Salute

It's about that time to call the Galapagos yet another adventure in the books. I've taken a flight a couple days early to get home soon than expected. But at the same time I feel I came and conquered what needed to be done. I helped with as much GIS stuff as possible and locked in the Google workshop in Sept. It was a great experience and quite different from the norm. Between living/working in a forgein country and I admit there was quite the mental game of being constrained to an island, I have learned alot.

On top of that I was able to complete my Open Water Diver (OWD) certification that due to ear issues was up in the air. The doc helped out with that one but it was a great experience overall. It's an extremely odd feeling being somewhere that humans aren't supposed to be. On that note I'm going to describe my first and second dive...although three and four were 100% better than the first two.

My ears due to the pressure felt like someone first slapped by ears at the same time as a cruel joke then left their hands there and continued to push on my head...All the while my eyes feel like their getting sucked out of my head because of mask pressure that I should of been releasing more often...For that I burst the blood vessels above my eyes like I was out till 4am puking...This is on the way down by the way. So I'm down and now suddenly everything is fine, no pain, nothing just awesome stuff to see. But of course air doesn't last forever so we make our ascent and all of the above start to replay. I get to the surface and my nose is bleeding for the first time in my life...I can't hear anything including myself talk and the pain in my ears is accompanied by a hissing air sound shooting out of my hear at a pace that feels similar to a jet engine. This is what defined to me that the ocean is not a human environment and why we probably crawled out of it in the first place some 2 million years ago.

Dive three and four to Daphne and North Seymour Islands were great. Since I've never dove before my ears have never been through the hell of that much pressure before. But once was enough and my ears sharply adjusted. Diving is oddly awesome and you get to see soooo many things, maybe it was because I'm in the Galapagos but to see a variation throughout the world wouldn't be a bad thing to do.
After diving I wrapped up what needed to be done at work and started to do my last of things. I got my last seco de pollo at the place that knows thats all I order. I went and got my last empanada at the municipal market then went and got my final dessert at my favorite bakery.

As of now I'm sitting in Quito staring out my window at a massive mountain capped in white towers that this message is being sent through. I arrived here at about 3pm, got my room at the hotel, and quickly headed out on the town. I found an open art market with super sweet paintings that I'd love to hang up in my future house. I then wandered around eating street fruit and chocolate buns : ) but then headed to an artisian market. They sell literally the exsact same things as every shop in Santa Cruz does but about $10-15 dollars cheaper.

The plan now is to sleep get up at the crack of dawn for my Miami flight at 8:40am then off to Minneapolis after a massive layover. I CANNOT wait to see rach and eventually the roomies and fam.

I am singing OUTTTTTTTTTTTTT, salute Galapagos

Tick. Tock.

Internets wide open today at the station...I'm not sure whats going on...but it's a GREAT day.

intuition vs. intellect

Your My Philosophy

I went for my scuba certification this weekend to try and wrap up my trip here. Started with book work on Friday which prepared me for the two open water dives on Saturday. I woke up at the crack of dawn (4:30am) in order to get on the boat by 5:30am. We were headed to the island of Floreana, about two hours by boat almost directly south of Santa Cruz.


The water was the choppiest I've ever seen, and we were in a smaller boat that I've been on as well. It was soo bad that out of the 8 people on the boat we would fly off the crest of a wave, 4 of us would get about 4 feet of air (close to a simulated weightlessness in a plane but cheaper) and then SLAM back down no longer perched on our seats. Much like a tangle of Barrel of Monkeys we slowly moved back to our seats just to have it all happen again next swell. While that was bundles of fun we watched the sunset come up as we pull into our dive sit at 8am. Named Punta Comorant dive site one was right off the northeastern tip of Floreana to the East of Devils Crown. Curious sea lions are greeting our boat as the water is clear enough to see the 10 meters to the bottom.

Our dive was to start in the shallow 8 meter area while slowly descending to a maximum depth of 14 meters for the first dive. I'm suiting up ready to get all Navy Seal on the world and enter the water commando style dropping in backwards off the boat. I think pictures would sum up the rest of the day better than me rambling...so enjoy.

