Sorry It Took So Long...

So yeah... Somehow I got sidetracked every time I intended to write more these past two weeks and so instead of writing several posts, I wrote none.  But anyway, two weeks ago I intended to write a second weekend update about our trip to Hetch Hetchy, but I never actually did.

Everyone has heard of Yosemite Valley, but before coming here I had never heard of Hetch Hetchy.  Hetch Hetchy is much less crowded than the Valley, but it is still incredibly beautiful.  The naturalist John Muir (founder of the Sierra Club) described Hetch Hetchy as a smaller copy of Yosemite Valley and he was right.  The two valleys are both very similar (and magnificent), but Hetch Hetch is only half as wide and half as long.  Unfortunately in the 1920's the Hetch Hetchy dam was built, submerging the valley floor under 350 feet of water.  But despite the reservoir, which provides San Francisco with water, Hetch Hetchy is still beautiful.

My second weekend update (from 2 weeks ago) was supposed to tell how we hiked up through a place called Smith Meadows and up to the top of Smith Peak that overlooked the whole area.  Originally we were going to camp near the meadow and hike up to the top in the morning, but we decided to push on up the night before and we ended up camping on the very top of Smith Peak at 7800 feet.  Smith Peak is the highest point in Hetch Hetchy and the 360 degree views are well worth the intense hike.  The picture above was from the top of the peak over looking Hetch Hetchy on the left and looking down the Grand Canyon of the Tuolomne on the right.

After we got back from Hetch Hetchy I spent the next week around Wawona, mostly writing up how exactly my experiment was going to go in addition to running, swimming and helping the group of high school kids up here for the summer write their essays.  Honestly, the week after the 4th of July was a pretty relaxing week for me, but somehow I still never wrote another post.

Things got more exciting last week because I finally got to go out into the field!  Our permit came through (about time!) and we headed up to the Tuolomne Meadows area to survey two meadows that were nearby.  They were meadows number 1830 and 1776.  The park was surveyed about ten years ago and all areas were classified by vegetation type.  This has been great for researchers because it has allowed them to very easily find, for example, meadows that meet certain constraints.  In my case, my mentor specifically chose meadows above 9000 feet of a medium size that are hard to get to.  As a consequence, we had to hike pretty substantial distances off-trail both days to reach the meadows.

After we arrive in a meadow, we lay down a transect (measuring tape) across the meadow in the same spot Kaitlin used last year and then we get down to business.  Business consists of sitting on the ground looking for little tiny pine trees growing in the meadow.  It's slow work, but the beauty of the area mostly makes up for it.

The only bad things last weeks were the bugs.  You can't see it from the picture (of meadow 1776), but the mosquitos were vicious.  Every time I stopped moving they swarmed, and I mean absolutely covered me.  I was sitting in the meadow in long pants, my rain coat and a head net just so I could keep my sanity.  But as soon as we moved out of the meadow the bugs dropped off almost to nothing.  Overall, my first experience with real data collecting was a mixed bag.  It was good to get out and work, but I wish there were fewer mosquitos.