Gone South for the Winter

This is what it says on my office door in Columbus.

For many, winter means heading south. Anyone who knows me is aware that I prefer my winters snowy and cold, but I like to go south, too – just a little bit farther south than most. This winter, I’m back in Antarctica, having left Columbus about a week before Christmas to begin what has become the routine flight to the west coast and across the Pacific Ocean.

I only got a couple of days in Christchurch between arriving and flying to the Ice, and I packed them full. I checked into my hotel (the Rendezvous downtown, quite a bit cushier than the last one, and brand new – one of the first new high-rises in the city after the earthquakes) upon arrival and set about exploring the city with Gail, a fellow polar scientist I met on the plane. The changes since my last visit were astounding and heartening. New construction was taking place on every block and significantly fewer lots were completely vacant. The new buildings were colorful, unique, and architecturally interesting while beautifully and seamlessly adhering to Christchurch’s status as “the Garden City”.

The scene was one of rebirth. Of a city that has a chance to recover not only from its recent past and dramatic events beyond its control, but also from its reliance on concrete and small windows. The new structures rose gracefully and reflected the clouds and the sky. Pedestrians, local and otherwise, made their respective ways around the city at all hours.

We ate a tremendously satisfactory dinner with my local friend Cat at the hotel’s restaurant and called it a night. The following morning, having not yet adjusted to the 18 hour time difference, I woke up at about 5 and decided to go for a walk in the botanical gardens to catch the sunrise. I didn’t take my camera, but rest assured that it was beautiful, peaceful, and a perfect way to start the day. Around about 8:30, I wandered back out, grabbed a SIM card for my phone (I lost my old one), and ambled on over to a small breakfast establishment on the recently reopened New Regent Street near the hotel.

Then it was off to the Clothing Distribution Center (CDC) to get all of our Extreme Cold-Weather (ECW) gear and be informed that our Ice flight, originally scheduled for December 23^rd, had been delayed to December 24^th. After a quick meeting with a friend from Alaska who had just gotten back from Antarctica, and lunch with my advisor at the InternationalAntarctic Centre’s café, I took a bus back into town and spent the rest of the day working in my room – not fun, but necessary.

Since we had the next day free, a few of us—Gail, Rob (an engineer/hydrologist), Adie (a chef), and myself—opted to go for a hike on the Port Hills between Lyttelton and Christchurch. After a bus ride to the edge of the city and a relaxing and delicious lunch of nachos on a deck overlooking Lyttelton and the harbor, the bartender of our lunch venue (Wunderbar) was kind enough to suggest to us a route which I had never taken before called the Major Hornbrook Track. We found it without too much trouble at the top of a quiet residential street and were quickly on our way up to the ridge separating the port and the city. It was a beautiful day, and we spent some time relaxing at the summit before it began to cloud over and we decided to descend and catch a bus back into the city. It was late and we decided to eat dinner again at the hotel restaurant before heading to bed in preparation for our 6:00 am transport to the airport the next morning.

Rob and Gail stopping to investigate some of the local flora on the way up the Major Hornbrook Track from Lyttelton

We sat for a while in the shade and tried to figure out all of the port operations

Fog rolling in at the top of the Port Hills

We got off without a hitch (except a minor delay for maintenance). We flew on LC-130s—prop planes which move significantly more slowly than the jets used during the shoulder seasons when the ice runway is thick enough to accommodate them. We made it from Christchurch to McMurdo Station in just over 7 hours. We were greeted with a waiting shuttle, the usual welcome brief, and relative peace. Because we arrived on Christmas Eve, the night before a two-day weekend (generally weekends on the Ice are only one day), the station was quiet and it afforded us the opportunity to move in unhurried. We got our bearings and our linens and set about reacquainting ourselves with the station.

The next day was Christmas, and the kitchen prepared a spectacular meal of crab legs, steak tips, and an array of fresh fruits, vegetables, and baked goods for all 800+ people at McMurdo. Good cheer was rampant over the course of the day with food, friends, gift exchanges, and games. There was plenty of time to reconnect with coworkers and friends of seasons past and show some newcomers some of the ropes.

The dessert station in the galley for Christmas dinner - no extravagance was spared!

Holiday dinner in the galley

Decorations in the entrance hall of Crary (where most of the science operations are headquartered)

The days since Christmas have been busy and slow all at the same time. I arrived as part of the late-season installment of the POLENET crew (if you've forgotten what we do, here's a refresher), and quite a few of my coworkers had arrived long before me and had anticipated getting out to the deep field camp at WAIS Divide on December 15^th (I'm scheduled to go out at the beginning of January), but due to a perfect storm of complications regarding fuel, cargo, and weather, had not made it yet. They were scheduled every day, only to check the board every morning and see that their flight was canceled.

As I write this, they are still here, patiently (if not a little desperately) waiting for their flight to finally take off. They almost made it today, but were canceled at the last minute while they were sitting on the shuttle waiting to go to the runway. Due to the nature of intracontinental travel here, they are living out of one small ‘boomerang bag’, which is tagged specifically in the event of flight cancellation or postponement after baggage has been checked. The checked bags, which have been palletized and prepared for loading on to the LC-130, are from that point inaccessible, but passengers are allowed to retain one carry-on bag (less than 15 lbs) and their boomerang bag in the event of flight cancellation. Except for over Christmas, the POLENETers have been living out of their boomerang bags for two weeks.

