This entry is dedicated to Miguel.
I have known many people to complain about taking language courses in school, arguing that they are useless, and anything they want to do in life can be accomplished in English. They mumble and grumble and forget the new vocabulary as soon as the exam is over, and then they walk outside into an english-speaking country and feel vindicated. These people are idiots.
Tuesday morning Chris and I set out for our last field location, both excited to be entering the last hurrah of our trip. A little over a two-hour drive from the city on some main roads, some less-main roads, and finally some tire tracks and we were there. Eager to get work done in time to set up camp that evening, we started right away, completing a couple of hours worth of scanlines before lunch. I felt confident that I would be able to accomplish everything I needed to as I sat there munching on an apple with peanut butter. We picked out a location for the next scanline, entered the coordinates into the GPS, and started the truck.... and started the truck... and started the truck. In horror, my mind flashed back to four hours before, when a passing truck had flashed its lights at me, and I had turned mine on in response. My mental promise to shut them off when we arrived rang in my ears as my eyes traveled to the knob. The switch was still on.
"Chris..." I said, my voice slow.
"What?" He too had been listening to the nauseating clicking sound that our truck had been making instead of its usual roar to life.
"Chris, I left the lights on. The battery is dead." I looked at him, having no idea what else to say, except, "I'm sorry" for the first of a thousand times.
We tried to keep our hopes up, knowing that, in theory, a vehicle with a clutch could be push-started. We had both seen Little Miss Sunshine. But even in Little Miss Sunshine they had a crew of more than five people pushing the van along paved roads to get it started. We had two. And dust, rocks, and sand. The first few pushes got the truck moving pretty quickly, because we were on a mild slope (emphasis on mild), but one of my attempts to jump into the driver's seat and start the truck resulted in a large lump on the top of my head and a bleeding tongue. Soon we were off the the "slope" and into a relatively flat channel. We resigned ourselves to the unfortunate reality that the truck was not going to start. We looked at the road in the distance, or the closest thing to a road we had to look at, which was about two miles off. True, at some point some mining company vehicle had driven through and plowed a relatively flat, drivable surface, but that surface had only been used by two vehicles so far that day - including us. The next closest road with a name was a half-an-hour away driving. The best plan seemed to be to keep pushing the truck, get it to the closest "road" and wait for some vehicle to come by.
We pushed. And pushed. And pushed. Over the next three-and-a-half hours we pushed our big, diesel truck towards the road. In between pushes, I sat on the bumper looking backwards at our tracks, our footprints in the sand recording our progress. There were a few segments where our footprints were spread out and shallow, as we jogged behind the vehicle only having to push with our arms to keep it going. More often, though, were the segments of deep, sprawling gouges from our feet as we threw our shoulders into the tailgate and felt every inch that the truck moved in our shoulders, backs, and thighs - involuntary, guttural groans escaping us as we used every ounce of strength we had. We both have a set of bruises on our shoulders corresponding nicely with the now-permanent, shoulder-shaped dents in the tailgate. Only having two people to push meant that we lacked the necessary ability to steer, so our tires left a zig-zag trace along the channel, as we would first tie the steering wheel with the wheels cocked to the left, push, retie the steering wheel, and leave another track veering off to the right. Our journey continued for three-and-a-half hours, not because that is how long it took to get to the road, but because that is how long it took for our bodies to completely refuse to work anymore. We had pushed the truck just over a mile. We were discussing whether or not to set up camp for the night right where we were, when we heard a low, rumbling sound. Chris grabbed the GPS and walkee-talkee and sprinted the rest of the way to the road, pushing his already-exhausted body harder than I like to think about. Unfortunately, the sound must have been a plane or distant mining vehicle, because no truck came. Chris used his time at the road to carve "Help!" in Spanish into the dirt with his heel. When Chris returned to the truck we started to set up camp for the evening. It was clear that our bodies were not going to move the truck any farther that day, bruises already blossoming over our bodies wherever they had touched the vehicle - shoulders, hips, thighs, the palms of our hands - and both of us were in pretty desperate need of some dinner.
Our moods rose some as we set up our tents, glad to be doing anything besides pushing the truck, the poles of our tents clacking together happily in the fading sunlight. Suddenly, both our idle chatter and the clacking of our tent poles stopped and neither of even dared to move our hands. Both of us had heard the bump and rattle of a large vehicle going over rough terrain, and this time it had been close. Before either of us could even pose a question, the sound came again, and after a momentary glance towards each other, Chris grabbed the GPS, the walkee-talkee, and his headlamp, and once again sprinted to the road on his exhausted legs. I grabbed the other walkee-talkee and stood in front of the truck, squinting watch Chris turn into an ever-smaller black spec as he ran the last kilometer to the road in the growing darkness, the sounds of the approaching vehicle ringing in my ears.
Suddenly, there was a larger black spec in the distance - a tractor trailer pulling a large flatbed with a front end loader on it had stopped. I gripped the walkee-talkee and said thank you. This was the only vehicle to pass since the discovery of our dead battery five hours before.
"Amanda?" Chris' voice finally crackled over the speaker in my hand.
"Yes!" I answered in such a rush that I almost forgot to push the button.
"He said he will drive us to Antofagasta." Chris answered. I bit my lip. I really didn't want to abandon the truck, if it at all possible, but our options were running quite slim.
"Can he call the police for us, once he gets to the road, maybe?" I posed, already hesitant to watch the only vehicle we had seen drive away.
"He says that we would have to come with him to the police, that they wouldn't come out here without knowing for sure that our story is true." Chris responded. "Plus, if Hertz couldn't find us with GPS coordinates, what makes you think the police could?" At this point I was trying to concoct a way to ask whether the truck driver seemed trustworthy, but not wanting to offend our potential rescuer by asking just that.
"Does he speak English?" I asked. Chris paused, confused by the question.
"No. Not really... but he said he is willing to take us to Antofagasta," he posed again.
"Ok, well, should I pack everything back up, or will you come grab some of it?" I asked, tacking "and-do-you-think-he-is-trustworthy" onto the end in what I hoped was too-rapid english for the truck driver, but not too fast for Chris to understand.
"Yeah, I do." Chris answered, but before I could ask another question, he said to "hold on."
As I waited I started to pull the tent poles back out of my tent and put them back in the bag.
"Amanda?" Chris' voice came again.
"Yeah?" I asked, pulling the walkee-talkee back out of my pocket.
"We are pulling the battery out of the front-end loader and are going to carry it out to you. Ok?" He said, clanging noises ringing in the background.
