Apparently, we do know the way to San Jose

Sorry for the delay, but as you will see in the next few blog entries, we have been quite busy. As Memorial Day weekend approached we decided to make the most of a three day weekend and make the drive up the coast to visit our Northern Californian friends, Chris and Shellie. You might remember them from such blog posts as "Setting up Shop"- they drove all the way down here to help us unload the moving truck. Such troopers. Anyway, we hadn't been up their way for a while and decided to make a weekend out of it. It also meant driving through one of Pie Girls favorite spots on the PCH.

The rolling hills of the country side were a welcome site to these two city slickers

Luckily, for Pie Girl, she did not need to be slapped this time around.

Several hours of winding roads later, we finally arrived in San Jose. It was wicked late (for us, not for Chris and Shellie, of course) and some of us turned in early. We had a action packed day ahead of us beginning with a 10 o'clock appointment at "The Mystery Spot" and we wanted to be ready. Thanks to some terrible Memorial Day traffic, we took a detour through the Santa Cruz mountains (more winding roads) for quite a while as we tried to make our way to Santa Cruz- home of the Banana Slugs!!! Just as Pie Girl started to think to herself, "Gosh this looks familiar. I wonder if we are anywhere near...." and almost as if to finish her sentence she saw a sign..."Now Entering- Brookdale". And as quickly as it had popped into her head, The Brookdale Lodge popped into sight. Pie Girl and Dirt Doc tried to put words together. Somehow Chris translated their gibberish and pulled over. Since the Brookdale Lodge is frozen in some sort of bizarro time warp, it looked exactly the same as it did when we saw it years ago with Alys. (And now after reading about it -click on the link above- I am even more freaked out.)

We tried to convince Chris and Shellie to have their wedding here, but the creepiness of the Brookdale Lodge was too much for Shellie to even think of eating lunch here!


Exhibit A

Well, we finally pulled ourselves away from the ol' Brookdale, and eventually made it to Santa Cruz. Since Shellie and Chris used to live here they were able to give us a personalized tour of all the local hangouts. Since our detour had made us unfashionably late for our appointment at the Mystery Spot (even by California standards) we decided to go all-in: we stopped by a creperie to have a bite to eat. Then it was off to the Mystery Spot. The Mystery Spot still remains a mystery to us. The parking situation and pseudo-park rangers maintaining an iron-fisted control on that situation were very mysterious. We weren't sure why, but their system consisted of us waiting in our car for about an hour wondering what the heck was going on. We finally decided to let the Mystery Spot remain a mystery and high tailed it out of there.

Once we left there we basically had the rest of the day to do whatever we wanted. We decided to head down to the beach. Santa Cruz is really beautiful and full of lots of people. We walked out on the pier and spotted lots of Sea Lions! They were adorable. They reminded me of puppies! They make a very loud "bark" that echoes under the pier.

adorable!

Not so adorable, but cool anyway!

Trying to look adorable.

We are Chris and Shellie and we approve this picture.

The next day we decided to pack up a picnic lunch and head back up to the mountains for a hike. We set off on a trail called Castle Rock (Tee hee... Picnic at Castle Rock). After working up an appetite we found a place near the waterfall to sit and enjoy our munchies. We didn't actually see it, but some other hikers warned us of a rattlesnake up ahead.

Later that night we thought it would be nice to see the downtown area of San Jose. Also, we discovered there was a giant Monopoly Board in a park downtown that we just had to see. Apparently they have giant dice to roll and giant pieces so you can actually play- this needs to be reserved in advance, however, so we were only able to see the board itself. Having all forgotten to bring our cameras we tried to take a few shots with a camera phone, but they didn't come out too well. Pie Girl had to pose on her favourite properties of Baltic and Mediterranean Avenues! We grabbed a bite to eat and headed home after a long day.

The next day basically consisted of saying goodbye and driving home. We did have one stop to make in Pasadena for dinner with V and Nic. More on that in the next post!!!

A Special Thanks to Shellie for sharing pictures of the trip!

Puppy Therapy!!!

The Atlantis

If you'll recall from an earlier post, I had just driven back from Flagstaff, AZ and arrived in San Diego to help Shannon offload some science gear from the research vessel (R/V) Atlantis. She had been at sea several months earlier, doing research at the hydrothermal vents of the East Pacific Rise at 9 degrees North of the equator. Often in oceanographic work, you can't take all the gear you need with you, so you end up shipping it to the R/V ahead of your arrival. Then you unpack and assemble it once you're aboard. But then what to do when you disembark? Usually, you pack it back up and leave it on the ship. Then, when the ship puts into a suitable harbor, you either arrange for them to send you the crates, or you meet the ship and offload the gear yourself. Since both Shannon and the Atlantis were in San Diego, she opted for the latter.

Shannon's husband, Gavin, works on the Atlantis as part of the Deep Sea Operations Group - he's a pilot for the manned deep submergence vehicle, Alvin. They're quite a husband-wife team! Anyway, we met them at the ship to offload the stuff and have a look around. Pie Girl has only seen photos of this stuff, but I spent 28 days at sea in 2002 on a research cruise similar to the one Shannon completed a few months ago. It was fun to see it all again. Ah, memories.

Hey baby. Did you miss me?

View of San Diego Harbor from the 3rd level deck.