In the meantime, I’ve been completing all of the various trainings necessary to live and work on the Ice (environmental awareness, field safety, snow mobiles, light vehicles, etc.), hiking a little bit, maintaining POLENET's wepage and setting up the online components of our upcoming Glacial Isostatic Adjustment workshop, and helping some of the senior project staff and engineers prepare for work out of McMurdo. 

Because of the fuel shortage at WAIS, we’ve attempted to reconfigure some of our logistics so that we can perform at least some of the necessary station maintenance by flying from McMurdo rather than from WAIS. The engineers and I requested a flight across the ice shelf to visit a difficult-to-access site. Because we requested it late, we were put on back-up (rather than first priority), which means that we get to go if the priority flight gets canceled, and if we don't go, we stay on back-up until we do or until we cancel the request. This means I wake up before 6 every day to make sure I'm in the office when the meteorologists check the weather, just in case we get called up. We haven't in the two days since we've put in the request, but we'll be on the list for the rest of the week. Hopefully we'll get to go out and do some work!

McMurdo Station from the top of nearby Observation Hill

More to come soon. Happy Holidays from the bottom of the world, and thanks for reading! 

So Long, and Thanks for All the Fish

As I sit here in the San Francisco airport, at a quiet gate with no flights, looking out at all the runway lights through my reflection on the glass, I can't believe it's over. I left in such a whirlwind that I didn't comprehend what was really happening. As I was leaving the office, it felt like I was just going into the field again. As I was driving to Anchorage, it seemed like just another conference trip. Even as I was sitting on the plane, playing blackjack with the couple next to me, nothing had changed.

Now I'm here in the lower 48 again, making plans for the next few days - where I'm going to stay, how I'm going to get around, what I need to do to prepare for my upcoming (as in, Friday) New Zealand trip, who I'm going to see - and it's started to sink in that my plane did, in fact, leave Alaska. In some ways, it felt like I was just settling in.

My last post here was at the beginning of June. After that, life took off. There was rain, followed by landslides, followed by a constant loop of fieldwork and revisions in the office. I got in the occasional hike on the weekends, and some good ones for work, but so much was happening that it became impossible to think about life outside the park. It was amazing - never have I enjoyed my work so much.

My coworkers and friends made it feel like I wasn't leaving. A few of them told me matter-of-factly, only half joking, that they would see me in December after I finish my degree. I laughed then. I'm getting emotional now.

I made some fantastic friends - a group of people with an immeasurable devotion to the natural world and a mission to help people everywhere understand why it's a world worth exploring. I will miss them and their unending enthusiasm and excitement in the face of some of the most aggressive terrain in North America, if not the world. I will miss working through pouring rain and escaping from bears; I'll miss taking a walk down to the other end of the office to chat about big-picture geology over breaks and when my brain was too tired to focus on details; I'll miss hiking the most difficult route just because it's fun; I'll miss watching movies so late into the night that we see the sun rise; I'll miss bonfires and playing music and pausing to watch moose walk through camp; I'll miss the freshly caught salmon they'd bring me; I'll miss spending time with, and learning from, these people.

Coworkers Russell (left) and Alina (right) work on summarizing a wet day of field work at a backcountry ranger cabin

But this is a circumstance precipitated by choice - a choice to continue learning and exploring. Traveling and living in new places has been my mode for over six years now, and I'm slowly getting better at maintaining meaningful connections and keeping in touch. So I hope that these relationships will not end (maybe if I write it here, I'll hold myself to a higher standard of communication).

In the meantime, it's off to new adventures. I get three days in Columbus before I fly to New Zealand again, only for two weeks this time, and then I'm back in Ohio to finish my degree, geology gods willing. I have multiple and various pending opportunities after graduation in December, and despite my whining in this post, I can't wait to see what's next.

So long, Alaska. Keep in touch. Maybe send one of those rainbows along every once in a while, or a good snow. I'll be thinking about you this winter, wishing I could follow the wolf tracks on my skis in the midday twilight and watch the lights sway in the dead of the cold, cold night.

I'll miss you, but I'll see you again. Soon.

"That's Alaska!"

This is a phrase that's been uttered countless times since I've gotten here, always by people who know. People who have lived here for ages. People who have stepped on bears and people who have walked away from multiple roll-over plane crashes.

It gives entirely new meaning to the phrase "that's ____!" I'm sure you've heard it. When invoked, it's part humorous, part smug, part implication that what you're hearing is insider knowledge, being coyly but knowingly shared between friends. Sometimes it's stated with an air of proud annoyance, as if to suggest that, yes, this particular aspect of [my state] is annoying, but in a unique way that I'll bet your sad, inexperienced, inferior state wouldn't know how to respond to. I've used the phrase, and I've probably heard it used in all the states in which I've spent any significant amount of time, but Alaska takes it to a whole new level.
__________

"People here are so nice!"
"That's Minnesota!"

The Saturday after I got into Fairbanks, I woke up at 5:00 am (this was okay, because I was still in Eastern time - it felt like 9:00) to go grocery shopping before catching my train at 8:00. I had purposely picked a motel close to a 24-hour grocery store so I could walk there, walk back, and repack all my stuff without budgeting for a taxi or extra transportation time.

After snoozing a couple times, showering, and repacking to make room for the incoming food in one of my checked bags, I ambled over to the Safeway at about 5:45 am, knowing I needed to be back to catch the train station shuttle at 7:00. Not knowing the layout of the grocery store, it took me a little while to find my way around. I also missed a few things the first time around, so by the time I got out (with almost 100 lbs of groceries and no cart), I was cutting it close with the 15 minutes I still had to walk back.

