Alaskan Field Observations ...

–if you sing silly songs out loud so the bears know you are coming … you will eat bugs … and if you don’t chew before swallowing they can buzz all the way down!!
– scrambled eggs for breakfast has a two week appeal, after that you will crave cold instant oatmeal
– if you work outside all day, you can eat man-sized steaks, desserts, cookies, and wine guilt-free
– the concept ‘clean’ is a luxury item
– it is not only pregnant women that crave ice-cream

This has been a month of contrasts working in buggy, dense forests collecting soil samples (yesterday I was wondering what a 45 year old mother of 3 was doing digging holes in the dirt – 20 in a day, about 45x45cm each in a dense forest with gazillions of mosquitoes and flies … all in the name of prospecting?; other days I wonder why all 45 year old mothers of three aren’t out here too?) to working on steep slopes that – well they were so steep that one night I dreamt our crew was walking up a rugged slope which got steeper & steeper … eventually it got so steep we were walking upside down! I guess that is better than the one that where Russell stashed all the shovels in my backpack for the day!

Besides some little dramas involving immature helicopter mechanics - the crew gets along remarkably well. However, I’m not sure how long I could live with all men (for a few weeks it was me & 8 men in a remote lodge – and not as much fun as it sounds). The recon crew didn’t have a day off to do laundry in our 2 and a bit weeks so our work clothes smelt really rancid at the end; fortunately we had showers so we could sleep clean. Interestingly I have observed that a bunch of men behave the same as a bunch of women! Not sure who came up with the Men are from Mars, Women are from Venus theory…but it’s bogus … and men are actually better gossipers than women (they don’t call it gossiping of course, to them it’s probably called ‘dispersing the facts’, and it works a lot like the game ‘broken telephone’)!!

The last day out in the Alaska Range project, we were supposed to finish up early. I was done at 10:30am as were Tristan [also known temporarily as Corporal Dewd, because of his addiction to Mountain Dew] and Dan - 2 of my trusty recon companions (Russell had already flown back to Fairbanks, and Ed was staying back to finish up paperwork). ‘Commander’ Andy, our helicopter pilot, flew to McGrath after dropping us in the field. We expected him back at lunch time, but he didn’t show. Turns out that whatever he was going to get wasn’t there until midday. However, we didn’t know this until much later in the afternoon, so the stinky weather and no helicopter caused us a lot of worry. Dan and Tristan were together, but I was on the other side of a mountain and had no radio contact with them. It was a pretty miserable field day – rain, snow, wind, fog, etc (but we’re tough!!) and by 2pm Dan and Tristan made a decision to hike down to a rendezvous position we had talked about earlier. Coincidentally, I also started walking down at 2pm. I got to the rendezvous point at 3:30pm and could finally get them on the radio (they were much further away than me and were still on the move). It was a relief to be in contact with somebody after 6 hours. I waited under a lone, scrappy alder bush for them, contemplating a long and cold night – the clouds were getting lower and it was just the hardest rain you can imagine (see self portrait taken during a lull in the storm – still smiling!). I can tell you that the greatest sound in the world was the helicopter buzzing up low in the valley with Andy on the radio saying – ‘I’m gonna get you out of there’ – and he did! My survival kit will have some additional things in it now – a large plastic sheet & a whole bunch of extra fire starters!

In the Alaskan bush, bears are the least of our worries. Breaking a leg, concussion, or spending the night out in bad weather are the real enemies, and a poor outcome is most likely to be linked to poor human judgment. We are our greatest enemies! Ed had his sample stash mauled by a bear two days ago, but bears are still not a real obsession with us, we are too busy trying to get our job done to be obsessed by the wildlife, although I do think we all have a heightened sense of awareness for anything unusual in our surroundings. Go Corporal Dewd and his close encounter with an Alaskan wolf!

Today I think I’m very lucky to have the opportunity to work here this summer – great people, great scenery, and memories for a lifetime! Enjoy the photos … and although the summer is winding down … we’re not quite done!