 

literally a wall of fish



hammerhead

Overall it was a pretty crazy experience because breathing underwater is quite the feeling seeing that your in a place that humans shouldn't be. You have to be calm while not freaking out so you use up all your air. On top of just crusing around the bottom I was being tested/skills checked for doing things like taking my mask off underwater and putting it back on, or taking out my respirator n just blowing bubbles. We ended up diving twice which were awesome spots to see some wildlife. I just took my exam and passed with flying colors. My ears took a toll however, on the way down the pressure is redicoulous but once you equalize them your content for quite some time. But then on the way back up I felt like someone was ripping the inside of my ear out with a tweezers. Not the most pleasant feeling and it was bad enough that I couldn't hear very well when I got back after the two hour boat ride. As I type this now, I still feel like I'm living in my head...So on that note I didn't dive on Sunday and plan to dive again on Wednesday instead...hopefully my sinuses cooperate because I would really love to take a break and head out of the office on Wednesday. Times winding down and I'm looking forward to getting home seeing and squeezin the people who I miss most.

Google Workshop

The first of the month is always a great day : ) but today on top of the first I had an epic email in my inbox.

Daniel has heard back from Google and after deliberation they have offered two spots for their Geo for Good Workshop. GUESS WHAT THAT MEANS!!! I'm invited to represent the Charles Darwin Foundation at their workshop being offered in September out in Mountain View, California. Although funds aren't provided for the both us, I'm currently trying to find funding through the University while encouraging them that this will benefit not only myself but the University as well as the collaboration between the Geography Department and the CDF.

The workshop presents Google's mapping tools and their application to non-profit organizations. By spatially enabling non-profit's decision making the power of data backed solutions sky rockets. Whether it be conservation efforts in Uganda or showing the impacts of genocide in Darfur, Google is proving to organizations that their tools can create positive change by taking on a geographic perspective to issues. Currently focusing on Africa, Google wants to expand their outreach to South America and what better than to start with the biologically complex Galapagos Archipelago. Their goal is to help and implement their toolsets to create a larger awareness of this sensitive ecosystem. By increasing awareness and data management it should empower better conservation management practices.

Super neat stuff, can't wait to see what comes of all of it but you have to start somewhere and this isn't a bad place to begin!


*Found this awesome photo rendering program on my computer. I haven't become that good at painting but the previous post as well as this the photos were taken on Isabela then changed to look like colored pencil drawings!

Villamil Artwork

My oh My

As the weekend comes to a close I've got to say it was one of the most relaxing places all summer.

This weekend the whole group decided to head south to a large island called Isabela. It's the one that looks like an L in the Archipelago. Taking off early on Friday our ferry left at 2 to blue skies and the sun on our backs. This boat, much like the one I took to San Cristobal has about 15 people on it getting pulled around by a 3, 200hp engines. I'm enjoying the huge swells of the open ocean, as this German guy looking white in the face insisted on coming to the back of the boat. Two minutes later he was throwing up and a half hour later I have this man on the right dry heaving over the side while Joe is now to my left is regretting eating lunch an hour ago. As I pretend not to smell the grossness surrounding me, were cruising by these massive volcanic cones sticking out of the open ocean. To get a sense of size...imagine a football stadium about a mile long and equally wide sliced open like a pie, delicately coated in a layer of bird shit. Huge features that puts into perspective this island chain and whats going on.

We cruise into the port of Villamil, the only town on the entire island. Mind you this town is only about 2 miles long almost entirely on the coast. But as we pull into the harbor penguins curiously greet the boat at the same time looking at a massive beach with palm trees waving in the wind. I already feel far removed from Santa Cruz which is great. We eagerly get picked up by some guy who says his hostel is the best! Doubtful, but we went anyways which brought us to the outskirts of town to this small hostel with about 5 rooms. Joe and I got our own rooms, had a kitchen, bathroom, shower, wifi, the Olympics on tv, and hammocks strung on anything that would support the weight of a person. Not bad for $10 dollars a night. Still antsy with light in the day Joe and I set out to look around. This town is strictly centered on the people who come for the weekend. Bars, hostels, hotels, and restaurants...that's about it. Were walking down the main strip and stumble upon this bright pink surf hostel that has the best atmosphere in the entire Galapagos. We quickly put our names down for Saturday and Sunday and planned to move in the next morning.