"Ok." I said excitedly. "Is there anything I should do?"
"Just knock down camp and put on your headlamp so it will be easier to find you."
I took one last glance at the distant truck in the fading light and continued to repack our tents. Once I had everything back in the truck, pulled out the jumper cables, and popped the hood, I looked out again in the direction of the truck. The light had faded too much to see the vehicle anymore, but I could see the vague outline of Chris and the truck driver, battery hanging awkwardly between them, making their way towards me. Even at that distance and in such poor light, it was obvious that the battery was quite heavy from their wide, heavy steps and changing of hands. Night had fallen in earnest by the time they reached the truck, and I held out my hand to say thank you to our mysterious rescuer. He took my hand, and fluttered the fingers of his other hand over his heart and simply said "my heart is pounding" in response. I imagine that the distance to the truck had seemed significantly less than it actually was - large, open spaces play with your perception like that. Chris and I used our headlamps to light the truck driver's hands as they worked, no one saying anything out of exhaustion and nervous anticipation. Finally, the truck driver told us to start the vehicle. I tried, but there was only the same, empty clicking noise as before. All of our hearts sank. We tried a few more times, but nothing. The truck driver suggested that we try push starting it, but after a few minutes of pushing, and the truck only moving about six inches, he declared "Oh my god, this truck is heavy" and the plan was abandoned. We would have to abandon the truck.
Chris and I discussed potential plans as we threw all of our most important gear into our packs. We decided to ride with the truck driver out to the main road and try our luck with the police. If that failed, we would just go the rest of the way to Antofagasta. We began the slow walk back to the tractor trailer in the dark, the boys once again carrying the battery between them and me following the GPS point Chris had made of our rescuer's truck. When we reached the truck there was a moment of panic, because when the truck driver pulled his keys out of his pocket, nothing came out but the keychain. Thankfully, after a few moments of frantic searching the key turned up deeper in that same pocket. I don't think we could have found a lost key during the day, let alone at night. We loaded into the cab of the truck, which was much nicer than it looked from the outside, and started the slow journey out of the desert. In the silence, Chris apparently calmed enough to remember social courtesy.
"My name is Chris." he said, putting out his hand. The truck driver took it and shook it.
"Miguel."
I put out my hand and did the same.
"Amanda."
"Miguel."
"Thank you." we both said again, the words feeling woefully insufficient.
"De nada." said Miguel. (I write the Spanish response there, even though I have been writing the rest of the story in English, simply because it is not the same as what we say. In English, we would have said "You're welcome." In Spanish, you say what roughly translates to "It is nothing." In this context, with all that Miguel had already done, that response had a much more lasting meaning).
We drove in relative silence to the main road, and Miguel stopped the vehicle while we tried the police. Our Spanish got us about far enough to say "Our truck battery is dead out in the desert and we need help." Thankfully, Miguel took over and explained the situation more thoroughly. After a few minutes of rapid Spanish, he hung up and shook his head no. He explained that they did not have a four-wheel-drive vehicle, and thus weren't going to come help us. It was on to Antofagasta.
At this point I called Gabriel, our collaborator and contact at the Universidad Catolica del Norte in Antofagasta. I quickly explained our situation and Gabriel said to get a hotel for the night and to meet him at the University in the morning. He would arrange to have the geology department driver there to meet us and take us back out. I thanked him profusely and began calling hotels. The only hotel with an opening turned out to be the hotel we had left approximately twelve hours before, but at least we had somewhere to sleep.
We made a brief stop where Miguel had to turn in his tractor trailer and pick up his own truck, and Chris and I waited, tired and filthy, just outside the gate. Within a few minutes, Miguel's own Toyota emerged and we continued our journey. He explained to us animatedly about how he had put in the stereo system and added all kinds of neat features, and we did our best to follow along. Chris and I tried to figure out some kind of parting gift for Miguel, to say thank you, but we only had dirty clothes and equipment for our research. Eventually Chris remembered he had a hat with him and his green laser pointer, so he dug them out so that they would be ready when Miguel stopped. Miguel weaved into the upper part of the city, taking roads neither of us had seen, but explained that he would call a taxi for us to get back down to our hotel on the coast. We stopped and said our thank yous and goodbyes as the taxi approached. After telling the taxi driver where we needed to go, he thanked us for the hat and laser pointer, and walked out of our lives. The taxi ride itself was interesting, weaving and maneuvering with all the speed and aggressiveness of a New York City taxi driver, but with none of the angry honking. We stopped and picked up additional passengers, the taxis here operating on a "the taxi is only full once all of the seats are full" policy, simply dropping people off in the order they were picked up. It may not be as direct as a private taxi, but it is certainly cheaper.
At the hotel we met the smiling face of the same woman who had checked us out of our room that morning. We were simply short a truck. We trudged up to our room, and thankful to be rescued, slept soundly through the night.
In the morning we walked by a grocery store on the way to the University and grabbed some fresh bread and juice for breakfast. Our filthy backpacks and clothing drew more than a couple of glances. We arrived at the geology department a few minutes early, plopped down in the hallway, and started eating our breakfast. One of the other professors stopped by our feet and asked us who we were waiting for, and we said Gabriel, both motioning at his door with the bread in our hands. The professor stared at us for a moment, then broke into mildly accented English, asking if we wanted any coffee. We both shook our heads no.
"How about some tea? And a table and chairs?" He pointed at the label on the door across from us. "This is a kitchen."
We both said that tea would be nice and gathered our things as he unlocked the door. We must have looked so pitiful: exhausted and filthy on the floor of the hallway, chewing on bread and staring at the floor. The professor turned out to be Hans, a German, who knew my advisor and cheerfully talked to us as he made tea. It was wholly refreshing company, considering how the previous day had gone. How normal everything seemed, just sitting around having tea. Gabriel arrived then and joined us while we waited for Alejandro, the department driver. Hans told stories about times he had gotten his vehicle stuck and walked 25 miles, or when he and Gabriel had two tires blow out simultaneously, causing the vehicle to flip.
When Alejandro arrived, he introduced himself jovially, kissed me on the cheek, and lead us out to his truck. We weaved through a similar part of town as the night before, stopping to pick up a spare battery and a tool box from what I assume what his house. A little while longer of weaving through tiny streets, and we were on the main road out of the city.
