yesterday marked the one year anniversary of cassie's new leg. a year ago we were both miserable and crying at the vet, but today she continues to astound me with how well she has recovered. i took her for a run today and she was tearing up the trail like she was a puppy (she will be 10 next month). it is so wonderful to see and i am excited to have my running buddy back a couple days a week.

finally, life has been a little unsettled for the last couple of weeks as we just found out that our landlord is selling the house. i have been in my current spot for the last 3+ years and am really sad to be leaving our wonderful home. ken gave us until 1 february, but for some reason unknown to me, two of my housemates decided that it would be best to try to find a place immediately before the holidays. can you tell how excited i am about this?? as it stands now, i have to be out by december 20th....and there is nothing available...especially with cass. maybe my standards are too high, but these are the things i am not willing to live with:

$800 rent for a 10x10 room (mom, i told you you would be able to get good money for your closet out here!)
someone else's children
pot heads
a house full of 19 year-olds
sharing a room with another person (or 2 or 3)

call me crazy, but those are the standards. and as it turns out, those things are pretty hard to avoid in this town. grr. so i'll probably be living at the marine lab camped out on the couches in my lab for the foreseeable future. there's a kitchen and a shower here so it might not be too bad... damn this town and its unaffordable living situation!

anyway, i hope everyone has a wonderful thanksgiving. pete, cass, and i are heading up to oakland tomorrow for dinner at grandma's and then family fun day with his mom, dad, and sister on friday.

the travel report

to give my body a break from sitting in front of my computer for long days, i headed up to british columbia to see roly and christine and to meet their new little ones gabriel (human) and bugaboo (dog). we had a great time catching up, cooking, hiking around, visiting with family, and watching some local hockey. i miss them all already...

pete and his sister made it back from italy safely (bags included) - they had a great time. pete really enjoys history and connecting place to knowledge, so rome was his favorite part of the trip. i think his favorite moment was when he stood on the spot where charlemagne was crowned the first holy roman emperor in 800ad. and then there was the bridge that had been in use since 62ad. stuff is OLD around there.

i'm leaving this afternoon for a return trip to belize. i have a few days to travel to the western side of the country to see some mayan sites before heading out to the atoll for the research part of the trip. pete leaves for orlando (dive conference) tomorrow. but once we both return we will be in santa cruz for a whole month together!

alaska

my parents and i had a fantastic ten days in alaska! to say the whole trip was amazing would be an understatement. we had great weather, beautiful scenery, amazing fall colors (the trees looked like they were on fire!), and good company. we started our adventure by picking up a motorhome. yes, that's right, i drove a motorhome (at least it was a small one). we headed north first to denali to try to beat the snow and the closure of the park road. the road was still open, but we did get snowed on pretty good. what would a trip to alaska be without a little snow, right? we also saw the most enormous moose i have ever seen... i could have easily fit within the span of his antlers...laying down. on our way back south we were treated to a most spectacular view of denali herself. that is one impressive mountain, by the way. our next stop was the kenai peninsula. we toured around homer and seward mainly. while in seward we went on a boat tour of the kenai fjord national park. it was amazing! we saw orcas (killer whales), stellar sea lions (endangered species), dall's porpoises, sea otters, dahl's sheep, lots of glaciers, and a nearly cloudless sky. we headed back to anchorage after the peninsula and were treated to beluga whales on our way back. it was so cool! i nearly made my dad crash the rv because i was so excited. oops. we had a couple days in anchorage before flying home. we were lucky enough to be hosted by my childhood piano teacher's daughter, which was great fun. having 10 days with my parents was one of the best parts of the trip. i have been away from minnesota for 10 years this month and not a day goes by when i don't miss having my family close.

i am going to try to hold onto this feeling of enjoyment as i go into proposal writing hell for the month of october. pete left for italy yesterday for a two week excursion with his sister. i am sad he is gone again, but i will get lots of work done without him as a distraction.

we have had a bought of high drama at the bellevue house. cassie got into a scuffle with some raccoons while i was gone and got a little scratched up; one housemate is now going through rabies vaccinations; another housemate was hit by a car on her bike yesterday. she is soooo lucky and walked away with a broken hand, sore neck, and bruises. i am hoping the drama ends there...

denali - what a sight!

holgate glacier - kenai fjords national park

orcas!

exit glacier

out of the deep blue sea

moon jellies abound in big sur

my field assistant kate and i just got back from another field adventure in big sur. not exactly the smoothest trip we've ever had...but nothing a little duct tape couldn't fix. today we were boating back from one of my sites and the ocean was full of jellies. they were everywhere and as deep as we could see. fortunately these are not the stinging kind... what a beautiful and rare sight (climate change, i know, i know, but i did enjoy the moment).

last week we were out on the national marine sanctuary boat doing some other work in big sur. big lesson learned...i don't think i'm cut out for government work. efficiency is not the name of the game so you can imagine my frustration. grr. i think working at rei just moved up on the list of options if this science thing doesn't pan out...

