Field Camp House of Horrors

This is my submission for last month's Accretionary Wedge hosted by Ron Schott. My posting is late, so hopefully I'll sneak in under the wire - which is related my field camp story...

I was that student that took all my classes backwards. I took structure before mineralogy, field camp before structure, and the capstone historical geology course after taking Intro and a course called mass extinctions. I had two notebooks for each class, the one where I wrote all the class notes and the other is where I listed all the words I had to look up because I had NO clue what they meant. Somehow it all managed to work out, advising aside, and themes and relationships coalesced. I was lucky that most of my fellow classmates were supportive and taught me what they knew and I repaid my debt to other students when I eventually took mineralogy, igmetpet, structure, geochem, etc. I also had some great instructors who weren't going to hold anyone's hand and just pointed me to the raised bar...

My field camp was located on the NY/VT border in Castleton, VT and Whitehall, NY (well that's where most of our mapping was located). If you've ever been to the Taconics, you know that the rocks are pretty straightforward but the structure can be pretty ridiculous. My field partner was John Moss and his field camp experience was truly horrific. He was lucky enough to contract poison ivy in week one, rolled around in his sleeping bag and kept it for the ENTIRE duration. Yikes! John and I also shredded ourselves hiking one particular power line infested with blackberry brambles... they were so amazingly tasty, but we definitely paid for that day in blood. But those are the fun stories...

We managed to map 90% of field area without anyone getting upset or angry, although we were asked numerous times if we were looking for oil or gold and if we found any that we couldn't keep it. Fair enough, but we told them not to hold their breath. However, we met one interesting ol' Vermonter who was adamant that we not traverse his property. He was mean, swore at us, threatened us and was downright un-neighborly. So we did what any two young geologists would do given the predicament of not being able to walk the middle of the field map (yes, it was smack in the middle of our map) - we waited until Sunday morning service and pouring rain and walked his property. We were psyched to collect the data until... we found the reason why he didn't want us on his property. He had two huge fields filled with 50-gallon drums of "something," there were 18-wheeler bodies filled with "stuff," and what looked like huge (12-18 inch) oil pipeline shut off valves, 90's, 45's and t's. John and I also thought, in our infinite 20 year old wisdom, that it would be a good idea to trespass wearing a bright orange gore-tex jacket and a bright yellow rain parka... So we ran. And ran. And ran. We were scared out of our mind, envisioning Mr. Happy firing away at us from across the field. Needless to say, we survived but learned a wonderful life lesson - scattered outcrop isn't worth dying over...

But the real story, for me, of field camp occurred on the day I refer to as "penance." For what I'm not sure, but I paid for all my trespassing sins on August 9th, 1997. It started out with a hot drizzly, humid morning and we were mapping on a farm in Whitehall. There is nothing more enjoyable than field mapping scattered outcrop between cow piles, your compass takes on a wonderful odor after contact with the ground enough times. As we were traversing a sloped wooded area, I slipped on some wet leaves and managed to butt slide all the way to the bottom into a barbed wire fence. Sweet. I tore up my pants and both legs and even a bit of my arm. So I cursed out the leaves, and the rain, and the slope and told John I was done for the day and that we were going to the rope swing. THE rope swing I should say, because it was the most amazing rope swing I had ever experienced in New England. Someone had climbed a towering pine tree at the edge of the Mettowee River in Granville, NY and installed a 3" braided rope. You grabbed the roped and walked away from the river, upslope for ~30-40 feet where you found a tree with a tree stand ~10 feet high. So you climbed the tree stand, jumped out holding onto the rope, enjoyed a few seconds of free fall and then you were whipped down the slope out over the river and you could let go at your leisure (as long as you didn't slam into the opposite bank, which is how someone died a few years ago and so the pine tree was cut down).

However, on this day my hands were either sweaty, I was tired, or just not paying attention and when I jumped out of the tree stand, my hands slid down the rope, giving me a rope burn on both hands (I did hold on though so I didn't fly into the ground). Sweet action #2. So now I'm sliced and diced by the barbwire and have matching blisters the size of half dollars on each hand. Wow, what an awful day you say? It's not over...

Now I'm really in a bad mood, John drives us back to our campground at Bomoseen State Park, and he offers to make dinner. So I wander into the group camping area and my TA Nick Hayman, now at the Institute for Geophysics at the Jackson School, has a friend visiting from Albany. His friend has a chow. I love dogs and had spent the last 3 weeks approaching strange dogs in the process of mapping strangers property. Yet, here I am in "my" campsite, offer my hand to a wagging, tongue-lolling chow and, yup, CHOMP. 10 puncture wounds in my right hand. Sweet action #3. This is the point when it just became funny, and John and I laughed until our sides hurt (not right away though, I was definitely in pain).