I wake up on Saturday to pouring rain...the most we've seen the entire trip down here. But we were eager to go and took a taxi to Casa Rosala our new place. Our room was basic, two beds, no bath, or shower. The lobby I would say is more like the ultimate living area. It had a living area with leather couch's, a huge kitchen with island in the middle, dinner table, a bathroom that looks more like a giant roman washroom. As instrumental hip hop is bumping at the perfect level I sank into the comfort of a real couch and read as many Dr. Seuss books as I could. As the rain lightened up I walked into town for some break fast...This town by the way has roads made of sandy gravel, so I haven't worn shoes all weekend...again the best town ever. As alot of people were discouraged by the weather, I put on my yogo attitude on (You Only Galapagos Once) and went snorkeling at a small cove about a two mile walk. Not much to see but it was great cruising around in the chilly water. From there the weather turned from rainy to cloudy...which was enough for the rest of the day to walk around and check out the beach. I also somehow taught myself to slackline on the line rigged up by the outdoor bar.

By the time the night rolls around our room is soaked flooded and smells like clean laundry...something broke in the room next door and creeped into our room. Lucky for us we got upgraded to a pad on the second floor with a balcony overlooking the ocean. BOOM. However, a rat ran in our room as we were quietly watching a movie...not cool it scared the hell out of us. So now we have the ladder of our bunked bed conveniently blocking the space under the door.

Today we woke up slow to a cloudy yet not rainy sky. I slacked in the morning jamming to some tunes as the tide was coming in. From there we were headed up to a place called the "Wall of Tears." Back in Isabela's history the Ecuadorian government tried setting up a penal colony for prisoners. Using an old US Military base, operating as a radar station during the construction of the Panama Canal, they constructed a prison to house 300 inmates and 30 guards. The man in charge was an odd fella and decided to have his prisoners build a wall, yet with no reason why. Just a wall, that still stands, about 25 feet high and 50 yards long. They were to built it, disassemble it, then build it again. Aimless work to further torture the sanity of the prisoners. Hiking a pretty unmaintained trail past the wall we were able to get on top of one of many old parasitic cones littering the coast of Isabela. With a view spanning over the entire, now dwarfed city, we had a surprisingly picturesque view of how uninhabited as well as large this island actually is.

Cruising back down the hill on the way back we were flying by giant land tortoises, probably could of went over some of them but that's probably highly frowned upon. Beat from hiking, and biking, I slacked some more and to a point where I can now walk backwards. But as I tried not to nap I quickly fell asleep in the hammock. This island paradise has more hammocks than it does people.

Between the beach, hammocks, bakery, food, supa good Internet, slackline, hostel bar, one of the coolest places I've showered, best place I've went to the bathroom, palm trees, atmosphere, and more Isabela is thee coolest island ever.

Hootie is the perfect thing sometimes

Updates from the work side of things have been quite significant over the past few days. The station has had communication with Google and they have an effort to start becoming involved in non-profit organizations. They basically have developed a series of geospatial tools that help organize, store, import, and visualize geospatial information. In order to promote these tools to non-profits they have organized a workshop at their Google headquarters in California. “Geo for Good” is a workshop that is designed to not only show their products but help representatives from non-profits learn the basics in order to determine their potential with the organization. Google has personally invited one and maybe two representatives from the Charles Darwin Foundation to attend in September.

For the past week or so I’ve been putting together ideas that help identify the problems within the current CDF database system. On top of asking people to attend their conference Google wants to establish a presence in South America because their efforts are currently focused in Africa. This brainstorming of problems has been composed into a comprehensive proposal that is going to help in showing Google how their mapping tools could be implemented here at the Station. They plan to get involved much more in 2013…Which is conveniently right when I want to start graduate school…Good thing? Yup.

