Nearing the End, Water Taxi, Lunch Room, and Leslie's Pic

We are nearing the end of our research cruise and we have obtained and preserved thousands of samples over the past few weeks. Although I didn't get to dive in Alvin, the trip was worth it. It was also nice to work with some people outside of the tree-ring community. I will update the blog probably one or two more times at the most before returning to "The Haute". Most of the work has been repetitive, which is why the posts have been lacking recently.

We will be leaving the ship on the 9th and commuting towards San Jose, Costa Rica. Plans currently are to explore around the Monteverde area, eat a slice a pizza, and drink some Mt. Dew and maybe some more Guanabana....boy am I excited.

Since there is not a decent place to dock our ship, we have to take a water taxi in to Puntarenus and catch a cab to San Jose.

(Water Taxi)

Some of you expressed interest in seeing what the lunch room looked like....T.V. shows different camera angles of sections of Atlantis.....No cable........

(Taking water samples for PH and DO)

(Up close and personal.....just for you Leslie.....enjoy:)

Positioning and CTD Deployment In Rough Waters

This is a map from the captains deck that shows the exact positioning of the boat and where the drops have been. The red dots indicate where drops have been made. Today we are currently sampling with the CTD at 1800m, two samples. Do to the weather conditions, we are kind of in limbo about what is going to happen tonight, with respect to coring. I just got word that we are headed back to Jarco Scarp to do some more sampling. The Navy said that they are advising us to leave the area and try a place with calmer waters.

Today's recovery of the CTD were much more interesting than usual, the rough water made trying to grab onto the ropes an interesting game. But it also made for a rougher than usual night of sleeping. A few people got sick because of the hours on end under a scope of moving sediments. I had to take a few Drammamine and Mecklazine tablet in order stay "normal".

Here are a few pictures of the worm tubes, inside and out. When they are cut into sections, they are little easier to process.

(Getting excited about deploying the CTD)

Being a "Hooker"

"Steady"

(Yup)

http://www.atlantis.whoi.edu/

Above is the site where you can find information on where our current position is. Just click under the current research cruise link. There you can also find pictures of all the scientists under the Cruise Parcipants, along with the Alvin and Atlantis crews. There are also many pictures taken from the various dives on the trip listed under the Alvin Internal Still Pictures link.

Styrofoam, Jason's Nixon, and Cooler

We brought along a styrofoam head that everyone on board signed, along with styrofoam cups. I cups with Bella and Sommer's names on them. Bella's cup has a drawing of ALVIN retrieving "Night Night Bear" from the great depths.

The Nalgene bottle was used for scale. Originally, the dive was thought to be going 1000m, however, it ended up going over 2000m. The head seems to weigh more than it did before, but its just the condensed version which throws things off a bit, obviously it weighs the same.

Jason, his best Nixon......his first time going down in Alvin was today. He has been on a ship before that was carrying ALvin, but there are only so many spots. I have done the math.....I don't think that I'm going to make it down on my maiden voyage, but keep your fingers crossed.

It is customary to give the person taking their first dive in Alvin to get drenched in cold water. Brian and I filled some buckets with ice, poured some sea water in so it wouldn't freeze, and stuck the buckets in a freezer for about 30 minutes before dousing him.

Some pictures of things in the cooler. These worms are tough to pick "forams" from, because of the constant rotating that is envolved.

Anyone have questions about anything? Click on the "comments" link and type me something. Nobody has done that yet????? and thanks to Chuck for passing the blog around to a few others.