I had been telling myself through the previous night that it would be utterly ridiculous for anyone to find our truck, and of course our stuff would be there when we got back to the truck. As we drove, however, rational thought faded, and I began to worry. Would our stuff be there? What if it wasn't? What if something happened to our truck? These thoughts eventually slowed, and I fell asleep. I woke up as Chris asked if this was the road where we wanted to turn of, and I confirmed that it was, the concerns of missing gear or a missing vehicle returning. I sat rigidly in my seat as we made the half-an-hour trip off of the main road back to our particular patch of the desert. Finally, we rounded a corner and crested a ridge, and there it was: our filthy, dead, heavy, wonderful truck.
Alejandro's truck made it easily out to ours, and we asked if we should pull out the jumper cables. He shook his head now and gestured to the extra battery in the back. He said it would be easier just to use the new battery. We watched as he pulled out our battery and put in the one he brought with him, which was of a slightly different design. Chris and I discussed softly about whether it was a good idea to put a new battery in a rented vehicle. Alejandro said "okay," and we both looked up. He has crossed some cables and shoved some cables around to make the leads connect to the proper part of the new battery. The solution looked tenuous to me at best. Then, with his gloved hands planted firmly on he connections to the battery, he said "start it up." We both stared.
"With your hands in the truck?" we asked, trying to make our Spanish as understandable as possible.
"Yes."
"Yes? Yes, start the truck with your hands in it, holding the battery?"
"Yes."
I looked at Chris, and we were both wearing the same 'I really don't want to kill this guy' expression.
"You are sure?" I asked one last time.
"Yes." he said, full of confidence, and in the moment before Chris turned the key, Alejandro gave me a clear, smiling wink.
The truck roared to life, especially loud with the hood open, and before I could even react, Alejandro was busily removing his battery and putting our old one back in. The engine continued to run, making the most wonderful sound I had heard since Miguel's truck the night before. We thanked Alejandro, and drove the half-an-hour back to the main road behind him, so that we could test the engine again once we got there without having to make him simply wait. Once at the road, we shut off the truck, and it turned back on without hesitation. Chris and I breathed a collective sigh of relief, waved goodbye to Alejandro, and headed back to our field site.
All in all the whole experience took just under 24 hours - not that bad - but it could have been much worse. Miguel's truck was the last vehicle besides our own to travel that road for the next three days. If we had not caught him, or been able to explain or problem, Chris and I would have had to face some of the decidedly less favorable "hiking out" options. We are back now, only a day away from the end of our trip, and very glad to have that whole ordeal behind us. Take care; I will post some pictures soon.
Take care.
Study foreign languages.
Don't leave your lights on.
Amanda
Sunday, July 5, 2009
Monday, June 29, 2009
Chile at its best
Greetings!
Not much time to write a full entry today, so I will just post some pictures. I come home in a week!
Field assistant... or monkey... I think both
Mmmmm... nothing like a layer of dust on your clothes to tell you it has been a good day
The prettiest kitchen I have ever prepared a meal in...
Looking out over one of our field areas from the past week
The rest of the photos are from one of our campsites. The views were incomparable, but the wind at night was decidedly less than ideal. We opted for a less picturesque / more sheltered site the following night.
If you look closely, you can see me writing in my journal and looking out over the sunset.
Ok... that is it for now. Until next time!
Not much time to write a full entry today, so I will just post some pictures. I come home in a week!
Field assistant... or monkey... I think both
Mmmmm... nothing like a layer of dust on your clothes to tell you it has been a good day
The prettiest kitchen I have ever prepared a meal in...
Looking out over one of our field areas from the past week
The rest of the photos are from one of our campsites. The views were incomparable, but the wind at night was decidedly less than ideal. We opted for a less picturesque / more sheltered site the following night.
If you look closely, you can see me writing in my journal and looking out over the sunset.
Ok... that is it for now. Until next time!
Tuesday, June 23, 2009
And so it goes...
Greetings!
We are back from another successful stint in the desert, even with the few complications that seem to be necessary for every leg of this trip. A few miles outside of town (thankfully) we blew a tire... and I mean blew... look at the pictures... it tore off of the rim and rolled away from us. Luckily we were somewhere where it was relatively easy to stop. We got the tools out from behind the seat, jacked the truck up, and started to remove the bolts. Whoever tightened them must compete in strong man competitions... you know the ones where they throw trees to show how manly they are? Anyway, we couldn't get them all off. We almost broke the handle of the shovel trying to use it to extend out for leverage, but one more push and the handle would have broken. I dug out the cell phone and called Hertz in Iquique, telling them in terrible Spanish and some English what our predicament was. When they asked where we were, we found ourselves facing another problem... we had no idea. "On the road that heads north out of Alto Hospicio... into the middle of nowhere... there is some trash by us" was not nearly specific enough for the person trying to bring us a tire. Eventually I flagged down a car and asked them what road we were on. They were kind enough to write it down. It was no wonder we couldn't explain where we were; the concise road label the people in the car gave us was something equivalent to "The road that heads north of X, next to Y, up to Z." Thankfully, the people at Hertz seemed to know where that was and said someone would bring a tire in the next twenty minutes. Eventually we figured out that we could get the bolts off by standing on the wrench and jumping up and down (I don't imagine this is the intended procedure) and switched the demolished tire out with the spare. It has now been almost an hour since the twenty minutes when the tire was supposed to arrive, so we made another call to the people at Hertz. They assured us that the man with the tire was ten minutes away... as they did every time we called for the next two-and-a-half hours. I would have preferred that they said "It will take three hours;" at least then I would have known what to expect. I really only started to worry when it reached ten minutes to closing time for Hertz, so I called back and asked for the cell phone number of the man with the tire, so that we could help him find us, if need be. The man finally arrived, highly apologetic, with two tires about half an hour after Hertz closed. Within minutes we had the new spare up under the truck, thanked the man profusely, and were out on our way.
Though we didn't accomplish much on the day of the blow-out, the next few days were filled with nothing but work and some stunning sunsets. I wish that I could describe how beautiful it was from the knob where we camped. The first night the fog came in just before sunset and sat covering the land below us like a giant sea. I have included some pictures, but nothing will come close to capturing it. An ocean of clouds came in and settled below us, making an impromtu shoreline of the terrain, the ridges and peaks becoming nothing more than lonely islands out in the distance. Chris and I stood there in awe as long as the light lasted. I am thankful that we stood and watched the fog that first night, because the other nights didn't even come close as far as level of beauty. Such a weird place.... such a weird, weird, beautiful, weird place. I had gotten used to the absolute silence out here, but was struck by it again when Chris pointed out that we could hear the sound of the birds coasting through the air overhead. He wasn't referring to when they flapped - that produced a noise sharp enough to make you look up - but the sound of them simply cutting through the air with their wings produced a sound like a soft tearing... like the bird was ripping through some invisible sheet. Amazing.
