Alaskan Dinosaur Expedition

Supply Snafus

July 28:

Kevin, Lizzie, Linda and I make one last attempt at removing the large jacket. We brought duct tape, aluminum foil, sticks, various hardeners and whatever else I could think of. The unexpected discovery several days ago of an old field jacket that needed reinforcing depleted our jacketing supplies. That, combined with the absence of the University of Alaska museum director, who was supposed to arrive a couple of days ago with more supplies, has brought us to this predicament. We are now out of jacketing material. Plus the plaster we did bring was dental plaster, and it is not setting up properly. So this whole business is turning into an exercise in futility; the duct tape can’t adhere to the greasy jacket, and with the wet plaster the hardeners aren’t getting good purchase either.

I radioed Roland, who is back at camp getting it ready for breakdown, and explained the situation. We both agreed the jacket was staying behind. After I was through trying my options, a shower passed through, saturating everything. We were left wallowing in the mud. Packing everything we intended to take down a now-greasy 100-foot chute became an interesting challenge: The ski season is open on the Colville River.

As we loaded the boat with the last of our gear, I was almost grateful we ran out of supplies, so we didn’t have to attempt getting a large jacket down that chute. I’m sure one or more of us would have suffered some body damage as a result.

We broke camp and moved back downriver. We are now seeing caribou everywhere -- always, though, in very small groups. They are occurring in such numbers that I find I am not paying nearly the attention to them as I was earlier in the trip.

Over the past couple of days, I’ve been sampling the berries on the tundra. There are blueberries everywhere, but the bushes aren’t much taller than my ankles. The berries are, in fact, at times bigger than the leaves on the bush. The berry size is about the same as what I’ve seen back home in Connecticut, but the rest of the plant is diminutive. Unfortunately the thrill of finding the berries was greatly reduced with the discovery that all of the berries I’ve had are quite tasteless. Perhaps those small leaves don’t photosynthesize enough sugar for these berries. A minor disappointment in the grand scheme of things.