Today half of the ONH team went on a helo trip up through the Dry Valleys and then a visit to see Alan Ashworth and Adam Lewis's field camp in Friis Hills. It was a glorious trip, first going up Ferrar Valley, entering the wide expanse where the Ferrar and Taylor Valleys meet and then onto Friis Hills, where Adam and Alan awaited us. I had done a similar trip through the two valleys last year (see the 2007 blog for my impressions about what I saw , http://blogs.qc.cuny.edu/blogs/ONH2007/).
The Ferrar and Taylor Valleys.
The Friis Hills camp is in a remote and isolated part of the Dry Valleys, up slope from Taylor Valley and nestled and surrounded by mountains. It was a small camp, consisting of three people (the last being a student of their's). But what it lacked in size was made up in plenty by their hospitality and enthusiasm. After a conversation in their dining tent, we set out immediately to see what they were finding. There finds were incredible. Fossil leaves and branches that were deposited in fine lake beds with ash dates that suggest an age at least 20 million years old.
What these fossils clearly show is that Antarctica was far warmer than today, with alpine vegetation growing. The ONH team was mesmerized by the fossils they were collecting. Although we had three hours, the time flew so quickly that I felt that we had only barely started to scratch the surface of this enchanting and scientifically exciting place.
We continued down taylor valley by helo to our next destination: the New Harbor Camp along the coast of Explorer's Cove.
Here along the coastline, the sea ice has been twisted and distorted by pressure from expansion and contraction, melting and refreezing and forces of from a far that have heaved up the ice in all manner of ways (see the 2007 blog for words about what it looks like).
The coastline at New Harbor, with the sea ice roughness clearly shown.
This evening was the last time that the entire ONH team was together as Howie, Andrea, Joanna and Shakira were leaving for good from the field camp to do video conferencing with students from the around the US.