I learned a lot of lessons during field camp, many were geology related but most were "life" related. I've heard so many amazing "field camp was awesome" stories over the last 14 years and I had an amazing time teaching field camp in graduate school, but the amazing time I had during my field camp was definitely altered by that one day.

There are also a few stories about a lost rock hammer, riding horses without saddles, feeding bulls gorp, and trying to trick Nick with furnace slag... but I'll save those for another time. Looking forward to reading others stories!!!

p.s. - I need to track down John so he can substantiate this story, I know it sounds crazy!

Future Geologist?

You have to feel sorry for this poor kid, BUT I imagine this prompted him to ask "why" is that one deeper than the others! It also may have scarred him for life and he'll never explore another mud puddle, sandbox, or swiftly moving river again! But seriously, that's a deep hole with no real evidence explaining why... I've seen potholes like that before, but not puddles! I'm guessing man made (like when I tried to dig to China), but maybe you have some other ideas!

Accretionary Wedge #10: Geology in Art

Johan Christian Claussen Dahl: Outbreak of the Vesuvius (1826)

Well, depending on your geographic location, you have may have been experiencing similar thunderstorms as those blanketing Vermont - so I've stayed away from the computer until it seemed safe again! We had a great turnout and I'm thrilled to write up this summary.

I think a lot of scientists live with the dogma that they aren't necessarily artistic or creative (i.e. - the whole left versus right brain argument). But geology is a science driven in many cases solely by imagination and creativity, which then leads to an artistic representation or recreation of a time we'll never visit, a place we'll never see with our own eyes, or an organism that was only partially preserved. Not only do I believe our science riddled with aesthetic values, but as your submissions indicate, many geologists also yearn to see our science within 'traditional' art, literature, music, etc.

Within the genre of paintings/sketches, Hypocentre offers an abstract representation of the Law of Cross-Cutting relationships from Glen Tilt painted by John Clerk for James Hutton, David over at Cryology and Co. provides a link to a fascinating sequence of glacial landscapes and a discussion on the climatic inferences one can make from historical paintings, Silver Fox describes a beautiful McLure's Magazine cover meant to illicit and capture the life of early prospecting in Montana, Tuff Cookie posted both paintings and photos while discussing the early expedition into Yellowstone and the significance of Thomas Moran's work in preserving this region (for past and future field camp visits?), Kim offers up a double dose of art with a Chinese painting and poem, one which I think all of us can identify with, EffJot posted a beautiful cross-section, complete with historical context, which is housed in the German Federal Institute for Geosciences and Resources - I wish I had the pleasure of walking by that one every day, and Dr. Ralph Harrington writes with exceptional talent describing Sir William Hamilton's "Campi Phlegraei: Observations on the Volcanos of the Two Sicilies" and provides a few beautiful examples from this monograph. If I remember correctly, Hamilton is the guy who carried all sorts of materials and objects up Vesuvius to throw into the lava streams just to see "what would happen" - but I might be mistaken. And finally, albeit belatedly, Chris reminds us all that geologic maps are not only informative and fun to make, but art themselves. My undergraduate structure professor once told me that when making your map, if you're confused about the geology in an area to "color it beautifully" to make up for that fact... This was tongue in cheek of course, but a reference to the aesthetics one should consider in mapping!

Within the genre of geologic materials, Andrew asks us to keep an eye out for anthropomorphic features in outcrop - clearly a fan of The Old Man in the Mountain, Coconino explores the link between geology and architecture in Los Angeles - and made me jealous with her choice in countertops, similarly the Lost Geologist gives us an e-walking-tour exploring Berlin's building/carving stone origins - this seems to be a topic that is ripe for exploration in almost any city, perhaps the online geocommunity needs to provide such a service for the world? An online repository of virtual building/carving stone tours?

Within the genre of the written, the read, and the sung - Geotripper revels us with a short rendition of Landslide (anyone else care to "chime" in on their favorite geo-song), Harmonic Tremors describes a fascinating relationship between geologic processes, culture, and Javanese music, goodSchist posts a beautifully chilling Maori legend surrounding Mount Taranaki (and manages to sneak the word Emo into the post) and also provides a link to a recent discussion that might be of interest, and finally Brian posts yet another geo-relevant song - Rift by Phish - which conjures up images of topography and should metaphorically elicit a response from any geologist!