As I wobbled across the parking lot, I heard a honk coming from the adjacent Carl's Jr. I looked over and a couple guys in a Ford F-250 Super Duty were waving me over. They asked me if I needed a ride somewhere, and I motioned in the direction and mumbled something about it being out of their way (it was on a dead-end road). They said it was no problem - they had nothing to do anyway because the establishment to which they were taking the large contraption being towed on the back wasn't open yet. I hopped in and we started chatting, and five minutes later they dropped me off and helped me carry my groceries to the door. I gave them my thanks (they refused anything else), packed up, and headed to the train station.

I related this story to a few of my new coworkers in the park. "That's Alaska!" they said.

Even the graffiti is friendly!

View down Healy Canyon toward the Alaska Range aboard the Alaska Railroad Denali Star

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"Seeing a bear in the [Baxter State] Park is a rare treat!"
"That's Maine!"

At the end of my first week (last Thursday), the physical sciences group here at Denali took a trip over to the far west end of the park road, which is only paved and accessible to private vehicles for the first 15 miles. The trip served multiple purposes. We were headed to Kantishna, a small mining town that had enjoyed several booms over the course of the 20th century and that had been absorbed by the park in 1980 and was now a small community with no cell phone service, one road in (the park road), a grass airstrip, and a few very expensive lodges for people who wanted a comfortably hardcore wilderness experience and could afford it. A few of the buildings and camps that the park now uses as personnel stations in Kantishna are historic, dating back to the prosperous gold and antimony mining days. The park had repurposed one of these camps, Friday Creek, as a staff camp for people coming out to work on reclamation efforts on the numerous streams running through Kantishna. This camp is used relatively often because the streams run neon orange and are therefore a constant source of work and study, and it falls under the purview of the park geologist, so every year, he and the staff go there to set it up and spend some time up there.

A fragment of the physical science team pauses to discuss Moose Creek in Kantishna. Rocky, a lifted Ford F-350 Super Duty, looks on.

The trip also serves as an introduction to the geology of the park. Much is visible from the park road, including formations, fossils, fault facets, and all manner of fun geological things. We stopped periodically to admire spectacular folds in the schist, colorful volcanics, and enormous glaciers. For us newbies, though, it was an even better opportunity for spotting wildlife. In my few short days at the park, I had already seen a bald eagle, a moose, caribou, marmots, pikas, ground squirrels, and mice. I was figuring we might see a large mammal or two on the trip up. My expectations were thoroughly surpassed with 10 grizzly bears (including three cubs), herds of caribou, golden eagles, and other smaller fare. All of this in about 8 hours.

A Toklat Grizzly (uniquely identifiable by their blonde coats) clambers up a slope near Polychrome Pass

While another sleeps below the same cliff. It's adorable, but look at those claws...

We got to camp, set up, and had some wonderful food. I met some other new folks and chatted with a few of my superiors well into the evening. There were only three of us left around the campfire when we decided to put it out and call it a night. It was still broad daylight, of course, but I still felt a little uneasy walking back to my cabin, which was down at the end of the road and semi-isolated. I was lucky enough to get the historic one in the camp. It had no power, water, or gas, but it was incredibly comfortable and well built. It had a little register where rangers and other park staff who had been out at that end of the road had written about their experiences. Generally, they corroborated with the signs plastered all over the walls that said "WARNING: BEARS FREQUENT THIS AREA AND HAVE ENTERED THIS CABIN AND KNOW IT MAY CONTAIN FOOD! IF POSSIBLE, STORE ALL FOOD AWAY FROM CABIN! KEEP FOOD IN BEAR-PROOF STORAGE!" The bear-proof storage was a 50-gallon drum under the sink that was sealed with a steel bar and multiple bolts. I was suitably unnerved by this, but slightly reassured after my boss told me they didn't usually get into any mischief if humans were around. Just to be on the safe side, I built a fire in the cozy little fireplace in the cabin. I slept wonderfully.

"That's Alaska!"

My own little slice of bear-infested heaven! Couldn't really get a better view without disturbing the local wildlife.

__________

"It was 65 degrees on Tuesday and now it's snowing!"
"That's Ohio!"

On Saturday we drove from the end of the park road back to HQ (a mere 92 miles away). Only five of us were left at the camp because we were working on a specific project on the way back that involved a lot of stopping and thinking and observing. We woke up and looked like it was going to be a beautiful day for field work. It was 65 degrees, sunny, and we were all well-rested and ready to go. As we drove away, it started to cloud over a bit, and stayed cloudy for the first 30 miles (about 2 hours). When we got out at Eielson Visitor Center to take a look at some volcanics and glacial features, it started to rain. We popped inside for a quick look around and came back out.

It was snowing. Hard. It started accumulating before we even left the parking lot. Thankfully we were in a monster of a truck, so even with slightly slick conditions on an unimproved road along sheer cliffs, we still felt reasonably safe. We limited our stops after that point, and by the time we got to Toklat at Mile 53, there was a substantial amount of snow on the ground. We stopped to eat lunch at the camp there, played some table tennis, and took Rocky out onto the river bed for a short demonstration of its abilities.

Snow falls in front of the Toklat ranger station

We moved on and had made it another 10 miles before, abruptly, the snow stopped and the sun came out. 40 miles later, we were back at headquarters, shedding our down jackets and raincoats because it was back up to 65 degrees. The entire park road between headquarters and Kantishna is between 2000 and 4000 feet of elevation, so I couldn't really blame the weather on freakish highs and lows.

