Ring of Fire

Every once in awhile, I'll wake up in the morning, unsuccessfully try to brush my crackling hair and notice it's a bit hotter and smoggier than usual, even for Los Angeles. It takes me a few hours to realize that the Santa Ana winds are blowing in, bringing hot, dry air and the perfect conditions for wildfires.

That was yesterday. Today it's impossible not to notice the evidence of wildfires. The sunlight streaming through open windows has an orange tint to it, and every breath of air tastes like smoke and ash.



The newspapers say Los Angeles is surrounded by a "ring of fire," but that's a bit of an exaggeration (as poetic as it is). There's a fire out near Santa Barbara, two hours to the northwest of LA. In the Los Angeles metropolitan area itself there's a fire to the northwest in San Fernando Valley and a fire to the southeast in Chino Hills.

As always, people and homes in urban areas are fine (myself included), but those in less dense neighborhoods running up into the mountains are being hit hard.

New Blog Home

I am in the process of transferring from my z0r_palmer Livejournal to this, the Wandering Geologist blog. I hope this makes it easier for people without Livejournals to navigate and comment on my blog. Besides, Blogger seems more professional (blog-ish, one might say), while Livejournal seems more personal (journal-ish), and what I write here is intended for a broader audience.

I have moved over all my old Palmer Cruise posts and written a few new posts, mostly about the end of the cruise in Punta Arenas, Chile. The new posts are:
3/23/2008: The Bridge (photo of the Palmer's bridge)
3/29/2008: This is where science happens (photo of the watchstander station)
4/2/2008: Roll-o-meter 2000 v.2.0 (photo of my Roll-o-meter)
4/14/2008: Oops (the Chilean flag)
4/15/2008: Pisco Calafate (what sailors do with their first night on land)
4/15/2008: Punta Arenas (the town Plaza)
4/15/2008: Sagrado Corazón Cathedral (going to a Chilean church)
4/16/2008: Goodbye, Punta Arenas (self-explanatory)
4/20/2008: Amusing Signs (photos of, umm, yeah)

I will go through my Croatia/Venice posts soon and add new stuff.

Amusing Signs

From the New Zealand part of the trip.


A bar in Lyttelton, New Zealand.



Teehee! They call their shopping carts "trundlers" in New Zealand. Isn't that adorable?

Goodbye, Punta Arenas

I leave Chile today. I'm going to miss all my friends from the Palmer, the science-ing, watching movies in the afternoon, eating greasy food (especially when we ran out of fresh fruit three weeks out), even the 25 degree rolls. Until next time!

Sagrado Corazón Cathedral

One of my favorite things to do when traveling is to go to church. This sounds bizarre because most people skip church when they're on vacation, but I love seeing local customs first-hand. You can only get so deep into a culture by shopping in tourist-y stores. Chile is predominantly Catholic, so it seemed like an especially good idea to go to mass.

I stopped by the cathedral near the Plaza and took a leap of faith that a sheet of paper on the bulletin board saying "Masa Domingo 8:00, 10:00. Masa Diario 16:00" meant that I should show up at 4 PM. Much to my surprise (have I mentioned that I don't speak Spanish?), people were actually gathered for mass when I came back.

Since Catholic services follow the same order everywhere, I was able to follow along and mumble English responses. That's another beautiful thing about going to church in a foreign country, knowing that everywhere across the world people are going through the same rituals, reading the same Bible passages all in their own languages.

Once mass was over, two old men stopped to talk to me. Our conversation was basically them talking in broken English and me attempting to make Latin sound Spanish-y. It must have worked because I figured out that they were thanking me for stopping by their church and telling me "peace be with you" (one of the responses during mass). We managed to work out that I was about to meet a friend at the Plaza. They also told me, "You look, to my eyes, very good." And now I can say I've been hit on just outside church by guys three times my age.

Punta Arenas

That's pronounced "Punta Arena," by the way, because final s's are silent in the Chilean accent. My (non-existent) Spanish is ruined forever. The next time I visit Mexico I'll go around saying "Gracia" and everyone will think I can't even say "Thank you" correctly.



This is a statue of Magellan in the Plaza. Sailors are supposed to rub the big toe of the guy sitting down for good luck before a journey. I rubbed it for retroactive good luck on the Palmer.

The Plaza itself is adorable with a few stands set up selling souvenirs. Apparently Chile is famous for its wool. Guess what you'll be getting, guys back home! Because the ship sure didn't have a souvenir stand.

Pisco Calafate

The first night in port we went to a restaurant (with meat! lots of meat!) and then to a pub. It turns out sailors like to get REALLY DRUNK their first night back after a cruise with no alcohol allowed. I think this photo captures the spirit of the night. (No, parents, I didn't get drunk.)



The regional drink is Pisco Calafate, similar to Pisco Sour but with Calafate ("Magellan barberry") juice. And don't ever get Chileans started on the "Is Pisco from Peru or Chile?" debate. It turns out Pisco Calafates are really good, which is sad because they don't exist outside of Southern Chile.

Oops

When we first arrived at the port, I was astonished by the number of boats from Texas. Almost every boat had a Texan flag.



Turns out I need to study my flags.



I think the mistake was understandable.

We've Arrived

We got into Punta Arenas this morning. I woke up briefly at 6:30 AM and went up to the bridge to see the sunrise. We were hanging out in the harbor for a while since they weren't expecting us until later. I've been out to see the city, but it's not nearly as photogenic as Christchurch was. I'll try to find some good pictures to post, though (now that I have internet!).



(originally posted on Livejournal)

Land Ahoy

Things are slowing down on the boat. Turned out there wasn't a ping editing party this morning since most people finished their edits beforehand, so when I woke up we had stopped collecting data and land was in sight.



That rainbow has been following us all day. :) Ironically, the land we're seeing to either side of the channel looks a lot more like the LotR scenery than the stuff I saw in New Zealand. (The picture above isn't actually an example of this.)

It's funny how my subconscious has gotten so in tune with the rocking of the boat. When I woke up this morning I opened my door and didn't close it or latch it open right away and just left it hanging. This is amazing because after about the second day of the trip I learned never to leave a door open because it will just slam shut or attack you when the boat rocks. But my subconscious had noticed that we weren't rocking any more even if my mind didn't.

The next few days:

Monday: Get in to Punta Arenas in the morning (4 AM?). We're free to get off the boat as soon as customs is done with us (9 AM?), explore! and spend the night on the boat.
Tuesday: More exploring, possible trip to a penguin colony. Spend the night in a hotel.
Wednesday: Begin making my way back, Punta Arenas to Santiago, Santiago to Lima, Lima to Los Angeles (Lima being in Peru, which I didn't actually know.)
Thursday: get to LAX in the morning :)
Weekend: work like crazy

(originally posted on Livejournal)