I had more photos to include especially JR's trips, I blew a few transitions there at the end and I wanted to add music to provide some ambiance as we looked back over our year. This will just have to do. I plan to be more organized NEXT year, which is almost here!
Of course, he asked for some science fiction and fantasy books too. Poor guy, it's in his genes and he can't help it. (He's even named after a sci fi character.) There's no escape.
Memories of birthday parties with watermelons, cakes with little trains, special presents, birthday cash. Seems like just yesterday he went out this door on his way to kindergarten. How'd he ever get so big so quickly?!
Okay, maybe I'm a little old for the girl designation, it's a granite shore, and Kharma's legs are filthy--but the delight and relaxation were primo. Kharma's never been in a kayak before; I wish I had some photos of our struggles.
Sigh, I should have taken it slowly from the beginning but I'm determined to succeed in getting her on-board and calm!
The K-dog was much happier hiking around the lake--pushing through ferns, leaping creeks, dashing down into the lake, meeting other vacationing pups, keeping our beach free from marauding ducks, playing with Quincy and occasionally checking to see if I was napping or awake.
I had a very pooped puppy dog; she napped in her crate during the two hour trip and nothing, but nothing, that Zelda did could get her to play when we got home.
As usual, Kharma has let me know that if Quincy's mom wants to adopt another dog she'll happily change homes. (No worries, it's just her way of telling me she had a good time.) She'll have to settle for me, the frisbee in the pasture and hikes up the creek until next summer rolls around and another trip to the lake is on the calendar!
Yesterday we drove to Altai to catch the charter flight, which was bringing in the change of crew from UB. But when it got halfway, they reported iced up wings, so were obliged to turn back. So we had to stay in Altai an unexpected night; terrible hotel conditions, but at least there was a toilet down the hall. Meanwhile, around lunchtime when we were still awaiting the plane that wouldn’t come at the airport, I started getting chilly. Didn’t think much about it until we reached Altai, but when we were finally arrived at a camp we thought we could stay for the night, I was freezing, and then became nauseous. I did finally vomit, which is rare for me, so I knew something was wrong. I then became feverish and still could not get warm. Luckily we had the camp doctor with us and he advised it might be food poisoning, so gave me some things to settle it. He decided it was best to get me to a hotel in town since the camp gers are not heated, and it was obviously going to get cold (freezing) and typically they give you nothing more for bed clothes than a sheet and light blanket. So we searched Altai for a motel room. When we had just about run out of options for motels, we learned by phone the rest of our crew had returned to town and found a hotel, so we joined them, and shared 3 rooms between the lot of us (14). I ate almost nothing for 30 hours. Finally, the plane arrived around noon today, we exchanged greetings with the new crew, and loaded up the prop for the 3 ½ hour flight to UB. But first we had to weigh in; the pilot, a very friendly lady with English accent, asked us each our weight in kilos and then weighed our bags, and naturally we were overweight. The doctor volunteered to remain in Altai as most of the rest of us had international connections to make and he is Mongolian; but besides, he grew up in Altai, so hopefully it is no hardship for him to remain there an extra night. We landed in UB about 5pm today, and went to eat at an Indian restaurant. The food was very good, mild but nicely flavored, but I could eat little since my stomach is still tender. Hopefully I will recover better tonight. It was absolute luxury to have a warm shower, especially after having been sick and sweating in the same clothes.
Don’t know if I am up to it, but the others want to get up to watch the final football match at 3:00am. I would like to but, probably need my rest, even if I will be mostly sleeping long hours on the remaining flights. Hopefully the trials are mostly behind us, but we were counting on a day in the UB office to do some clean-up work, so are now further behind. Guess we will have to collaborate on the flight. Time is running by, so wish us well on our connections so we return on schedule. Guess that it about all for now. I’m glad this hotel in UB is modern enough to have wireless connection! See you soon.
Did you know tropical water lilies come in blues and purples? 
We also snuck in a trip to Fort Clatsop (conveniently located close to my dear SIL and BIL) on Tigger's first day of summer vacation. We had sun the entire day and Tigger got to try out his throwing arm on Calvin who will retrieve his tennis ball till H-E-double toothpicks freezes over. Throw in some yardwork and visits to the local nurseries, lots of yummy food and perfect company...what more could we have asked?!
Early this morning it started to rain, and it continued steadily all day, and blew as well, so was really cold. We decided to make it an office data catch-up day, which we needed anyway, and had really planned for such a rain out. But I did not expect it to rain the entire day. Finally just quit after dinner time, and we could see the mountains covered by a dusting of snow; this is how summer begins here? Since it is so damp, and will be very cold tonight, we finally asked the camp manager to install a stove pipe, so he did, and then lit the stove, and the ger warmed up right away, so maybe we will be comfortable tonight. Expect to spend a solid day in the field tomorrow, so imagine it will be cold and damp. Lucky the rain began early today, or we would have gone out and have been stuck in steady rain all day, as we are now working far from camp and get a driver to take us out and pick us up. So it worked out all around. Just have to hope we won’t have more days like this.