Adding to this we recently had a meeting to discuss how UWEC can get involved. I was asked to put together a power point and present my proposal to the growing GIS crew at the CDF. I’m currently acting as a mediator between the Station the University and what we now discussed as being Google. IF Google has enough spots for us to send two people I’m currently in line to be that second guy. Daniel, my boss and Director of the Social Sciences is obviously number one. I’m giddy with excitement and can’t wait for Google to get back to us… We’ll let fate determine that one but it would definitely be great to get involved with….

Another thing that has been on my mind is that the Stations database system which is currently being displayed as the Datazone on the Foundations website, is a great way to start serving this information to the public and conservation managers but still isn’t what it could be...Small world but I found out today through some research that the small GIS firm (Applied Data Consultants) outside of Eau Claire that actually hires people from our Department, is highly involved in this same matter. They are implementing the same exact software and logistical path that we are trying to put together which means were on the right track. They however, have created large systems for 4 states now and called it NatureMapping. It’s a system that citizens can upload data, view it, and become more aware of the issues in their own backyards. Let’s just say that I’ve become quite attached to the issues here…and can see what they could be as well as what the solution could do for the Galapagos as a whole…They only thing missing…is a solution…

Staying idle isn't my thing...

I signed up for my PADI open water scuba certification last night...It was on a whim that a Good Earth tea quote inspired. It's a 3 day course with an introductory dive, then 4 dives on two different islands. I start not this weekend but the following weekend, going Friday, Saturday, Sunday. Early birthday present to myself and I CANNOT WAIT!!!!!!!!

The goldfish grows to the size of the bowl in which you put it in

The other day I met with Henri to discuss some more work he wanted tackled. This time it consisted of converting over 5000 points of collected ant specimens. The conversion that he wants is to convert a point that is in degrees, minutes, seconds (DMS or 0°24'35''S) to decimal degrees
(-.40972, -90.708) a format more conducive to mapping in ESRI and Quantum. This is usually done manually with a formula that looks a like this.

D + M/60 + S/3600

Manually works great when only doing a few points, but we are tasked with over 5000 which would not only take a large amount of our time, would be painfully mind numbing work. I believe this would be quite a simple task if given the extension licenses in ArcGIS by calculating normalized fields. But we are going the route of doing it within Excel first hand then adding our file to ArcMap to map it. Our excel sheet by the way is of course highly disorganized... The person who entered the information randomly chose to use super case zeros in combination with the (°) symbol
as well as using double apostrophes instead of quotation marks (i.e '' " <---look very much the same huh?) So we first used find and replace to change all of the values to the same format. As I was working a code to write a formula in Excel Chema goes Rocky double fist pose in the air and says "I got it!" The guy knows his stuff because he worked out a solution in open office by writing a formula that identifies the location of the number then divides where it needs to and does that for each part of the DMS format.

It took me awhile for him to explain what it was and what it was doing but it's a great way to learn new solutions to old problems. The actual formula is below and saved so in case we need to do this again.

This scenario is also a great example of bringing new solutions to old problems can get things done highly efficiently. Henri thought this would take up to a week or more which would of consumed all of our time in the process. It was done in little under 3 hours...NEXT task.

10lb binoculars from back when they
were doing military operations
in the Galapagos

Yesterday we also set out on expedition two to go find the tracking device that we looked for last week. The errors of all the points were made into ellipses then overlapped to find a more accurate location of where this thing could be. We set out at 8am with a smaller boat, and more people. It took about an hour to chug around the southern portion of the island but we made it to another cove that was coated in marine iguanas and large sea turtles that look like moving rocks beneath our boat. We searched the coast for about 5 hours including climbing through the jungle gym of mangroves, and wading around the inner coves further cut off my mangroves. Nothing but trash, and a huge quantity of perfectly round kettle stones that have scoured equally perfect holes into the basalt. Due to wave/tidal action rocks stuck within other rocks then get blasted around in circles acting as a drill bit and over how every many hundred years have created 5 foot holes with all but a ball at the bottom. Overall, we didn't find the device but it was a beautiful day to hike around in a spot were no one has ever probably hiked before.

