Scientific Ink

Tag: Travel

  • Cruising in the Caribbean

    Sunshine on the Caribbean
    Dave’s grandfather John loves cruise vacations. He has been on something like 30 cruises with his wife. They couldn’t cruise at the end, her Alzheimer’s made traveling challenging and unsafe. Since her death, we’ve gone on two cruises with him. The first was especially hard for him, as all the memories of their time together came flooding back. This one was easier, though we had some medical mishaps (I sliced open my foot on the first night, he caught a stomach bug).

    We enjoyed our trip on Royal Caribbean’s Enchantment of the Seas. It was the same cruise line and the same ship as our previous trip, and so we re-encountered some of the folks that helped make our trip special the first time, especially Mihai from Romania who recognized and immediately fussed over John in Romanian (John speaks Romanian).

    Things I liked:

    • enforced indolence. On a day at sea, after an hour or so at the gym, there really is nothing to do except relax, read, talk, eat, etc. Even the stopovers were relaxed (see photo below from our day on CocoCay in the Bahamas).
    • the international staff. Fun to meet folks from Goa, from Romania, from the Phillipines….
    • the amazing cheery helpfulness. They must have some fascinating hiring criteria. We met nothing but patient, sunny folks who sincerely seemed to enjoy taking great care of us.

    Dave and Nate enjoy CocoCay

  • Thanksgiving highlights

    • My nephew
    • My niece
    • My brother-in-law’s deep fried turkey
    • My sister’s homemade non-canned green bean casserole (from Cook’s Illustrated – subscription required)
    • Hot and numbing beef roll in our take-out meal from Tasty China in Marietta
    • Dave’s bacon, avocado, leftover turkey sandwich, a play on Zingerman’s Tarb’s Tenacious Tenure. Hingerman’s Barb’s Tenacious Tenure anyone?
    • Going to the Marietta YMCA with my sister to work off aforementioned meals
    • My nephew and niece, again.

    Nathan samples the fried turkey

  • Almost stranded

    Getting towed

    We flew up north this weekend and stopped to clear Canadian customs in Sarnia. After a brief stop, the engine of our Cessna-182 had uncharacteristic trouble starting. We got it started, and continued up the coast of Lake Huron to Tobermory.

    On our return, the cold start at Tobermory airport was easy, but we had worse trouble hot starting the engine after clearing US customs. The engine simply wouldn’t turn over, and Dave tried a few times before he became concerned about running down the battery. It was mid-Sunday afternoon, sunny and beautiful, and the phone number we had for the local FBO (fixed base operator, the folks who service planes at airports) didn’t work, the airport manager wasn’t in his/her office, and the airport was quiet. Dave and Guy wandered around, looking for open hangars and helpful people. (more…)

  • Whose bone is this, anyway?

    Mystery bone – from above, originally uploaded by dunrie.

    I have a doctorate in biology. But I studied plants and insects. And neither plants nor insects have bones, so I’m officially excused from having to know what this is.

    We first thought it was a cranium, but it didn’t seem to have the characteristics I’d need to key it out on online keys. Anyway, I’m completely stumped. The “eye sockets” seem much too small to be….pretty much anything. I’m hoping one of my bio-friends knows the answer. Bueller…? Bueller?

    Note 9/6/2007: this appears to be an avian pelvic girdle – thanks AnnaBess! We’re guessing a cormorant, which would make sense given the number of cormorants out on Waquoit Bay and the Vineyard Sound.

    Mystery bone - side

    Mystery bone - bottom

  • Striped Bass log

    The big one, originally uploaded by dunrie.

    My sister-in-law is doing graduate research on Christmas Island in the Pacific. The food choices are limited (tuna, tuna, and more tuna), and she has a funny blog entry about the forms of tuna they’ve eaten, including tuna salisbury steak and tuna patties with gravy.

    Well, Dave and Nate both caught big striped bass on our fishing trip, and we’ve been having striped bass in many forms.

  • The way to travel

    My husband and I just returned from a one-week trip to Austria. My husband works for an Austrian firm, he travels to the head office several times a year, and we have often spoke about me coming along for a visit, maybe to the wine country south of Graz, maybe to the Alps to ski…

    The Wilder Kaiser from the Chapel

    Now, I’m not a downhill skier, and, in 1991, when deciding whether to have surgery to repair my blown-out left knee, whether or not I skied was a decision criterion (no downhill ski? maybe don’t need to cut into knee). The list of vacation destinations on my bulletin board is:

    1. Quebec City,
    2. Cape Breton,
    3. Iceland,
    4. Trieste, Italy (largely because of Trieste and the Meaning of Nowhere),
    5. return to Alaska,
    6. return to Hawaii, and
    7. Austria.

    So, how come Austria jumped to the top of the list and we elected to go to the Alps to ski?

    Friends.

    (more…)