(C)older than Methuselah
So today, I spent five hours stuck on a mountaintop at about 3500 m above sea level, in near-zero °C temperatures and with howling winds.
So first of all, this week is Thanksgiving break at Stanford, which accounts for my not having spent those five hours in a classroom, lab, or library. Secondly, I am on a field trip in Owens Valley in Eastern California, because the geology department is awesome that way. But how that translates to my being stuck on a mountaintop? Read on.
The White Mountains, that border Owens Valley on the eastern side, happen to be home to the oldest living organism on Earth: a bristlecone pine nicknamed Methuselah that is about 4700 years old. However, it so happens that the forest in question is high in the White Mountains, just below tree line. (To read more, see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bristlecone_pine.)
Anyway, we drove up there early this morning to take a look at the "grizzled Methuselah trees" - it's a good 2-hour drive from our camp, on narrow, winding roads that snake up through the mountain range. Once we got up to the grove of Methuselah trees at about 10 in the morning, however, we came to a somewhat heartbreaking realization: One of our cars had a flat tire.
And both of the spares for that particular kind of vehicle were for some absurd reason in the other vehicle of the same kind, that we had left at camp.
O_o
And of course, because we had chosen to leave our fourth vehicle behind, the other three were crammed full with people - every seat taken.
So, there was no way to solve the problem other than leaving a group of us behind. In the end, a full two vehicles (about 14 people) ended up staying, and the rest returned to camp to get the spare. And thus it was, that I spent the day wandering around frigid, near-barren mountaintops with Mindi and Tim, while most of the rest of the group huddled in the cars trying to stay warm in the low-single-digit temperatures. The three of us, however, had a great time hiking around the unearthly-looking forest, eating our lunch, napping beneath a Methuselah tree, playing hopscotch, dancing salsa, and watching the occasional ground squirrel. Five hours later, at 3 pm, the rescue vehicle came and brought us back to the camp.
So yes. Being trapped on mountaintops + freezing + good company = heaps of good fun!
So first of all, this week is Thanksgiving break at Stanford, which accounts for my not having spent those five hours in a classroom, lab, or library. Secondly, I am on a field trip in Owens Valley in Eastern California, because the geology department is awesome that way. But how that translates to my being stuck on a mountaintop? Read on.
The White Mountains, that border Owens Valley on the eastern side, happen to be home to the oldest living organism on Earth: a bristlecone pine nicknamed Methuselah that is about 4700 years old. However, it so happens that the forest in question is high in the White Mountains, just below tree line. (To read more, see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bristlecone_pine.)
Anyway, we drove up there early this morning to take a look at the "grizzled Methuselah trees" - it's a good 2-hour drive from our camp, on narrow, winding roads that snake up through the mountain range. Once we got up to the grove of Methuselah trees at about 10 in the morning, however, we came to a somewhat heartbreaking realization: One of our cars had a flat tire.
And both of the spares for that particular kind of vehicle were for some absurd reason in the other vehicle of the same kind, that we had left at camp.
O_o
And of course, because we had chosen to leave our fourth vehicle behind, the other three were crammed full with people - every seat taken.
So, there was no way to solve the problem other than leaving a group of us behind. In the end, a full two vehicles (about 14 people) ended up staying, and the rest returned to camp to get the spare. And thus it was, that I spent the day wandering around frigid, near-barren mountaintops with Mindi and Tim, while most of the rest of the group huddled in the cars trying to stay warm in the low-single-digit temperatures. The three of us, however, had a great time hiking around the unearthly-looking forest, eating our lunch, napping beneath a Methuselah tree, playing hopscotch, dancing salsa, and watching the occasional ground squirrel. Five hours later, at 3 pm, the rescue vehicle came and brought us back to the camp.
So yes. Being trapped on mountaintops + freezing + good company = heaps of good fun!