"That's just Alaska!"

The view of Divide Mountain (so named because it divides the east and west branches of the Toklat River) from the Toklat River bridge on a significantly less snowy day

____________________

I've also done some phenomenal hiking since being here, but I'll save that for a hiking-themed post later on. Thanks for reading!

Planes, Trains, and Automobiles: A Night in Fairbanks

Well, I've arrived in Fairbanks and checked in to my hotel for the night. The flights from Columbus were uneventful. I met a couple fellow travellers and had time during each of my two layovers (in Chicago and Seattle) to catch a meal. The flight from Chicago to Seattle was only slightly longer than the flight from Seattle to Fairbanks, but the latter seemed much shorter because the Alaskan Airlines new Boeing 737-900ER was wonderfully comfortable.

As we flew north along the west coast, North America's tallest mountains poked out of the clouds, snow-covered and brushed by the sun. The passenger next to me, an excitable, middle-aged medical professional from Sacramento dressed from head to foot in designer running apparel, put it most aptly: "Whoa! Whoa! Crapballs!"

The landscape gave way to gentler, green slopes and braided streams as we descended into Fairbanks's 6-gate (International) Airport. Not that I'm complaining - it had hardwood floors, it was delightfully quiet, and rather reminded of Maine, and of Portland's airport before it was upgraded. The ratio of tarmac to terminal was outlandishly huge, but it made for a unique deplaning experience. It being 11:00 pm, the sun shone brightly over the hills and boreal forest.

I called my lodging for the night, the Golden North Motel, and requested a shuttle. I was picked up in an old, unmarked Ford van by the night attendant, Dave, who provided me with a little background on the city and where I could do my grocery shopping. A little digging revealed that he had lived in Ellsworth and Orono, Maine, and we bonded over our shared roots.

We reached the hotel parking lot (sedan population: 0) and I checked in to a small, clean, and quiet 1-bed room. I sit here knowing that I should be sleeping, because I need to get up in less than 6 hours to take care of my grocery shopping for the next three months before I catch my train at 7:15 am. But I'm writing this instead. You, dear reader, are more important to me than sleep.

Parks, Bars, and Hoodoos

The end is nigh...

Day 9. Miles 3,987 – 4,311: Groveland, CA to Reno, NV

Tall pine trees and an abundance of granite and granodiorite greeted our eyes as we wound our way into Yosemite National Park. The road twisted and turned through forest and cropped out occasionally for an overlook. Wildfire scars marred the trees and patches of grassland. There wasn't much to see for the first hour or so. And then we rounded a turn through a tunnel and the entire landscape changed.

We were suddenly in Yosemite Valley beneath towering sheeted granite cliffs. The sun reflected off ice and snow and gave the entire valley a glow that was amplified by the quartz and micas in the rock itself. Rivulets of water swirled under the hairpin road and careened off the sheer rock face to join with the meandering river below. In every direction waterfalls from melting snow jetted off the cliff edges, and thunder from small congregations of falling rocks echoed long after they deposited themselves firmly atop fans of their predecessors at the valley floor.

Limiting ourselves to four to five hours, we circled the valley loop scouting for potential hikes. We parked at the village and tried our luck finding maps in the visitor center, where a friendly ranger recommended either the western trail to Vernal and Nevada Falls or the Glacier Point (Four Mile) trail, which was closed at mile 2.8 due to snow.

Noting that the Four Mile trail looked steeper, ascended more quickly, and was relatively short, we decided on that route. We looped around the valley again and stopped on the south side at the trailhead. The first mile or so was paved at a relaxing grade through forest, with occasional breaks in the trees to take in the valley below. Soon, the trees disappeared—not because we were above tree line, but because the trail emerged from the valley and latched onto the side of the cliff, where it switched back steeply and continuously for the remainder of the 1.8 open miles. We moved quickly, passing almost every group on the trail with us (about four) before reaching a peaceful west-facing outcrop with spectacular views of Half Dome and the western valley, and the gate that restricted access to the remainder of the hike, which, after a short water and photo break, we scaled and carried on up the trail.

Perched on a rock in front of Half Dome (photography by Matt Hawrylak)

At first the trail continued in its fascination with switchbacks, and with increasing amounts of snow and ice, each new turn presented a series of footing challenges.

Matt takes a relaxing stroll on one of the less icy portions of the cliff trail

But after winding up through a forested break in slope, it came out on a cliff exposure facing east before turning west to resume the gentler grade of the first mile through tall pines to the valley rim. The view from the top, with Half Dome, Mount Lyell, El Capitan, and all the other landmarks of the valley and plateau in plain sight, was perfectly spectacular. The sun shone from the south and illuminated the Sierra Nevada as far as we could see. The valley whence we came, 3,200 feet below, was shaded but the river was visible by the clear path it cut through the forested floor.

The High Sierra from Glacier Point

We ate lunch but did not linger, as we were already behind schedule with the additional hiking we’d undertaken. We began a rapid descent, stopping only to take pictures of the sun setting over the valley.

Looking west over Yosemite Valley

We made it back to the valley floor just as the sun was setting. The 9.6-mile hike (the Four Mile trail is actually 4.8 miles) took us just under 6 hours and left us thoroughly tired and ready to relax. Unfortunately, as the eastern passes through the Sierra Nevada were all closed, we had to drive back out of the park and 150 miles north to I-80 and another 150 miles to our intended stop, Reno. We drove up California Route 49 through the westernmost extent of the Sierra Nevada. It was windy and snowy, and a little frightening at times, but eventually we made it to a Super 8 on the south end of Reno and promptly called it a night.