The night was cold despite the fact we had the stove; after the wood burned (too quickly), the ger cooled off fast, and of course the wind was howling all night, so it was difficult to get up in the morning. It was gray and threatening when we did, and the wind was still severe when we headed out but at least it wasn’t raining. We took rain gear, anyway, and by noon the clouds were parting and the afternoon was comfortable, even though there was still some wind, so we had a good field day. We timed everything just right taking our office day yesterday and getting back out today.
We have an “ablution block” as K calls it, with a number of separate rooms with showers and toilets; one of those is reserved for us, meaning the project supervisors. The shower usually runs cold water only, so showering in the evening is a real chore, just let water dribble, hoping the body warms it up as it trickles down. Tonight, however, I could get nothing but scalding hot water, so I had to resort to the same technique of turning the water on and off and using a minimum at a time. The toilets are not great, but at least they are toilets and do have a flushing mechanism (button on top of tank to release the tank water), and work OK.Let's head away from the head and onto the dining room:
A more serious problem we realized yesterday is that they ran out of bottled water. This is used for all drinking, mixing with tea and coffee, etc. Luckily we still had a few left over bottles for use in the field. So camp was without drinking water for 24 hours until someone drove back today to buy more cases. I hear that a truck load of supplies is on its way, but will probably be here tomorrow. It looks like they are also running out of some food items, so hope this will replenish all of those needs.
Tonight for dinner, us non-Mongolians actually got a small dab of vegetables, a “salad” composed of carrot pieces, pickles and red peppers. The rest of the plate of course had various items composed of meat. I had tea, about the only drinking option, but I’m not asking where the water came from; at least I know it was boiled. As for the apricots, I took a bunch of dried ones I had at home, so they have been useful; I have been spare with them, so still have some and some of the nut mix from Grammy.
They have a strange thin rubbery mushroom? item which we had for dinner both tonight and last night, and it was actually good. It’s dark brown to black, ruffly and thin, and looks kind of like some exotic pasta, but doesn’t taste much like mushroom.
All I can say is, What have you done with my husband? You know, the one who hates mushrooms and piles them up on my plate when we go out to eat, where'd he go?
I am totally burned out on eating eggs. They want to feed us eggs for breakfast and every bag lunch packed for us contains two sandwiches both of which are fatty bologna and fried egg between two slices of bread and then covered by another slice of bologna plus another fried egg. Everything is greasy. I am just asking for specifics now; at least they have oranges. Otherwise, not much fruit, so am glad for the dried apricots I took and for the nuts & dried fruit mix Grammy gave me. Dinners are mostly just a carbohydrate plus meat; usually noodles or dumpling type covering, often again fried or cooked in oil. Occasionally get some potatoes parts, sliced onions, and red peppers, so those are welcome. Not usually much to drink other than water or coffee, sometimes they give us a can of Coke, even for the field, which is really weird. I wish they would put out the fruit juice more often like they sometimes have in the mornings. Anyway, there is plenty of food, if it’s not completely balanced, so we will fare OK.A change in diet has to be the hardest thing to adapt to when you're travelling. This may be one reason I don't yearn to travel--if I don't have cereal and milk every morning, stay away from me for the rest of the day. He's had beef for breakfast, lunch and dinner when in South America. On the other hand, Turkey had an abundance of fruits and vegetables so that was an easy trip.
Last night was freezing and lots of us had a hard time. Today it was clear, though, and warmed up, so hope tonight will be better. Although the gers have wood stoves in the center, we still don’t have a stove pipe in our ger, so can’t get heat even if we want it.
Let's see, that was Saturday. The weather didn't improve much for Sunday:The wind was ferocious in the field today, and now it is blowing again, bringing some rain. John and I may stay in during the morning to catch up on all the mapping.
On the way after lunch, we traveled through an area where a pastoral family lives where JS and I had previously avoided since we knew we would be asked questions and couldn’t respond. But the Mongolian in our group translated, and as per tradition, we were invited into their ger and asked to eat; it is considered more than rude to refuse such hospitality, and in fact when passing by, you are expected to drop in. So we all crowded into their ger and sat as they served up milk tea (goat & sheep mixed), then brought on a platter of biscuits, hard cheese, and a huge tub of “yogurt”. We all drank the milk tea, but only JS and I tried the “yogurt”; we still aren’t sure what it is but it is rather bitter, so they sprinkle sugar over it. I’m hoping that I don’t get sick from the unusual food and possibly unsanitary utensils, but it looked like they kept a reasonably clean ger. All of this is a show of wealth. Apparently the herders are doing better these days since the price of cashmere is high. We still see a lot of dead goats in the field, however. This family looked to have 200-300 goats plus sheep, so are considered well off. They actually have a small TV and solar panel. We couldn’t communicate much, but apparently this family was suitably amused by our outlandish attire and inability to speak a word of their tongue. They commented that they had been seeing JS and I in the field on previous days, so it was good that we introduced ourselves.
I have no idea what day it is since we are always working and Mongolian time differs from Pacific time. We figure we have hit the 10th day of work here, so that means we are half done, so guess we are about on schedule as we will need some days to finalize.That's all for now. It's so nice to have an adventure on the other side of the world and still be able to "talk" daily.