We are now done with three of our five stints out in the field, and I am getting pretty excited about coming back home. The next one is five days, so don't expect anything new until Monday the 29th. Take care in the meantime... ok... now the pictures
The way in and out of the parking garage underneath our hotel in Iquique... this picture does not capture at all how steep, narrow, and tightly turning it is... nor does it capture how dark or insanely tight the spaces within the garage are. I hate this garage... simply hate it. But I like the hotel...
So much is captured in this photo... the utterly demolished tire, the shovel we tried to use to get the bolts off, the shards of tire that tried so desperately to remain on the rim, and me staring off in the direction of where the man with the new tire should be coming from... should...
The enormous sand dune that looms over the city of Iquique. This photo was taken from the cliff road leaving from Iquique to Alto Hospicio.
Because we should have at least one picture of science on here... that is me hacking away at an ash at Punta de Lobos (this photo is from the location described in the last entry).
This is an attempt at a before and after with the fog on that beautiful night... ok... the knob sticking up in front of you in this photo
is to the far right of this photo (taken a couple of hours later)
and is near the left side of this photo
I know that it is hard to capture onscreen, but the fog just devoured all of the terrain, and you couldn't see anything but the peaks.
Similarly this daytime photo corresponds to the next three sunset photos
I like that you can almost see a little "wave" of fog in the foreground of this one
Sigh... pretty
And finally this photo corresponds to the one below it.
It is a crazy place out here... nothing like it.... nothing like it at all.
Until next time,
Amanda
We are back from another successful stint in the desert, even with the few complications that seem to be necessary for every leg of this trip. A few miles outside of town (thankfully) we blew a tire... and I mean blew... look at the pictures... it tore off of the rim and rolled away from us. Luckily we were somewhere where it was relatively easy to stop. We got the tools out from behind the seat, jacked the truck up, and started to remove the bolts. Whoever tightened them must compete in strong man competitions... you know the ones where they throw trees to show how manly they are? Anyway, we couldn't get them all off. We almost broke the handle of the shovel trying to use it to extend out for leverage, but one more push and the handle would have broken. I dug out the cell phone and called Hertz in Iquique, telling them in terrible Spanish and some English what our predicament was. When they asked where we were, we found ourselves facing another problem... we had no idea. "On the road that heads north out of Alto Hospicio... into the middle of nowhere... there is some trash by us" was not nearly specific enough for the person trying to bring us a tire. Eventually I flagged down a car and asked them what road we were on. They were kind enough to write it down. It was no wonder we couldn't explain where we were; the concise road label the people in the car gave us was something equivalent to "The road that heads north of X, next to Y, up to Z." Thankfully, the people at Hertz seemed to know where that was and said someone would bring a tire in the next twenty minutes. Eventually we figured out that we could get the bolts off by standing on the wrench and jumping up and down (I don't imagine this is the intended procedure) and switched the demolished tire out with the spare. It has now been almost an hour since the twenty minutes when the tire was supposed to arrive, so we made another call to the people at Hertz. They assured us that the man with the tire was ten minutes away... as they did every time we called for the next two-and-a-half hours. I would have preferred that they said "It will take three hours;" at least then I would have known what to expect. I really only started to worry when it reached ten minutes to closing time for Hertz, so I called back and asked for the cell phone number of the man with the tire, so that we could help him find us, if need be. The man finally arrived, highly apologetic, with two tires about half an hour after Hertz closed. Within minutes we had the new spare up under the truck, thanked the man profusely, and were out on our way.
Though we didn't accomplish much on the day of the blow-out, the next few days were filled with nothing but work and some stunning sunsets. I wish that I could describe how beautiful it was from the knob where we camped. The first night the fog came in just before sunset and sat covering the land below us like a giant sea. I have included some pictures, but nothing will come close to capturing it. An ocean of clouds came in and settled below us, making an impromtu shoreline of the terrain, the ridges and peaks becoming nothing more than lonely islands out in the distance. Chris and I stood there in awe as long as the light lasted. I am thankful that we stood and watched the fog that first night, because the other nights didn't even come close as far as level of beauty. Such a weird place.... such a weird, weird, beautiful, weird place. I had gotten used to the absolute silence out here, but was struck by it again when Chris pointed out that we could hear the sound of the birds coasting through the air overhead. He wasn't referring to when they flapped - that produced a noise sharp enough to make you look up - but the sound of them simply cutting through the air with their wings produced a sound like a soft tearing... like the bird was ripping through some invisible sheet. Amazing.
We are now done with three of our five stints out in the field, and I am getting pretty excited about coming back home. The next one is five days, so don't expect anything new until Monday the 29th. Take care in the meantime... ok... now the pictures
The way in and out of the parking garage underneath our hotel in Iquique... this picture does not capture at all how steep, narrow, and tightly turning it is... nor does it capture how dark or insanely tight the spaces within the garage are. I hate this garage... simply hate it. But I like the hotel...
So much is captured in this photo... the utterly demolished tire, the shovel we tried to use to get the bolts off, the shards of tire that tried so desperately to remain on the rim, and me staring off in the direction of where the man with the new tire should be coming from... should...
The enormous sand dune that looms over the city of Iquique. This photo was taken from the cliff road leaving from Iquique to Alto Hospicio.
Because we should have at least one picture of science on here... that is me hacking away at an ash at Punta de Lobos (this photo is from the location described in the last entry).
This is an attempt at a before and after with the fog on that beautiful night... ok... the knob sticking up in front of you in this photo
is to the far right of this photo (taken a couple of hours later)
and is near the left side of this photo
I know that it is hard to capture onscreen, but the fog just devoured all of the terrain, and you couldn't see anything but the peaks.
Similarly this daytime photo corresponds to the next three sunset photos
I like that you can almost see a little "wave" of fog in the foreground of this one
Sigh... pretty
And finally this photo corresponds to the one below it.
It is a crazy place out here... nothing like it.... nothing like it at all.
Until next time,
Amanda
Friday, June 19, 2009
From Mars to You
Greetings!