Day 10. Miles 4,311 – 5,012: Reno, NV to Rock Springs, WY

This is where the trip started winding down. It was cold, windy, and there wasn't much to see alongside the highway. We drove and drove and drove across Nevada and Utah, through basins and ranges, hitting the Bonneville Salt Flats late in the afternoon. The reflections were surreal, but because we drove across the top edge we barely got the sensation of intense isolation the flats are so often reputed to purport. Still, it was photogenic.

Bonneville Salt Flats with the railroad in the middle ground

We passed the Cedar Mountain Range just before sunset and navigated into Salt Lake City as the sky was darkening.

Cedar Range south of I-80

We stopped for some delicious and filling Chinese food (and Asian beer, which was a new experience for me) at a thoroughly locally-involved, Reader’s Choice award-winning restaurant outside downtown called Sampan before getting back on 80, climbing through the Wasatch mountains and up onto the Laramie Plateau in Wyoming. We made it as far as Rock Springs before deciding to turn in.

Day 11. Miles 5,012 – 5,515: Rock Springs, WY to Rapid City, SD

We awoke to a fresh coat of snow, a delightfully low below-zero temperature, and a clear blue sky. As we drove out of town, we spotted some rare Kelvin-Helmholtz cloud formations (the ones that look like waves), and we knew we were in for a windy day.

We drove along US 30 (could’ve taken it all the way back to Ohio!), stopping briefly in Rawlins to check out the old State Penitentiary (aka Wyoming Frontier Prison). It was nifty, albeit closed, and it was interesting to read about the history of the institution. It was completed in 1901, which seems recent, but as a New Englander, I often lose sight of the fact that the West was still very much a frontier at the turn of the last century.

Downtown Rawlins, WY

Wyoming Frontier Prison, Rawlins

We took a hard left at Rawlins and ascended further onto the plateau between low mountain ranges. The roads got icy, visibility dropped to next-to-nothing, and blowing snow recreated Antarctic conditions to an astonishing degree. All while the sky above, when it appeared, remained blissfully blue.

Clouds envelope mountains under a blue sky on the plateau

Just a short while (literally, 10 minutes) later...

Accompanied as we were by numerous trucks, the drive was thoroughly harrowing and mentally taxing—at the time, that was probably the longest I'd ever unbrokenly concentrated on anything—and we didn't get to see much of Wyoming because of the conditions. But as we passed Lusk and headed into South Dakota, the sky and the road cleared, and the remainder of the drive was a pleasure.

We swung up through Wind Cave National Park, where we stopped at the visitor center only to determined they were closing for the day (it was after 4:00 pm at this point and, on an unrelated note, still below zero), so we scheduled a cave tour for the next morning and we carried on our way up past the yet-uncompleted Crazy Horse Memorial, which, while intriguing, was a bit expensive for our tastes. It also appeared and felt much more commercial than I think it should have and was overall somewhat disappointing. We continued through Hill City and up to Rapid City, where we found a hotel and deposited our belongings. The proprietor recommended to us the Firehouse Brewing Company as a place to whet our collective whistles, so we found our way downtown to the pleasant themed establishment. The beer was quite good and the food was definitely satisfactory, and, it being a Sunday evening, the place was relatively uncrowded. We stayed for a while and chatted briefly with the bartender before heading back to the hotel and resting up.

Day 12. Miles 5,515 – 6,383: Rapid City, SD to Iowa City, IA

We checked out and made it to Wind Cave, so named because of its ‘breathing’ to equalize internal and atmospheric air pressure, in time for our scheduled tour. Because we were the only ones present, we got an extended tour from the guide, a young, knowledgeable geologist. We learned all about the history of the cave, some of the mineralization taking place, the impressive boxwork features, and the continued process of exploration (in which Matt and I both swore to come back and participate) in the 140-mile cave (currently, placing it at the densest and 6^th longest in the world). I bought a woefully outdated cave map for inspiration, hoping that eventually I’ll get far beyond the 1.5 miles or so we explored on the tour.

Wind Cave has some of the most extensive boxwork deposits in the world. These features are formed when host rock (limestone or dolomite) erodes away and leaves more resistant calcite vein deposits.

We chatted with the rangers on duty for a while. The day was quite quiet in terms of visitors, presumably because it was a very cold Monday. Soon enough we were on our way. We didn't see any bison (another well-known feature of the park) on the natural prairie on our way out, but we did get to drive through the Black Hills and buzz Mount Rushmore, which I found a little unimpressive—the level of skill it would have taken is quite incredible, but I just thought it would be… bigger.

Another granite batholith! Oh, and those face things...

We headed back to Rapid City and then headed east, stopping briefly at Wall Drug before heading just a short ways into Badlands National Park. We encountered a wolf in the grasslands who didn't seem too bothered by us.

A wolf warily eyed us before deciding we weren't worth the time 

Suddenly, out of the prairie rose a complex series of buttes and pinnacles. We came to a small parking lot with some informational signs, where we hopped out and hiked a short trail up onto and around the hoodoos. The setting sun provided a beautiful backdrop against the loosely cemented fluvial sedimentary features, and I think I almost broke one trying to get a picture from up high.

Sun sets on the resistant sand and mudstones at Badlands National Park

We turned around and headed back for the freeway, where we remained until we were too tired to go on and we found a hotel somewhere in Iowa.