I've also recently watched the movie Big Fish. Great movie, check it out.

The greatest part of large challenges is that they tend to reap the greatest rewards : )

Maybe I'm Amazed

Friday 7/13/2012

Today started out great, except the fact we woke up without running water. However, I finished up with the basic Quantum workshop. Frank had mentioned that Google was offering a developer grant which after looking into doesn't apply to Ecuador for some reason. He did however mention that the station has direct contact to Google and could possibly take that route for help. He rattled off a bunch of goals that he felt should be addressed and I added in some geospatial aspects to those problems that could ultimately create a better system for the station overall. This however is going to be quite the task because we are going to start meeting in order to create a proposal to Google stating our objectives and ways about efficiently dealing with those tasks. The underlying goal is to get them excited to get involved. It's cool to see that whether it be myself personally writing this or our group of GIS people collectively that people are more than willing to help as long as you can state your intentions.

That took up most of my morning all while Chema was chatting with a granted over marine biologist. I asked them what they had been doing all morning and she explained they had lost a $3500 tracking device that they had placed on what I think she said was Oahu? At any rate, there not cheap. It sends out a highly inaccurate GPS point when it believes it has a clear signal. The last point sent out was at 7am this morning on the south western side of this island, past Tortuga Bay to the north. Their plan was to go and try to find it...I said Chema, you have to get me on that boat with you. So by 2:00 I was on that boat. We rallied 7 people including two National Park people, and 5 of us from the station all huddled in this dinky fiberglass hull, half inflatable, zodiac with a 50hp motor. What seems like small swells from shore were no longer small swells in a 12 foot boat. We were bouncing around, getting that flight or fight reflex as we try not to be the one to go overboard. As we near the GPS location, which did happen to be in the water this morning, we realize that this is going to be extremely challenging. The device is about the size and also looks like a car cell phone charger which is conveniently colored blackish grey...the same color as every rock on this island. It also, if floating, doesn't float upright so it will also be half submerged. We park our zodiac in this small cove while dozens of the largest marine iguanas I've seen to date here, stare at us like we've just arrived on another planet. We start our search and continue our search until 4:30pm where we assume we've had enough for the day. Although we couldn't find the device, it was pretty neat to sift through the piles of debris that get washed up during high tides. Of the how ever many tourists come here, it looked as though about half have lost just one of their flip flops which have now taken residence in this very spot for the next million years.

Back to the boat, back to the dock, and off to the fish market to get dinner. I stopped and got two pounds of fresh Oahu fillets to cook Chema, and Joe. Then of course since I was in town I stopped by the bakery, this time getting what look like strawberry buns mhmmm I am excited for those. The fish we cooked up looked 5 star restaurant material....here me out...We sauteed a sauce of aja pepper seasoning, yellow pepper, onion, and garlic until it was caramelized. Then dropped in the fillets turning them accordingly. While cooking rice with squeezed orange juice and pepper. The fillets were complemented by a yellow pepper/green pepper salad with oregano. Rachel, all of this I'm making for youu when I get home by the way. We had it all made and eaten in less than 45 min. From there Deb came back with our care packages from home. Thanks family I now have more candy than I can possibly eat! Other than that I am now off to skype it up with Rach and go to bed : )

MAPHEAD

I've started an interesting new book called "Maphead" by Ken Jennings. I can finally get reading again after finishing The History of Everything : ) and also Kurt Vonneguts book "Galapagos" (extremely strange by the way). Maphead is a book about the culture of geography and how geography shapes our every experiences. I already recommend it for anyone interested in maps as well as those those intrigued by the artistic trance of cartography.

To start out he addresses that maps don't always have to depict data or have to show the route of a physical world. He highlights allegorical maps that illustrate things like emotions or in the example below the idea of success.

Later on he also poses an interesting question...