The morning after the long drive to and from and to camp we headed out to find some unique features on the satellite imagery. My chosen path was apparently too optimistic as far as what I could accomplish with our big truck, and rather than looking at fascinating surface cracks or dunes, we were looking at a channel that we had been able to drive into, but not back out of. Then we were looking at the end of that channel, the very steep slopes outside of the channel, the extremely rough terrain below those hills, some mine property, and an abandoned railroad grade with all of the tracks and wood pried off. The afternoon, while not necessarily filled with academic inquiry, was mentally strenuous in its own right trying to find a way back out of the seemingly one-way-access piece of nowhere we had gotten ourselves into. The answer was, unfortunately, the railroad grade. Driving on a railroad grade, while relatively straight and approximately the width of the truck, is unpleasant. I could try to describe how unpleasant, but I think it is best explained by the fact that we vibrated the labels off of the water containers in the back of the truck... simply vibrated them into fingernail-sized scraps. Chris was afraid he would have a seatbelt shaped bruise across his chest. Though we did not find the features we were looking for and left a few new marks on the truck, we found our way back to camp, and that made the day a victory. I had not really liked the tent that I bought in Iquique, it shook in the wind and one of the poles cracked to the point of almost breaking the first time I tried to put it up, so I decided to see if the poles would work with my other tent. With some finagling, removing a few pieces from the new tent, and a few extra stakes, I had an only mildly deflated version of my tent. As I knelt to pound in the last stake, my pants tore... right across the back of my upper left thigh. I sighed, pounded in the stake, and resigned myself to having one fewer pair of pants for the rest of my trip.
Thankfully, the tearing pants marked the end of the mishaps for the start of the trip. The next day we found a somewhere to park within an hour-and-a-half hike to the features we wanted to see. That marked the start of three more days of productivity before heading into Iquique for some showers, food, and gas. We had a tasty dinner at a not-so-tasty time (they brought our food at 10:20 when we had ordered at 9:05) and headed back to the hotel for some sleep. We spent the next four days at Punta de Lobos (Wolves' Point) which Chris believes earned its name from the constantly howling wind. Excepting one day of clouds, our time there went basically as expected - sun, wind, and lots of walking. Now we are back in town for the evening, and will be heading out for another three days. I'll let you know more when we come back on Tuesday. Now... the part you actually look at: pictures.
Working at Punta de Lobos... or Mars... you decide
Our super-gourmet kitchen
Trying to get the crappy poles from the crappy tent to work for my nice tent
Camp at Punta de Lobos - note my awesome use of the wrong poles to put up the better tent
Who needs a light table??
The footprints of a little visitor that came while we were sleeping... what it is doing all the way out here, I will never know
The convenient parking spot to hike from... aka, the truck wouldn't go any farther up the channel
The view from where we hiked to... people will apparently drive ATV's anywhere
Ok... that's it. Until next time....
The morning after the long drive to and from and to camp we headed out to find some unique features on the satellite imagery. My chosen path was apparently too optimistic as far as what I could accomplish with our big truck, and rather than looking at fascinating surface cracks or dunes, we were looking at a channel that we had been able to drive into, but not back out of. Then we were looking at the end of that channel, the very steep slopes outside of the channel, the extremely rough terrain below those hills, some mine property, and an abandoned railroad grade with all of the tracks and wood pried off. The afternoon, while not necessarily filled with academic inquiry, was mentally strenuous in its own right trying to find a way back out of the seemingly one-way-access piece of nowhere we had gotten ourselves into. The answer was, unfortunately, the railroad grade. Driving on a railroad grade, while relatively straight and approximately the width of the truck, is unpleasant. I could try to describe how unpleasant, but I think it is best explained by the fact that we vibrated the labels off of the water containers in the back of the truck... simply vibrated them into fingernail-sized scraps. Chris was afraid he would have a seatbelt shaped bruise across his chest. Though we did not find the features we were looking for and left a few new marks on the truck, we found our way back to camp, and that made the day a victory. I had not really liked the tent that I bought in Iquique, it shook in the wind and one of the poles cracked to the point of almost breaking the first time I tried to put it up, so I decided to see if the poles would work with my other tent. With some finagling, removing a few pieces from the new tent, and a few extra stakes, I had an only mildly deflated version of my tent. As I knelt to pound in the last stake, my pants tore... right across the back of my upper left thigh. I sighed, pounded in the stake, and resigned myself to having one fewer pair of pants for the rest of my trip.
Thankfully, the tearing pants marked the end of the mishaps for the start of the trip. The next day we found a somewhere to park within an hour-and-a-half hike to the features we wanted to see. That marked the start of three more days of productivity before heading into Iquique for some showers, food, and gas. We had a tasty dinner at a not-so-tasty time (they brought our food at 10:20 when we had ordered at 9:05) and headed back to the hotel for some sleep. We spent the next four days at Punta de Lobos (Wolves' Point) which Chris believes earned its name from the constantly howling wind. Excepting one day of clouds, our time there went basically as expected - sun, wind, and lots of walking. Now we are back in town for the evening, and will be heading out for another three days. I'll let you know more when we come back on Tuesday. Now... the part you actually look at: pictures.
Working at Punta de Lobos... or Mars... you decide
Our super-gourmet kitchen
Trying to get the crappy poles from the crappy tent to work for my nice tent
Camp at Punta de Lobos - note my awesome use of the wrong poles to put up the better tent
Who needs a light table??
The footprints of a little visitor that came while we were sleeping... what it is doing all the way out here, I will never know
The convenient parking spot to hike from... aka, the truck wouldn't go any farther up the channel
The view from where we hiked to... people will apparently drive ATV's anywhere
Ok... that's it. Until next time....
Sunday, June 14, 2009
Back in the Wasteland
Greetings all!
I am back in Chile, and have one week of four under my belt, but what a week it has been. If any of you remember my 12-hour layover in Santiago last year, you will understand why I tried for shorter connections this year. Forty minutes into arriving at the airport in Newark, I started to question this decision. Why forty minutes? Because at forty minutes the status of our flight went from on-time to one hour delayed. Considering that our next layover was an hour and thirty-five minutes in total, worrying was well within reason. When our flight finally took off and then landed in Miami, an all out sprint took us to the next gate, where everyone had already loaded. Thankfully we made it on board, and had all night before our next connection could even begin to be a concern. A couple of hours into the flight, when I finally started to settle in tried drifting off to sleep, I noticed that the light that pointed at my seat turned on and then off, on and then off, on and then off every few minutes, staying on just long enough that when it turned off it startled you again. The Chilean boy in the seat next to me and I spent the next few minutes experimenting with the buttons on our chairs to establish that it was, in fact, my chair that was malfunctioning. With that, I called over the flight attendant and began to explain in mangled Spanish what seemed to be happening. A few sentences in, the boy next to me broke in with some proper sentence structure and we were in business. The flight attendant bustled off to the front of the plane with a look of determination and the boy next to me gave me an encouraging nod. The first flight attendant returned with a second, who mashed at the buttons on the seat for a while, turning the light repeatedly on and off, much to the chagrin of everyone trying to sleep in the surrounding three rows. When the frantic button-pushing stopped with no notable change in the rouge light's behavior, the flight attendant told us that nothing could be done, she was sorry, but we would have to just deal with it for the duration of the flight. The boy and I sighed in unison, put our jackets over our faces, and eventually drifted off to a fitful sleep.