Here is a stock photo of Alvin and the Atlantis, its mother ship.

The orange bit is called the sail, and it leads to a 6' diameter sphere that houses the three crew: one pilot and two science complement.


This diagram is inaccurate in that a normal human can't really stand up inside the sphere. The positions adopted by the other two guys are pretty close to reality. Anyway, most of the rest of the space inside Alvin is consumed by batteries, ballast, electronics and hydraulics. Here are some additional specs on Alvin for those of you interested in building a duplicate in your basement.

Here we are inside the sphere, looking up through the sail hatch.

Here I am, assuming the role of pilot. Fire torpedoes!

Alvin has been involved in many exciting missions, from the discovery of life at hydrothermal vents to the exploration of the Titanic wreck. Alvin, the Atlantis, and their crews, have also been featured in a 1999 PBS Nova special and an IMAX movie. I'm just a soil scientist from the 2nd smallest state in the Union. So I feel very privileged, indeed, to have had the opportunity to work aboard the Atlantis with the dedicated people who make this type of research possible.

We accomplished our mission and transported Shannon's gear safely to the lab. After that it was Miller Time! It had been a long day for yours truly, and I was looking forward to a hot shower, a cold brew, and my own bed. All in a day's work for your friendly neighborhood Dirt Doc.

Do you need help little man?

I'm sorry, but this is the funniest thing I have seen in a really long time.

Trip to Arizona

I have been updating the blog quite a bit, but I don't want you to get the impression like I am giving you our activities in real time... a lot of this stuff happened weeks ago and we are just getting round to putting it up. A friend just asked me today, "Where do you get time to go to Julian and do all this stuff AND blog about it in between work?" The simple answer is that I don't work. But the nuanced answer is that the stuff you see here on the blog is pretty spread out over time - and the interstices between blog entries is pretty much filled with your normal everyday activities. Digging up tubers. Shinnying up palm trees to gather coconuts. Laying in the hammock. You know, much like your own life.

But this latest post is pretty close to recent, April 28/29. I took a drive through the desert to Flagstaff AZ to visit my old friend Matt. It's a 7 to 8 hour haul, but long drives never bothered me much. I took I-8 most of the way, which runs out of the city, through the Laguna mountains, and then drops you down into the desert. The worst part of the drive is getting through Phoenix, but then it's a clear shot, about 3 hours to Flag.

We chilled at Matt's place the first night and I relaxed from the drive over burgers and beer. The next day we got a fairly early start, laying in provisions and making the drive up to Page, AZ. Page is right next to the Utah border, and the Glen Canyon Dam that forms Lake Powell. Basically, Glen Canyon used to be a dry canyon (and was breathtaking by all accounts). Then someone got the bright idea of diverting the Colorado river to fill the canyon and setting up a hydroelectric dam at the far end. So they flooded the canyon. We'll never get to see what it looked like in those antedeluvian days, but as a lake it's still pretty scenic.

We pitched our tents right on the shore of the lake (which would have been the edge of a mesa if it were still a canyon).

Views of the lake:

Meanwhile, back at camp...

Matt spent about a half hour gathering stones to make our firepit. A true outdoorsnerd. And he's available, ladies.

Our enjoyment of the surroundings was dampened by these two ass-hats who rolled in after dark. They camped right on top of us and proceeded to crank the boom box. Why is it that people take all this needless junk with them when they camp? Are they trying to assert their dominance over nature by playing crappy music in the middle of nowhere? At first I took small solace in the fact that they were at least playing some Zepplin... until jackass #1 started dropping all of his arcane Led Zepplin knowledge on jackass #2. There is nothing the world need less than classsic rock scholars. I missed this little tidbit, but apparently Matt overheard one of them proclaiming that he was glad to be here: he just had to get away from people. Irony!

The next morning, we caught sunrise on the lake.

OH GOD MY EYES! TURN IT OFF! TURN IT OFF!!!

After a leisurely breakfast, we went to obtain a pass to hike into a slot canyon called Water Holes, located nearby. This canyon is on Navajo lands, so we needed to get permission to go in.

Hiking down into the canyon. Matt is indicating the wind direction so I can stay up-wind of his horrible farts.

At the canyon floor.


One of the canyon denizens.

We started climbing through this narrow branch...

And ended up back on top of the mesa.

Back down in the canyon.

We also found out why this canyon was called "Water Holes." As we progressed along its length, we were presented with increasingly challenging obstacles, water-filled depressions, to scramble over.

Matt pauses to drop a deucer in the hole. But not really.

Soon after the hike, we loaded up and drove back to Flagstaff. That evening we had an awesome Mexican dinner and then saw the movie Hot Fuzz. Good stuff! Then I tried to get some sleep - I would need to wake up early the next morning and get on the road by 6:00 for the drive back to SD. I promised Shannon I would help unload some science equipment from a research vessel docked in the harbor (the Atlantis) and I like to keep my promises.

I got up and underway without any problems. You may recall from a previous post that Phoenix is home to the closest Dunkin Donuts. This fact did not escape my notice, and I made a detour into town specifically to pick up a box for Pie Girl. It cost me dearly in terms of time and sanity - Phoenix is a godforsaken wasteland full of traffic - but I got the goods.


I arrived back in SD around 2:00 and we met Shannon and Gavin at the harbor - but that is a story for another post. This one is already long enough!