The next morning was relatively easy work-wise, but it was
rough for me because I didn’t sleep well the previous night. Though it sounds
contradictory, I was too cold, even
with a jacket and pants on. There was also this mouse on our roof making the
worst possible noise in the world throughout the night, so I woke up every
couple hours or so either from being cold or some mice screwing on the roof.
After checking all the traps, we went on a three hour hike/“drive” (walking in
a line in a field looking for stuff), during which I found a little venomous
snake which was pretty cool.
Later on, my group of three went out with Jan and Werner
(the actual spelling) for what was supposed to be a relatively short drive and
search around Dwesa for a certain type of frog. The plan for the night for
dinner was sausage (which really excited the two of them) so I totally wasn’t
expecting us to be out until 9:30. It was fun though because we got to see a
few different corners of Dwesa and learn a little more about the reserve.
Apparently, locals burned down and vandalized the rondavels at different gates
housing the staff that worked there to intimidate them into letting them in. So
for a while we just walked in and around the burnt down houses (which held up
surprisingly well for mud, sticks, and poop) looking for frogs and snakes. We
then worked our way to some streams to look for a specific frog, where things
were super close to being scary and painful. Jan was using the machete to chop
down some stuff in his way to go investigate blood someone found on this tree.
Not two minutes earlier I decided to cross this stream across and behind the
aforementioned tree. In the process of chopping something down (which he easily
could’ve snapped with his fingers) his follow-through swung the machete back
and flew through the air, right where my legs would have been had I not moved
across the stream; it was like when a baseball player accidentally lets go of
his bat during the swing. So yea that could’ve been real bad.
We spent the next few hours walking in and around streams
and ponds, the latter of which we did when it was pitch black out, the only
light coming from our headlamps and the stars not masked by the clouds. Eventually
they got the species they wanted and we were able to go back. The drive back
was miserable, though, because we were really hungry, tired, and straight-up
fed up with the road conditions, which were much worse than what we were used
to. It’ll definitely be a weird adjustment when I get home, this place makes
Pennsylvania roads seem not that bad. That night felt great though: getting out
of that godforsaken truck bed, eating a ton of food, and sleeping like a baby
in my sleeping bag all made for a good night.
The next day was reconvention day, but we still had to go
out and check the traps one last time. It was annoying because the other group
essentially had two days off due to travel, while we worked on both of those
days. I think their work was more strenuous than ours (with the exception of
the first day and a half), though, so I’m sure it evens out in the grand scheme
of things. All of the traps were empty, and because of some girl drama and
general tiredness amongst us, our last ride in the back of the bakkie was
filled mostly with silence, with some sporadic two- and three-sentence
conversations sprinkled throughout. After passing out for a surprisingly-long
amount of time (considering my great sleep the night before thanks to the
sleeping bag) to the point of almost being late to our session to discuss the
next steps in our learning process, I went solo to the beach and went to work
on my book (“Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter”), which is soo good. Just about
when the sun went down, the other half of our group rolled in after a long day
of travelling (essentially 7:30 am to 7:30 pm). You would’ve thought we hadn’t
seen each other in years by everyone’s reaction. Though both groups of six
seemed to really bond together well, it really was nice to get everyone back in
the same room together again. We spent the next hour or so at the conference
center just eating and sharing stories, then walked back to the tents and
chalets and essentially did the same thing until we all (the guys at least)
passed out around 11, which is like really late for us.
Breakfast the next day started “late” at 7:30, so we got to
sleep in and get some more sleep than what we were all used to the past week. I
was starved from eating just mostly rice for dinner the night before, so I and
a few others went early, where I helped myself to a double stack peanut butter
sandwich and a buttload of lemon crème cookies, which really hit the spot. It was
nice to actually sit down and slowly eat breakfast, considering most of the
week we either packed our breakfast and ate it during a break or stuffed our
faces in the minutes before (and a little after) 6 before we hit the road. After
everyone else got there we went to work on our group projects, which
essentially just consist of each group telling the other what they did and why
it’s important. Our ten minute presentations turned into two that lasted at
least twenty minutes, but they went fine so it’s all good. Knowing we had a
rest day tomorrow, we all just chilled the rest of the night, eventually
wandering down to the beach where us guys chatted under the stars on the huge
black rocks. Fun stuff.
Our off day was essentially a beach day for everyone, which
made me really wish I had a book available: my Hunger Games book is making the
rounds among the guys and I finished my Lincoln vampire book the other day. Not
having a book though was literally the only problem all day. As I said, any day
spent on the beach is a good day. The sun was finally able to penetrate my SPF
15 sunscreen (albeit in the most awkward formations, burnt splotchy feet are no
fun), I got to kick around a soccer ball for the first time in what seems like
forever, and actually took a long walk on the beach. At night we had another
braii for the departure of Jan and Werner, which, despite eating in the dark
because of the lack of power, was awesome and amazingly delicious.
The following day was our first day in the field with Dr.
Smithwick, so we were all pretty eager to get out in the field and do some
relatively-simple grunt/slave labor. I somehow got stuck on the litter and soil
team, so for the first three or so hours I and three others walked around the
40m x 40m plot of dense forest and thickets plopping down a roughly 2m2
square PVC pipe contraction and collecting the sticks and leaves from the
sample area, as well as taking a soil sample. It was quite exhilarating, so
much so that I was ready to switch tasks after lunch. Thankfully, I was able to
join another group that was doing DBHs (diameter (of the tree) at breast
height), which basically just involves tagging trees, measuring their diameter,
and recording it. Unfortunately that got old pretty quick, but we weren’t out
there too long so it was all good. We capped off the night with some basic
dinner and a long and dark session afterwards. The next day was to be
essentially the same deal (plus an additional few hours), so I was determined
to get on a different task force (the name I gave them to make things more
exciting) for the new plot. So the next day comes around and I was able to get
on a DBH crew that was really fun and chill; some people are straight business
out in the field, so it was good to get with a group of people that was able to
mix some humor into things. Somehow we finished like three hours early, so we
were able to head back after lunch into the waiting arms of showers and
electricity (not at the same time), the latter of which had recently been
restored in the conference center. When we got back to our chalet, whoever was
in front walked in and yelled “There’s shit in here!” I thought he meant like
cockroach poop or something, which is unfortunately pretty common. No no no,
this was monkey shit. After
inspecting the scene a little more, we found an empty peanut butter can (from
the closed trash can) out on the verandah, and muddy monkey tracks leading to the poop, but not away from the poop. Very strange. The
rest of the day was super chill: I got to start my Hunger Games book, we
figured out some more details on our group project/lab report, and killed a lot
of time watching stuff together on people’s laptops.
The next few days will be spent working on our lab reports,
so hopefully there’s a decent amount of free time before we head back to The
Haven (praise the lawd) on Sunday. #bartscott
No comments:
Post a Comment