It's a small n I know, but it seems as though geologists are still drawn to the visual - the paintings and sketches that we can interpret through 'scientific' eyes. The paintings of Moran, Cole, Turner, Brueghel, Friedrich, Church, etc., are easily appreciated and interpreted by our well-trained eyes. It was a real treat to see where people took this Wedge and I look forward to future posts on the topic, whether individual or whether we choose to tackle a more specific genre (e.g. - geology in music). Finally, there are some wonderful books out there that provide more information on this alternative perspective of our science: Romantic Rocks, Aesthetic Geology, Bedrock: Writers on the Wonder of Geology, and a new release I just saw in GSAToday is Home Ground: Language for an American Landscape. Thanks, this was a blast and very informative!

Volcano Tour of Italy...

I wanted to share a few photos from a trip I took in April visiting all of the "major" volcanoes in southern Italy. I took a train from Meran to Milan and then flew EasyJet to Catania, a relatively painless traveling day. Saturday morning I awoke in the 'Sea and Volcano Room' at the Catania City Center B&B to a fabulous view of Etna.

I then took a trip up Etna with Etna Excursions, but by the time we arrived on the mountain, it was windy and snowy, so I didn't get to see much of the volcano. We traveled across various aged lava flows and poked around a little lava tube but it was fairly anticlimactic given the photos I've seen of Etna...

I traveled north to Messina via TrenItalia and caught an UsticaLines ferry to Vulcano. I can tell you that off-season on Vulcano is quiet... It took quite some time to find a room, not because it was crowded, but because so many of the pensions were closed! I headed up the main street, Vicolo Vulcano, and then up a well-worn path to the rim of Vulcano. Luckily I passed a sign that was clearly put there for geologists (I was informed by a National Park Service employee in Hawaii how crazy we all are) warning about the fumerols.



















The wind was incredibly strong and blowing the nasty air away from me, otherwise I wouldn't have wandered so close (ok, maybe)... I took a few movies, none of which capture the true nature of standing on the rim of this mellowly belching volcano.

Honestly, with the wind, there was little danger of inhaling much of anything, in fact this was the front of a scirrocco that blew up from Africa, the next day I could see dust veils carried to the west. This fresh sulfur will likely make its way down to Vulcano and sold to tourists throughout the summer, a renewable source of income!

I continued on to Stromboli, the 'jewel' of my trip... You have to summit Stromboli with a guide, as far as I could tell there are only two, but perhaps more during the summer months. I summited with Mario Pruiti, a guide working for MagmaTrek. The hike took about 3.5 hours with a large group, it's probably 2 hours if you could just hike up on your own. The sun started to set as we reached the summit, so we were offered a beautiful sunset and an amazing light show. Mario informed us that this was as active as Stromboli had been in 3 weeks. I've been close to lava before in Hawaii National Park, but that was flowing lava not erupting pyroclastics. Watching the cinder cone develop as debris fell was fascinating... so was listening to and feeling the volcano beneath you. A living and breathing system indeed...



















Just a smattering of the photos I took along the way, eventually I'll build a more comprehensive flash gallery of the rest, including a few photos from Pompeii and Vesuvius... I was underwhelmed at Pompeii to be honest, mainly because of the 1000's of people clogging the streets in April, I'm scared to think of what it's like in August!!! If you're planning a trip to any of these volcanoes, shoot me an email and I'll see if I can offer any help to make it run more smoothly!

Seeking Submissions for Accretionary Wedge #10: Aesthetic Geology - Geology in Art

Kilauea on Oil by Ernst William Christmas, 1816-1818

The joys of a dead laptop in a foreign country! Sorry I've been away so long again, I returned from Italy and I'm now officially requesting submissions for geology in art (e.g. - paintings, poetry, literature, sculpture, buildings, etc). This possibilities are ENDLESS and I'm really excited to see what you've discovered over the years! I'm bummed that I missed out on Wedge #9 - Significant Geologic Events, although I'm wondering if in a group of this many scientists, did anyone ask how we were defining "significant?" Sorry, flashback to graduate school...

The deadline for submission is June 15 (even though it says June 8th on the Accretionary Wedge schedule) and my only request is that we try to dig up as much background as possible on the origin of the work and possible influences on the artist. Please add a link to your submission in the comments section or shoot me an email.

Let the mafic creativity flow!!!