For a long time I blamed writers like John Bunyon and Dante for this allegorical form of cartacaoethes. Desperate to extract a storyline from a possibly dreary and didactic subject -  the struggle to a life worthy of heaven - they seized on a quest narrative, a "pilgrim's process," and mapmakers were quick to follow suit. I wonder: how would history be different if Bunyan or Dante had chosen to represent life not as a linear journey through a geographic territory but as something a little more holistic - a library, say? or a buffet? What would Western civilization be like in that alternate universe? Would we value different things, set different goals for ourselves, if the governing geographic metaphor of our culture were replaced by something else - recipes instead of maps, cookbooks instead of atlases? Would shallow celebrities still tell interviewers they were "in a good place right now"? Or Would they say things like "I'm at the waffle bar right now, Oprah"?

*copied from chapter two


The Road To Success

gahhhh

The agave plant...the source of tequila

Today I woke up pretty slow from the night before but I made it to the market by 9am to grab a bunch of fresh vegetables. I found a papaya the size of a watermelon that was calling my name as well as a mini pineapple. Love fresh fruit. Other than that I got the bare essentials including peppers, onions, and pears as well as a bunch of cheese empanadas. Afterwards we summoned enough energy to head over to Las Greitas for the rest of the day.  It was much different than when we were there last time because of the tides going on right now. It was about 6 feet lower than normal and clear as day or as Joe put it "I can see clearer underwater than above water.” On top of being crystal clear you can see down the 45 some feet just as clearly. We swam around then did some climbs. If you climb up 20 feet in this one section then another 15 from that it comes to a cave that then goes back until you can’t see the light of day anymore. From here there’s no other way to get down but to jump back into the water. Same place as one of the earlier videos I posted.

A woman we work with and lives over in the German section of town was hanging out at the beach we passed on the way back. She was more than eager to show us her house so we went to check it out. Right off of the beach we passed through this picturesque blue gate that opened to a small winding path around salt water tide pools. It then led to this blanketing path of picture perfect, spongy, overgrown, grass that swerved to the porch of the main building. The main building is no longer occupied and was sold by the owners to a local hotel…Should probably mention that this is the childhood home of Tui De Roy. For those of you who don’t know who Tui De Roy is (because I couldn’t put a face to the name either) she is one of the world’s greatest photographers with prints in nearly every National Geographic and plenty more publications globally. Her parents who built this house were one of the first 100 people who came from Germany back in the early 1900’s and built this very house. Built from local materials it has a semi thatch roof, indoor garden, naturally lighted displays, cactus infused windows (gives it a stained glass look) and a porch overlooking the beach we were just at. Currently in the process of moving out, her mother sold it, built a 4 story house in Bellavista and now 84 years old she wanted money to travel the world for the rest of her life. In her youth and knowing nothing of sailboat design they constructed a handmade sailboat from materials they found on the island. Another fun fact, living on an island gives you plenty of access to sea shells. The family’s collection holds some of the rarest shells and was sold for more than any normal person would want to pay for shells. Quite the life. Now, you can understand when given this as your backyard in your childhood you could start out a photography career in the most photogenic archipelago. Tui now spends her time in both, the house of her own behind this one, and a home she made in New Zealand.

 As we were on the porch hundreds of finches lined the trees, table, and ground looking for a rice handout that they know will come. As we leave the house there are exotic and definitely not native species of plants growing in and around everything. If you look close enough there are is a species of finch here called woodpecker finches. They are one of two species of birds in the world that use a tool to find food. We watched this little guy for quite some time, first find a thorn of his choosing, then start jamming the thorn in holes throughout this branch hoping to stab whatever he can, whether that be ants or worms.

Behind this place is a special tree that grows graviola. It is a fruit that is what I deemed nature’s version of yogurt. The inside is a gooy-white substance with fairly large seeds. Although looking much like the inside of a coconut it tastes like a mixed fruit yogurt container. Adding a delicious fruit tree to this little ocean oasis it almost felt like we were back at Bellavista in the Andes. Put that tree on my list of things to grow in my future garden : )

Pretty beat from our day I was able to skype Rachel and get stoked for our upcoming road trip which is about to aweeesome : ) Watched a bunch of community and was out by 10.



flower off of an exotic lilypad

GAHHHHH, soon enoughh : )