I awoke to the arrival of the breakfast cart and checked my watch while drinking some juice. It seemed that we would be rushed, but would probably be able to accomplish everything we needed to and still make our connection in Santiago. Before leaving for the trip, Terry Jordan (one of the professors at Cornell) told me that the protocol for buying cellphone sim cards had changed since I was last there. When she entered the country a few months ago, she rented a sim card from at the Santiago airport, used the phone as much as she wanted while in the country, and was handed a bill when she returned the card on her way out of the country. When Chris (my field assistant for this year) and I got off the plane in Santiago, I left him in the line to buy his entrance visa and told him that I would meet him by the baggage claim on the other side of immigration, where the cell phone booth was also supposed to be. Unfortunately, since the flight was so early in the morning, the booth wasn't open yet. "Fine," I thought, "more time to get through customs and get some cash before we get on the next plane." I stood waiting for Chris by the conveyor belt with all the baggage, pulling our bags off as I waited. Chris joined me and the line thinned... as did the supply of bags on the belt. Anyone who has ever checked luggage knows that it is completely normal to assume that your piece of luggage will be the one that got left behind, or sent to Fiii, or got run over by the plane. From the first piece of luggage that enters on the conveyor, we convince ourselves that ours will not be there, and with each new suitcase that isn't topped with our particular identifier (hideous orange yarn, brightly colored luggage straps, etc) we become more and more convinced. Until, of course, our piece of luggage does appear, and all of those terrible thoughts disappear off to Fiji themselves. "You've never lost luggage before," my Kris had said before I left this summer, "I don't see why this time should be any different." Those words played on loop in my head as I stood watching the same twelve items come and go on the now-barren conveyor, repeating their descriptions to myself as they went by "... bulgy blue duffel with the green stain followed by the brown suitcase with the broken wheel... taped up guitar hero box... green suitcase with the creepy cat sticker..." Swearing under my breath, I finally turned and got in line at the counter for reporting lost luggage. A glance at my watch told me that we had less than an hour to report my luggage, go through customs, check back in, and board our flight to Antofagasta. As I waited for the woman in front of me to describe each of her family's six lost pieces of luggage, I began ticking off a mental check-list of what was in the bag that had been left behind. "... tent, sleeping bag, sleeping pad, field books, hammer, tool belt, shampoo, conditioner, soap... sigh... sneakers, siphon for gas, batteries, walkee-talkees, camp pillow..." and I was sure there was more I had forgotten about. "It's fine," I told myself, "it will show up."
B y the time we reached the counter, our plane had already begun to board. I quickly described my duffel, filled out some forms, and gave them the name of the hotel I would be at until Tuesday morning in Antofagasta. We started through customs with fifteen minutes to take off, and sprinted to the counter where we had to recheck our bags. By the time we got there, our flight was already closed. Thankfully, before the flashbacks of last year's twelve hour layover could even fully form, they told us that, if we hurried, they could get us on the next flight, leaving in half and hour. We checked our bags, ran through the airport, and madeit with about ten minutes to spare: the best connection we had made yet. That flight, the taxi ride to the hotel, and moving everything up to the room was relatively uneventful. After a nap and some food shopping, I stopped in at the desk downstairs and asked if there had been any news about my bag. Since I A) did not currently have a working cell phone and B) have extremely mediocre Spanish, it seemed best to enlist the help of the native speaker at the desk in trying to ascertain the whereabouts of my bag. A few phone calls later, she said it would be on the flight arriving into Antofagasta at eight o'clock the next morning (Monday).
Playing the game of "where in the world is my luggage" became an unwelcome common thread holding together the rest of our tasks the following day. Wake up, catch a cab to go get the rental truck. Drive back to hotel. Ask if bag has arrived yet. Receive the slow, sad head shake and pressed lips: no. Drive to University of Antofagasta to meet Gabriel, almost hit j-walking students, park illegally, chat with Gabriel, get camping gear, return to hotel, and ask about my bag. Now with and added shrug: no, but she will call and ask... 4:30, they say it will come at 4:30. With that we headed to the mall to buy the sim card for my cell phone that we had not been able to buy at the airport. Once at the mall, the seemingly simple task of activating the cell phone became a somewhat monumental ordeal requiring practically every staff member in the store. I believe my initial request was relatively straight forward.
Me: I need a new sim card for my Entel phone. Can you do that here?
Man 1: Yes
We were off to a good start, but the conversation was in Spanish, so things began to quickly deteriorate.
Me: My professor... said... the old cards... not work... now rent card new way.
Man 1: What?
Me: My professor... she said she buy sim card at airport... and... give people credit card number... uses cell phone... give return sim card... and pays.
Woman 1 (who has approached during this embarrassing monologue): What? (to Man 1) Do you know anyone who speaks English?
Me (picking up new sim card form counter): Will this work? I buy cards and this work?
Man 1: (to woman 1) I don't.... well... maybe
Woman 1: Call him.
Woman 1 then assures us that the card will work, but Man 1 is already dialing. Eventually the phone is handed to me and a disastrous dialogue ensues. His English, it turns out, is worse than my Spanish. During our conversation Woman 1 tells Chris that after three months of non-use, a sim card is deactivated. We decide to buy the new card. For a while, Woman 1 stares at the package confused. Eventually she and Woman 2 start digging through a bag of price tags. Apparently the item we want to buy is missing one. Eventually they find a sticker and Woman 1 disappears. She returns with Man 2, who motions us over to another counter where he rings us out, speaking English at the one time we could have most easily gotten by without: numbers. We are then sent back to the original counter where Woman 1 installs the sim card and punches some numbers. She and Man 1 ask for my passport, which, after inspection, apparently was not at all what they needed. After a few more minutes of rapid Spanish, the phone is handed to us.