Day 13. Miles 6,383 – 6,920

We woke up late and headed for home, figuring we only had 8 hours of driving ahead of us. We didn’t account for the fact that a pretty massive winter storm had hit Indiana over the previous two days and their entire highway department appeared to have decided to take that time to go on vacation.

We hit ice on the roads just a few miles into Indiana. At first it was manageable, but the closer we got to Indianapolis, the worse the roads became. We were driving on inches of solid ice, much of it very smooth. We were traveling at 25-35 mph and hoping that the trucks buzzing by at 45 didn’t lose control and crash into us. I was trying my best to keep the steering wheel perfectly steady, because the slightest movement sent us drifting. We passed by at least 5 accidents in progress and counted upwards of 40 cars and trucks on our side of the highway between Veedersburg and Crawfordsville. There was color-coded tape on the mirrors of crashed vehicles, clearly indicating that nobody was coming out here with a tow truck until this stuff cleared up. We didn’t see a single snow plow, salt spreader, or other winter service vehicle, and it got so bad that we decided to get off the highway and try our luck on backroads in the hope that driving on less consolidated snow/ice would be much better than driving on the solid, compacted ice on the highway.

It was. We navigated route 32 between I-74 and I-65 and it was much more comfortable. There were still 4-6 inches on the road, but it was softer and the traffic was much lighter. There were some frightening moments when we had to negotiate some gentle hills, but relatively speaking, that segment was rather pleasant.

Eventually, however, we had to find the highway again and head toward Indianapolis. I-65 was ever so slightly better than I-74, but it was still a thoroughly unfortunate experience. After we passed through Indianapolis and found I-70, we saw salt spreaders—three of them, driving in a flying V and spraying the road. We tailed them for a little while, just for the sake of not having to concentrate so heavily, but the road cleared a bit and we navigated around them. Soon, of course, we were back to solid ice, but it was patchy now rather than continuous. Oddly enough, as we got to Richmond, IN (right next to the border of OH), the road began to clear in earnest. We stopped for some dinner and drove back to Columbus with ease, arriving after nearly 12 hours on the road, the majority of which, it seemed, were spent in Indiana. Just another example of how, given the chance, the Midwest will grab hold of you and resist all your efforts to release yourself.

The End

Notes

Somewhere in my calculations, I've misplaced 300 miles. According to the odometer, the whole trip was 7,219.2 miles. Some time, when I'm feeling motivated, I’ll find the rest of them.

I find this style of travel incredibly frustrating. Don't get me wrong—I had a blast, and it was fantastic being able to see so many things and go so many places. I was lucky enough to be on the road exploring for over 300 hours straight. But I can't tell you how many things I added to, rather than subtracted from, my mental bucket list. I've been to the Grand Canyon, yes, but now I want to go and backpack to the bottom. I’ve seen the Painted Desert, but now I want to spend a few days or weeks just exploring it. I've gotten the tiniest taste of some of the best wine country in the world.

This is the same way I feel about museums. Whenever I visit big cities with good museums, I only ever have time to go through them in hour or two increments. I went through the Metropolitan Museum of Art and the American Natural History Museum in two hours each. I went through the Field Museum in one hour, and I went through the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston in 45 minutes.

There is so much to see and learn that these lengths of time are never enough. This is why I prefer to move around a lot and live in different places rather than simply visit them. I realize I can’t have my way all the time, and I've accepted this, but this basic problem is a driving factor in my life goals. I crave information and experience, and I will continue to seek it.

Thanks for reading!

~Andrew

Oakland is next to San Francisco, and other realizations by an East Coaster in California

Where was I? Ah, yes.

Day 6. Miles 3,322 – 3,737: Barstow, CA to San Francisco, CA

It was another cold, sunny morning when we woke up in Barstow to a large freight train rumbling by down the road from the hotel. This particular Travelodge, though generally pleasant, had very little to offer in the way of breakfast, so we contented ourselves with fruit and hit the road, bound for San Francisco and anticipating no stops in between. When we started out it was clear, but as we made our way out of the mountains and into Bakersfield, a fog descended. And it didn’t lift until we were in San Francisco. Southern California, it turns out, is incredibly smoggy. I’d heard of this phenomenon, of course, but I wasn't quite prepared for the reality, which was that visibility was less than a mile all the way from Bakersfield to San Francisco. The vast commercial fruit orchards, vineyards, cattle yards, and goodness knows what other sources of our health and well-being were just sitting, soaking in the stuff. If I didn't think twice about where my food came from before, that would have been a pretty startling moment of realization. It was a little unnerving, to say the least.

That being said, the trip wasn't without its scenic moments.

After lunch at that classic western staple, In-N-Out burger, it wasn't long before we were approaching Oakland, and suddenly we were crossing the San Francisco-Oakland Bay Bridge. Now, I had always thought that Oakland was somewhere in northern California, somewhere even farther north than Sacramento (where Sacramento actually is). And I had thought that Sacramento was between San Francisco and Los Angeles. I don’t know why I thought these things, but imagine my surprise when I discovered that Oakland and San Francisco are right next to each other, and Sacramento is 90 miles northeast. It’s always a bit stunning when your personal perception of geography requires a large, quick update. Combine this with the fact that San Francisco is anything but a grid system, and you’ll understand why I was basically lost for the entire 4 days we were in California. But I digress.

We arrived in San Francisco in the early afternoon and met Matt’s friend Katie, who lives in the Excelsior neighborhood. The neighborhood is lovely, with lots of old Greek revival and Victorian-influenced close-packed row houses, but I was not prepared for the hills.