pete and i finally made it back to the stanislaus river after a two year hiatus. his family has a little piece of property up in the mountains that is absolutely lovely to visit. we went up to celebrate pete's sister erin's 30th birthday. we swam lots, cooked a turkey in the dirt, hiked around, and generally enjoyed ourselves. cassie, or course, chose the day of departure to eat 10 oz. of dark chocolate mint creams...no chocolate toxicity but her insides were unhappy!

cooking in the dirt...that's the turkey at the bottom!

belize adventures

sadie, collin, and me - hard at work!

our trip to belize was an adventure but great! the trip started off with collin and me stalking sadie in the airport until we were sure it was the woman we were looking for. we were then whisked away from the airport by a cabbie that drove like a crazy man to try to get us to the dock before the boat for turneffe left. we just made it...
all of the research went smoothly...although i am not a tropical convert yet, i must say that 85 degree water was a treat. diving on the reef itself was a little depressing - there was dead coral everywhere. a lot of that is due to the warm water temperature...the corals just can't hack it at sustained temps above 86 degrees. there has also been disease that has come through and over-fishing of the grazers that keep the reef clean and healthy. we saw some cool spots, but it was undeniable that the reefs are in big trouble. in the mangroves, the potential for salt water crocodiles was a little disconcerting, but fortunately we only had one close call with a log look-a-like. i am certain, however, that we provided lots of entertainment for our boat driver with all the hooting and hollaring we were doing to scare away any hungry crocs.
since we finished our work earlier than expected we had the opportunity to do a few things for fun. the boat was going into belize city to drop off some guests and pick up another group so we went along for the ride. we had a few hours before the boat left again so we went out to a place called the community baboon sanctuary. the belizeans call howler monkeys 'baboons.' it was cool to see them, but our guide had bananas to feed them, which turned me off a little. he also got the dominant male really worked up so he would howl out of aggression...again, cool to hear the incredible sound that comes out of one monkey but not what i had anticipated. another day we went out with the dolphin reaseacher, katheryn, and drove one of her routes. we didn't see any dolphins, but it was a beautiful day to be out on the water. our last day in belize we snorkled the blue hole and explored half moon caye. the blue hole was a trip...the fringing reef is 1-10 feet deep and then it drops off into oblivion. it was a little creepy to swim to the edge and look down into this massive deep, dark hole. half moon caye is a little island near the blue hole that has a population of nesting red-footed boobies and frigate birds. cool stuff!
hopefully i'll be going back in october for another round of monitoring, but it is funding dependent at this point. it would be great to get back and follow up on the study, but i feel fortunate to have had the opportunity to go on this trip.

red-footed booby on half moon caye

black howler monkey

reef

turneffe atoll (oceanic society field station)

lopez island

pete and i just returned from a wonderful weekend on lopez island, a small island in the san juan islands off the coast of seattle, washington. some of the people pete sails in the antarctic with gathered up there for a reunion of sorts. because plane tickets were astronomically expensive for last weekend and pete and i have been passing like ships in the night for the last couple of months, we decided to drive north and have some quality time together in the car....32 hours of it! we made it to seattle the first day and stayed with my friend molly who graciously agreed to let us stay with only three hours notice. it was wonderful to see her again. friday morning we made our way through pike's place market before heading out to the island. the place we stayed on the island was wonderful! robin and langdon have owned the 25-acre property since 1975 and have not developed it at all other than a 21' yurt they put up last year. we set-up the tipi when we got there and cooked a turkey buried in the ground on saturday. for those of you who enjoy an adventure...you should really try the turkey thing sometime. it was pretty cool...even to a vegetarian (yes, i even ate it!). we had to leave the island on sunday midday to start our journey south. we made it as far as corvallis and stayed with our friends chad and claire. it was nice to give pete the tour of corvallis so he knows what i am talking about when i tell stories from my years up there. the last 10 hours home was the most brutal part of the trip, but we made it. i am in town for a few days and then i leave for belize on friday night...i think cassie is going to disown me.

the report from isocamp...

science dorks hard at work...

nerd camp was great! my brain was full (okay, exploding) by the end, but i learned sooo much. for me the best part was learning how to run different types of samples on different instruments. we also got to do a few projects during the class. the variety included trees, cricket poo, and chicken eggs. my group was really proud of our egg project...we presented it as a spin-off of dr. seuss's 'green eggs and ham.' it is hard to rhyme with words like enriched, carbonate, and supplements... the outcome - go for the local chickens! while we worked long hours in the lab, we did get a free day to do some hiking, play horseshoes, and enjoy a 16 dutchoven dinner. a world champion dutchoven cook made us a delicious spread that included ribs (even i tried them!), soup, fried potatoes, parmesan rolls, and apple crisp. yum. many friends were made and fun was had by all.
matt made it out the last day of the class and we headed for southern utah the next day. we had three days to spend in bryce canyon and zion. they were both amazing! we went for a run one morning at bryce and nearly killed ourselves...turns out running up hills at 9,000 feet is a little tough when you are used to sea level atmosphere. we did lots of hiking at both places and saw some really beautiful spots. the photo below is from the top of angels landing. i'd show some photos of how we got up there, but they make me kind of nauseous so i'll spare everyone. the views were spectacular, though. our last night in utah was spent on antelope island in the great salt lake. in the morning we were treated to a whole host of wildlife spottings...chukars, antelope, coyotes (one w/ a pup), buffalo, mule deer (w/ two fawns)...it was wonderful. the last wildlife siting for the trip was bears in yosemite.
i am actually in santa cruz for most of the next month. there will be some field work mixed in along with a few day camps and possibly a short trip up to lopez island in the san juans.