Me: It works?
Woman 1: Yes.
Me: Is possible test it?
Man 1: What?
Me: Is possible call... and test?
Man 1: lknaje;otireng;sotnh;iurtnholikmneofina;ogn
Chris: (looking at my confused face) He said that the phone will receive a message in the next ten minutes if it works.
Me: Oh.
We decided to wander through the mall until said message arrived. Once it does, we make the pleasant walk back to the hotel, where my hopes are once again crushed by a sad shrug and shaken head: no bag. The woman at the desk calls the airport to find out that the man who left to deliver luggage at 4:00 had left without my bag. He simply forgot it. He would bring it on his 9:30 run, they promised. We headed back upstairs until dinner, and I left for dinner telling myself not to worry, when we got back, I would have my luggage. Unfortunately, as wonderful and uplifting as the dinner was, no happy mood could override the frustration I felt when I returned to the hotel to find that my bag had not yet arrived at 11:15. I resigned myself to the fact that my bag was not going to arrive, booked the hotel for the following night, and headed up to bed. At 12:15 the hotel phone rang and the woman at the front desk told me excitedly that the man with my bag had arrived. I ran down the stairs in my pajamas to find the woman at the front desk staring at me extremely confused. I asked about my bag, and she said the man had just gone up the elevator. Two flights of stairs later there it was, my bag with its wonderful topping of hideous orange fringe.
Bag in hand, we headed out the next morning for the long drive to the northern side of Salar Grande. Chris and I kept the mood high with music blaring and the pedal close to the floor. We arrived at the campsite in a little over seven hours, faster than we had anticipated, and jumped out of the truck to set up camp in the remaining daylight. I pulled out my tent and laid it out on the ground, excited by the lack of wind. I reached into my bag for my poles and, within moments had landed butt first in the sand. I did not fall because I tripped, or even lost my balance, but because I had realized, in that moment, that my tent poles were still in Ithaca. Within ten minutes of our triumphant arrival we were back on the "road" racing the daylight to Iquique. We got to Iquique, and after a few phone calls established that the hotels we knew were booked for the evening, we pulled into the mall. Eleven minutes after parking, I exited the mall doors, tent in hand, and started the two and a half hour journey back into the middle of nowhere, now with the dark and the fog to contend with. Finally back at the campsite, we set up our tents in the dark, and finally laid down to a good night's sleep.
More has happened since then (this blog only reaches until the evening of Tuesday June 9th) but I am tired and must go to sleep. Here are some pictures to hold you over until next time.
Always,
Amanda
Antofagasta... just a random part of the city where they water things liberally with hoses until grass grows
What Chris, the noble field assistant, has looked like every three minutes since we arrived here
The camp site north of Salar Grande (you can see our truck and such)
The new tent... the nature of it's integrity to be assessed in the next entry
I am back in Chile, and have one week of four under my belt, but what a week it has been. If any of you remember my 12-hour layover in Santiago last year, you will understand why I tried for shorter connections this year. Forty minutes into arriving at the airport in Newark, I started to question this decision. Why forty minutes? Because at forty minutes the status of our flight went from on-time to one hour delayed. Considering that our next layover was an hour and thirty-five minutes in total, worrying was well within reason. When our flight finally took off and then landed in Miami, an all out sprint took us to the next gate, where everyone had already loaded. Thankfully we made it on board, and had all night before our next connection could even begin to be a concern. A couple of hours into the flight, when I finally started to settle in tried drifting off to sleep, I noticed that the light that pointed at my seat turned on and then off, on and then off, on and then off every few minutes, staying on just long enough that when it turned off it startled you again. The Chilean boy in the seat next to me and I spent the next few minutes experimenting with the buttons on our chairs to establish that it was, in fact, my chair that was malfunctioning. With that, I called over the flight attendant and began to explain in mangled Spanish what seemed to be happening. A few sentences in, the boy next to me broke in with some proper sentence structure and we were in business. The flight attendant bustled off to the front of the plane with a look of determination and the boy next to me gave me an encouraging nod. The first flight attendant returned with a second, who mashed at the buttons on the seat for a while, turning the light repeatedly on and off, much to the chagrin of everyone trying to sleep in the surrounding three rows. When the frantic button-pushing stopped with no notable change in the rouge light's behavior, the flight attendant told us that nothing could be done, she was sorry, but we would have to just deal with it for the duration of the flight. The boy and I sighed in unison, put our jackets over our faces, and eventually drifted off to a fitful sleep.
I awoke to the arrival of the breakfast cart and checked my watch while drinking some juice. It seemed that we would be rushed, but would probably be able to accomplish everything we needed to and still make our connection in Santiago. Before leaving for the trip, Terry Jordan (one of the professors at Cornell) told me that the protocol for buying cellphone sim cards had changed since I was last there. When she entered the country a few months ago, she rented a sim card from at the Santiago airport, used the phone as much as she wanted while in the country, and was handed a bill when she returned the card on her way out of the country. When Chris (my field assistant for this year) and I got off the plane in Santiago, I left him in the line to buy his entrance visa and told him that I would meet him by the baggage claim on the other side of immigration, where the cell phone booth was also supposed to be. Unfortunately, since the flight was so early in the morning, the booth wasn't open yet. "Fine," I thought, "more time to get through customs and get some cash before we get on the next plane." I stood waiting for Chris by the conveyor belt with all the baggage, pulling our bags off as I waited. Chris joined me and the line thinned... as did the supply of bags on the belt. Anyone who has ever checked luggage knows that it is completely normal to assume that your piece of luggage will be the one that got left behind, or sent to Fiii, or got run over by the plane. From the first piece of luggage that enters on the conveyor, we convince ourselves that ours will not be there, and with each new suitcase that isn't topped with our particular identifier (hideous orange yarn, brightly colored luggage straps, etc) we become more and more convinced. Until, of course, our piece of luggage does appear, and all of those terrible thoughts disappear off to Fiji themselves. "You've never lost luggage before," my Kris had said before I left this summer, "I don't see why this time should be any different." Those words played on loop in my head as I stood watching the same twelve items come and go on the now-barren conveyor, repeating their descriptions to myself as they went by "... bulgy blue duffel with the green stain followed by the brown suitcase with the broken wheel... taped up guitar hero box... green suitcase with the creepy cat sticker..." Swearing under my breath, I finally turned and got in line at the counter for reporting lost luggage. A glance at my watch told me that we had less than an hour to report my luggage, go through customs, check back in, and board our flight to Antofagasta. As I waited for the woman in front of me to describe each of her family's six lost pieces of luggage, I began ticking off a mental check-list of what was in the bag that had been left behind. "... tent, sleeping bag, sleeping pad, field books, hammer, tool belt, shampoo, conditioner, soap... sigh... sneakers, siphon for gas, batteries, walkee-talkees, camp pillow..." and I was sure there was more I had forgotten about. "It's fine," I told myself, "it will show up."