Whenever people talk about driving in San Francisco, they always talk about the hills. I've been up the world’s steepest road (Baldwin Street in Dunedin, New Zealand), and it was steep, but it was short, straight, and a cul-de-sac with no cross-streets. San Francisco is something else. The gradient is surreal, and your progress is punctuated every so often by stop signs such that you are sitting on a 20-30% grade hoping that you can start moving again without flipping the car. Experienced San Francisco drivers, I later learned, avoid this problem by not stopping. But even this technique is risky, because sometimes you reach the crest of a hill without warning, so if you’re not careful, you’ll come up through a stop sign and find that your car and the surface of the Earth have had a disagreement and have opted for keeping their distance.

We got the hang of it eventually, and after picking up Katie, we made our way downtown, where we parked and started exploring. I didn't bring my camera (I wanted to get a feel for the city first, and figure out how out of place I’d look lugging around an SLR), which turned out to be an unfortunate decision, but so it goes. I learned my lesson and took it out the next day.

Katie guided us to Chinatown (San Francisco’s is apparently the largest in North America), where we walked through the arch and up Grant Street, peering into windows and popping into small eateries along the way. Numerous street performers played instruments (the names of which I do not know) and we could barely navigate the sidewalks with all the stalls and displays. At one point we past a McLaren and a Ferrari idling with a gaggle of admirers outside a very expensive-looking restaurant. The whole scene was far more luxurious than anything I had ever experienced. Eventually we came to a small alley with poetry by Jack Kerouac, Maya Angelou, John Steinbeck, and Chinese poets (I couldn’t read them to identify) on the walls and paving tiles. A small placard informed us that we had entered Jack Kerouac Alley, so named because the aforementioned used to frequent the adjacent City Lights bookstore on Columbus Ave.

Columbus Ave leads straight down to the famous Fisherman’s Wharf, so once we were on that road, the Wharf seemed the only logical destination. It was a wee bit far, but it was a nice day (especially for December. And, apparently, for San Francisco) and we decided to walk it. We passed through North Beach, by small shops and ornate but diminutive (and some not so) places of residence, along medians with subtropical flora, and finally we smelled it. The Wharf was bustling and literally sizzling as people wove to and fro, from one seafood establishment or gift shop to another. We opted for the Musée Mécanique, housed in Pier 45 Shed A, which provided us with a solid hour of entertainment as we perused the historic (most dated from the 1920s or before) mechanical musical instruments, games, and coin-operated scenes, including a Wurlitzer Orchestrion, a dreadfully frightful Laughing Sal, and scenes with such evocative titles as “Drunkard’s Dream” and “Opium-Den”. One door opened out to the pier, where we caught a glimpse of the World War II submarine USS Pampanito and watched the sky move through the colors of sunset over Alcatraz to the north and the Bay Bridge to the southeast.

With a New Year party to get to and time running short, we hopped on a street car at the Wharf and buzzed down the Embarcadero, took the BART inland, and grabbed a few slices of deliciously greasy pizza from Blondie’s before locating our vehicle and progressing toward the evening’s activities.

Katie’s friend Britt generously hosted a rollicking New Year’s party in the Sunset that consisted of copious vinyl listening, Great Lakes (courtesy of Matt) and local San Francisco beer, champagne, home-made munchables, and alcohol-infused baked goods. We met loads of new people and mingled well into the morning.

Day 7. Miles 3,737 – 3,744: San Francisco, CA

Having found our way back to Excelsior the evening prior, we woke up and headed to the Sunset again by way of Ocean Beach, which was crowded with surfers looking to take on the winter waves. 

Matt takes a picture while Katie looks on at Ocean Beach

Katie, Matt, and I found brunch in the Sunset on Irving Avenue at a small Mexican restaurant called LaFonda. Mexican food may not have been the best choice for our mildly hung-over stomachs, but the chorizo breakfast burritos were delicious and the portion sizes were not lacking, especially considering the low price. The salsa bar was also a perk, as was the well-daylit balcony over the serving counter that provided a quiet view of the restaurant below and the street beyond.

From the sunset we wound up through Golden Gate Park to the famous Haight-Ashbury district, where we explored Amoeba Music, an enormous independent music store which felt a little bit like a warehouse designed by Mondrian. We wandered down the street, which contained second-hand stores (consisting almost entirely of tie-dye products) and high-end boutiques and gastropubs in equal measure, simultaneously paying tribute to its hippie history and taking advantage of its name recognition.

Corner of Haight and Ashbury

At the boundary of the district we headed south on Masonic Avenue one block to find some of San Francisco’s famous “Resplendent Victorians”, the Painted Ladies.

Painted Ladies at Waller St and Masonic Ave

From the Haight we drove north, through the Presidio, to the Golden Gate Bridge. We were lucky enough to see it in its entirety, unobscured by the famous bay fog, and near twilight. Katie, who had presumably seen it many times, napped in the car while Matt and I walked to the Fort Point overlook and eventually onto the bridge itself, where we had a spirited argument over the definition of a pillar. This argument arose when we got separated and tried to find each other by describing our location on the bridge. We eventually found each other near the southern tower of the bridge and fought our way through the thousands of tourists (including what I felt was a disproportionate number of French people) toward the car, stopping to read about the seismic retrofitting of the bridge following the 1989 Loma Prieta earthquake.

Seismic refit under the Golden Gate Bridge. The column in the middle is comprised of alternating layers of rubber and steel to allow the supports to move independently of the road surface.