angels landing, zion

on the road again...

niece and nephew - madeline and kieran

my friend trevor was giving me a hard time for not updating this site very often. my excuse is that tomorrow will be the 10th (and final) day i am in santa cruz in the 6 week period between mid-may and the end of june. i have entered the feast cycle of my travel schedule...

i have been in the field quite a bit in the last few weeks. my friend and former co-worker matt came down from oregon to help me out with one of the trips...it was great to get to work with him for a few days again. kate and i were a little less lucky with the weather the last couple of days. the wind has been crazy strong. on the bright side, we now have a new metric for crappy days on the water (my mom worries already so i won't say anything more than that).

last week i was in minnesota visiting the family. i got to see everyone including my aunts and uncles on my dad's side, which is a rare occurrence. i was also able to spend some time with good friends, which was a bonus. my niece is nearly as tall as me (she's 8!) and kieran is running around and babbling up a storm. i also got my fix of lake fishing and thunderstorms but was a little too early for lightning bugs. my mom and i built a raised garden bed for their veggies...hopefully the little plants are growing like mad.

on saturday i am off to salt lake city, utah, for a couple weeks. i could tell you that i am taking a stable isotopes class...but you can just think of it as nerd camp. i'm okay with that, really. i know that i am a science geek. i am really excited about the class - i think it will be great! i am also looking forward to the days following the class because my brother is going to ride out to salt lake on his motorcycle and then we are going to southern utah for a few days to enjoy the beauty and magic of the redrock that is zion, bryce, and the canyonlands.

revelling

salmon creek falls

the last couple of weeks have been filled with revelations that my dissertation research is actually coming together (i think there may be a light at the end of this tunnel!) and that i have been so fortunate to work in an amazing place. i had a committee meeting a couple weeks ago that helped to spur many of these revelations. i have been working like a fiend in the lab for the last 3 months to get data together for this meeting. it wasn't until i actually started looking at the data a few days before the meeting that i realized the degree to which things are falling into place. for the last three years i have been collecting samples and data with the hope that something cool would come of it all, but i wasn't sure that moment was going to come...until now. i have to say that it is a pretty cool feeling. i just got back from three hard days in the field and am excited about the rest of the field season rather than dreading it. my assistant kate is home from kenya and working for me again this summer...it is great to have my right hand lady back. our dives were beautiful but soooo cold. the temperature at depth was a mere 47 degrees (no amount of peeing in your wetsuit can keep you warm in that water)!

yesterday we celebrated mother's day with pete's family in oakland. almost the whole extended family lives in the bay area so they are able to get together for lots of occasions throughout the year...it is nice. last weekend we celebrated pete's 31st birthday with the traditional 'motor monkey birthday ride' and a nice dinner out.

earth day

happy earth day! this weekend rounded out a busy week of grant writing, data analyses, and sample processing (on a machine that i have a love-hate relationship with). yesterday was a day for monterey bay aquarium associated fun. i am a mentor for the student oceanography club, which is a club for 6-8th graders around the area who are interested in the ocean and conservation. we have a theme every month that our meeting and field experience revolve around and april was tide pooling month. we took our 50 kiddies into the field yesterday to play in the intertidal. one girl was really excited about all the different kinds of algae out there so i got to teach her about the different ones we saw. i know i am a science nerd, but it was fun. last night the aquarium hosted its annual dinner for all their volunteers. if you have never been to the monterey bay aquarium, you should make an effort to see that amazing place. but it is a whole new level of wonderful when you get to eat yummy food in front of any exhibit you want to (think of giant tunas swimming in front of you) and decadent dessert trays are set up in nearly every corner of the building. AND despite the fact that there are still a lot of people in the aquarium, very few of them are running, screaming children. it is kind of a fancy shindig so i asked pete to wear a tie and i put on a dress and lipstick. a good time was had by all.

because I am awful at email and am afraid of the phone...

Cassie-dog ready for wilderness adventures on her new leg!

So...this might seem kind of lame, but i am turning to the powers of mass communication to try to keep you all updated with happenings on the west coast...or wherever i might be.
I am currently in Corvallis, Oregon, at Sunnyside Up cafe trying to write a grant proposal that is due on Monday and failing miserably. I drove up to Corvallis on Monday so i could process a bunch of water samples in my old lab. We just don't have the lab space or the set-up in Santa Cruz to do the processing down there. The drive is long, but it is a good excuse to come back here to see friends and get my running fix in Mac forest. Spring has sprung here...the trees and tulips are in full bloom and it is beautiful. Today was the first day without liquid sunshine...a good reminder of why I am a happier person all year long in California. I am heading home tomorrow and not at all looking forward to the long drive home. Or the snow that may be falling in the Siskyous...