B y the time we reached the counter, our plane had already begun to board. I quickly described my duffel, filled out some forms, and gave them the name of the hotel I would be at until Tuesday morning in Antofagasta. We started through customs with fifteen minutes to take off, and sprinted to the counter where we had to recheck our bags. By the time we got there, our flight was already closed. Thankfully, before the flashbacks of last year's twelve hour layover could even fully form, they told us that, if we hurried, they could get us on the next flight, leaving in half and hour. We checked our bags, ran through the airport, and madeit with about ten minutes to spare: the best connection we had made yet. That flight, the taxi ride to the hotel, and moving everything up to the room was relatively uneventful. After a nap and some food shopping, I stopped in at the desk downstairs and asked if there had been any news about my bag. Since I A) did not currently have a working cell phone and B) have extremely mediocre Spanish, it seemed best to enlist the help of the native speaker at the desk in trying to ascertain the whereabouts of my bag. A few phone calls later, she said it would be on the flight arriving into Antofagasta at eight o'clock the next morning (Monday).
Playing the game of "where in the world is my luggage" became an unwelcome common thread holding together the rest of our tasks the following day. Wake up, catch a cab to go get the rental truck. Drive back to hotel. Ask if bag has arrived yet. Receive the slow, sad head shake and pressed lips: no. Drive to University of Antofagasta to meet Gabriel, almost hit j-walking students, park illegally, chat with Gabriel, get camping gear, return to hotel, and ask about my bag. Now with and added shrug: no, but she will call and ask... 4:30, they say it will come at 4:30. With that we headed to the mall to buy the sim card for my cell phone that we had not been able to buy at the airport. Once at the mall, the seemingly simple task of activating the cell phone became a somewhat monumental ordeal requiring practically every staff member in the store. I believe my initial request was relatively straight forward.
Me: I need a new sim card for my Entel phone. Can you do that here?
Man 1: Yes
We were off to a good start, but the conversation was in Spanish, so things began to quickly deteriorate.
Me: My professor... said... the old cards... not work... now rent card new way.
Man 1: What?
Me: My professor... she said she buy sim card at airport... and... give people credit card number... uses cell phone... give return sim card... and pays.
Woman 1 (who has approached during this embarrassing monologue): What? (to Man 1) Do you know anyone who speaks English?
Me (picking up new sim card form counter): Will this work? I buy cards and this work?
Man 1: (to woman 1) I don't.... well... maybe
Woman 1: Call him.
Woman 1 then assures us that the card will work, but Man 1 is already dialing. Eventually the phone is handed to me and a disastrous dialogue ensues. His English, it turns out, is worse than my Spanish. During our conversation Woman 1 tells Chris that after three months of non-use, a sim card is deactivated. We decide to buy the new card. For a while, Woman 1 stares at the package confused. Eventually she and Woman 2 start digging through a bag of price tags. Apparently the item we want to buy is missing one. Eventually they find a sticker and Woman 1 disappears. She returns with Man 2, who motions us over to another counter where he rings us out, speaking English at the one time we could have most easily gotten by without: numbers. We are then sent back to the original counter where Woman 1 installs the sim card and punches some numbers. She and Man 1 ask for my passport, which, after inspection, apparently was not at all what they needed. After a few more minutes of rapid Spanish, the phone is handed to us.
Me: It works?
Woman 1: Yes.
Me: Is possible test it?
Man 1: What?
Me: Is possible call... and test?
Man 1: lknaje;otireng;sotnh;iurtnholikmneofina;ogn
Chris: (looking at my confused face) He said that the phone will receive a message in the next ten minutes if it works.
Me: Oh.
We decided to wander through the mall until said message arrived. Once it does, we make the pleasant walk back to the hotel, where my hopes are once again crushed by a sad shrug and shaken head: no bag. The woman at the desk calls the airport to find out that the man who left to deliver luggage at 4:00 had left without my bag. He simply forgot it. He would bring it on his 9:30 run, they promised. We headed back upstairs until dinner, and I left for dinner telling myself not to worry, when we got back, I would have my luggage. Unfortunately, as wonderful and uplifting as the dinner was, no happy mood could override the frustration I felt when I returned to the hotel to find that my bag had not yet arrived at 11:15. I resigned myself to the fact that my bag was not going to arrive, booked the hotel for the following night, and headed up to bed. At 12:15 the hotel phone rang and the woman at the front desk told me excitedly that the man with my bag had arrived. I ran down the stairs in my pajamas to find the woman at the front desk staring at me extremely confused. I asked about my bag, and she said the man had just gone up the elevator. Two flights of stairs later there it was, my bag with its wonderful topping of hideous orange fringe.
Bag in hand, we headed out the next morning for the long drive to the northern side of Salar Grande. Chris and I kept the mood high with music blaring and the pedal close to the floor. We arrived at the campsite in a little over seven hours, faster than we had anticipated, and jumped out of the truck to set up camp in the remaining daylight. I pulled out my tent and laid it out on the ground, excited by the lack of wind. I reached into my bag for my poles and, within moments had landed butt first in the sand. I did not fall because I tripped, or even lost my balance, but because I had realized, in that moment, that my tent poles were still in Ithaca. Within ten minutes of our triumphant arrival we were back on the "road" racing the daylight to Iquique. We got to Iquique, and after a few phone calls established that the hotels we knew were booked for the evening, we pulled into the mall. Eleven minutes after parking, I exited the mall doors, tent in hand, and started the two and a half hour journey back into the middle of nowhere, now with the dark and the fog to contend with. Finally back at the campsite, we set up our tents in the dark, and finally laid down to a good night's sleep.
More has happened since then (this blog only reaches until the evening of Tuesday June 9th) but I am tired and must go to sleep. Here are some pictures to hold you over until next time.
Always,
Amanda
Antofagasta... just a random part of the city where they water things liberally with hoses until grass grows
What Chris, the noble field assistant, has looked like every three minutes since we arrived here
The camp site north of Salar Grande (you can see our truck and such)
The new tent... the nature of it's integrity to be assessed in the next entry
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