The bridge, at 4,200 feet long, was impressive, as were the views. The crowds were very heavy, although this presumably had to do with the fact that it was New Year’s day and nobody was at work. The scale of the bridge was such that we didn't really notice all the people while we were on it, or from a distance. It was rather serene, actually.

Looking north over Fort Point to the Golden Gate Bridge

With the day nearing its end, Katie took us to Corona Heights Park, which contained a small (~220 ft) hill providing panoramic views of San Francisco. The red chert comprising the hill made up some interesting rock formations at the summit, but in this particular instance, I was more interested in the lookout.

Looking west from Corona Heights Park with Downtown to the Left

Twilight over San Francisco

We stayed for a little while at my request, so that I could get a decent picture of the city after dark, and then we headed into town so that Matt and I could find our hostel and we could all grab dinner. We walked around downtown a little, though not extensively since it was after dark, and Matt and I checked in and dropped our stuff off. The HI San Francisco Downtown was not cheap (although for downtown, it probably wasn't bad), and the wireless had some problems, but it was well appointed, secure, and clean with nice views of Mason Street and comfortable beds. We were in a room with four beds, only three of which were occupied. Our roommate was quiet software engineer from Wisconsin on a grand US tour who was thoroughly well-informed on world affairs and all topics newsworthy. After chatting with him for a while, we left in search of food, and found at Café Mason, a large 24-hour full-service restaurant that left us pleasantly surprised by their food selection and quality (easily as good as or better than any other 24-hour establishment I've ever been in). We chatted over our very filling dinner and eventually Matt drove Katie home and I headed back to the hostel.

Day 8. Miles 3,744 – 3,987: San Francisco, CA to Groveland, CA

Matt and I woke up bright and early, breakfasted at the hostel (which had an excellent selection of bagels and toppings, and where, while sitting, we chatted with a nice Dutch couple), swung by Excelsior to pick up Katie, and drove down to the Mission district, which was vibrant, colorful, and historic. Music seemed to come from every intersection and fruit stalls crowded the sidewalks. We parked and walked up 16^th and 17^th streets, through Clarion Alley (home to the one of the largest concentration of murals in San Francisco), past an inordinate number of little cafés and coffee shops, and wandered by Mission San Francisco de Asís (the oldest building in San Francisco, dedicated in 1971) to Mission Dolores Park, which offered yet another panoramic view of the city with the spires of the historic missions in the foreground. From there we walked to the Castro district, along Castro Street and the incredibly colorful shops and displays, down Market Street, and onto 16^th Street again, where we stopped for lunch at Ike’s Place, a sandwich shop named the best in San Francisco for a number of years (I forget exactly how many – it was a substantial number). The lines was nearly out the door but it moved quickly, and after I ate my sandwich—entitled “We’re JUST Friends” and comprised of fresh avocado, halal chicken, pepper jack, and a sweet orange glaze—I was inclined to agree with the aforementioned accolades. We finished our lunches back at Mission Dolores Park, hurried back to the car, which had been sitting at an expired meter for a few minutes, and, after dropping Katie off, headed for the hills.

We exited San Francisco on Route 1 across the Golden Gate Bridge and, after losing the trail in Mt. Tamalpais, climbed over the coastal hills and emerged at Muir Beach. We mostly stuck to the road, stopping here and there to clamber over some particularly interesting-looking rocks (check out this PDF from the USGS about the San Andreas fault and geology of the Point Reyes peninsula) to a decent overlook. We had hoped to make it to one of the lighthouses, but we were short on time and wanted to make it into wine country before everything closed, so we contended ourselves with the view from the car windows (which, mind you, was not lacking).

California coast

We took a hard right at Point Reyes National Seashore, left the coastal route, and motored inland, eventually making our way into hills covered in orderly rows of vines. It was nearing 5:00 pm and we guessed that most tasting rooms would be closing, so soon after we passed a sign for Sonoma, we followed the advice of a small roadside advertisement indicating the direction toward the Robledo Family Winery. We parked in the gravel parking lot next to a small house and barn and located the tasting room. A large group was leaving and the attendant, Jonathan, seemed happy to see us, a perception that was reflected in the quantity and quality of wine we received to taste. We chatted about the family history (a Mexican immigrant who started out working in another vineyard and slowly got enough money to start his own vineyard management business before transitioning to production), wine-making and transitioned to beer-making (which was his true passion) before leaving with a bottle each of a particularly delicious red blend of Cabernet Sauvignon, Merlot, and Syrah.

Sunset over the vineyard at Robledo Family Winery

We continued into Sonoma proper and had dinner at an upscale pizza joint called Red Grape, where I, for the first time, had a glass of wine with pizza. And it was wonderful. The wine list was thorough and the server well-informed, and we had an excellent dinner before carrying on through Napa and beginning the long trek back east. Before long, we were navigating the twisting, winding roads of the Sierra Nevada over cliffs and through rich alpine forest (not that we could see much, it being decidedly dark) with the temperature outside dropping rapidly. There was almost nothing in the way of settlements, so, fearing that we’d wind up stranded and freezing at the park entrance until morning, we stopped at the rather rickety-looking Groveland Motel. We were put up by a skittish proprietor in a small, comfortable, odd-smelling, severely dated cabin, but it was cheap, heated, and outfitted with wi-fi, so we couldn't complain too much. We settled in and dozed off.

Tune in next time for Part IV in this continuing series: Parks, Bars, and Hoodoos