Halfway done

The end of week 4 marks the halfway point of my summer in Los Alamos. Today completed a very fun weekend. I suppose I forgot to mention that we also had a bonfire last night over at Ted's. Not that it matters, it was just more fun. And then the night sky here is amazing. You can see so many more stars, and the stars that I'm used to seeing are just that much brighter.

Today was just a great way to top off the weekend. We went down to a winery early in the afternoon. The drive was pretty spectacular. We drove through the huge caldera here, although we didn't see any elk. Usually at this time, people say you can see up to a thousand elk if you're lucky. Oh well. Then there were some great mountains and canyons on the way. We also passed by some places that have some great hot springs. That will be another day's trip perhaps. The winery was very nice. They let us try tastes of basically all of the wines they had. They had a range from dry to very sweet in both red and white wines, which was very nice to compare all of them. The huge favorite of our group was their best selling wine, which they called a Jemez Red, Jemez for the area that winery is located. I must say that wine was incredible. The smell was just amazing and the taste was perfect. On the way back we stopped along the Jemez River, although the rivers around here are usually not very big rivers due the dryness. It had carved a little cave structure that people were wading in and enjoying some relaxing.

So after getting back, pretty much right away I took off with some others to go see Transformers. Good action, definitely an entertaining movie, I recommend seeing it at some point. Then went for a run to test out my endurance at this altitude. Wasn't bad, should be interesting to see what it's like coming back to sea level.

Well back to the work week soon... going down to Sandia for a field trip on Friday, everyone is looking forward to that. I hear from some program alumni that the Aging Aircraft facility should be a lot of fun. Supposedly we get to climb around in a retired 747. I've heard stories about people cramming themselves into the overhead bins, and also that we should try to find the path from the landing gear up to the main cabin. I'll see if I have time tomorrow to upload pics from this weekend, but don't count on it.

More hiking!

Today we went hiking at a place called Tent Rocks. The hiking was rather easy, only a couple miles one way. But the view we got was once again amazing. The whole area was made purely from erosion, primarily wind. The cave-like trails were incredible, leading up to the top of the canyon and making for some amazing views of the surrounding area. It wasn't quite the view we had last weekend, but it was great for such an easy hike. I'll have the pics up tomorrow probably.

After hiking, we had a cookout at a guy's house. The grill ran out of gas midway through cooking, and then we ended up finding out that the grocery store was the only place in Los Alamos that would exchange propane tanks. And then we found out that they needed customer service open to do the exchange, which had closed ten minutes earlier at 9 p.m. As cool as Los Alamos is, we're constantly reminded of how small a town it really is. So we had to improvise in finishing the cooking of the food.

Tomorrow should also be interesting. I'm planning on going to a winery. On the way, we drive through the caldera of the mountain that overlooks Los Alamos. Also, we might do some hiking on the way to or back from the winery, and possibly stop off at a hot spring. Sounds like a lot of fun and I'm definitely looking forward to it. As for now, I need to rest up.

Fourth of July

Hope everyone had a great 4th of July! It was a very fun one here to say the least. First of all, having a paid day off is definitely a great start. Sleeping in, playing soccer, grilling at the lake, watching fireworks down at White Rock; it was an incredibly fun day overall. The highlight was definitely the fireworks though. It was $5 to get into the main area where all the people were, but there was also a path up to the canyon wall, so we decided to go exploring in that direction to find a place to watch the fireworks. We ended up climbing up the to the top of the canyon wall and finding a nice spot overlooking the area where all the people were and where the fireworks were being shot off from. We definitely had a better view than the people on canyon floor. I took lots of pictures from the fireworks, they lasted about half an hour which is definitely different than the fireworks I'm used to. I'll post some of those probably on the weekend since I have a presentation on Friday that I'll be preparing for tomorrow. As for the weekend, we're not entirely sure what we'll be doing, but it will definitely be something lighter than last week's big hike. I'm hoping to get a round of golf in as well, but I'll have to find someone else to do that with. Time for bed now...

EDIT: Pics from the 4th are up.

Climbing Pecos Baldy

We survived Mount Baldy!

Yesterday's hike was a lot of fun, comparable to my experience with Mt. Fuji last year, but only warmer and not quite as long. We were hiking for about 8 hours or so total, with plenty of altitude changes along the way. At the peak, we were at about 12,000 ft above sea level. All I can say is that I am glad I was adjusted to a higher altitude this year compared with last, I'm not sure I could have endured more altitude sickness. The view at the peak was amazing. It was a clear day, and we could see maybe 50 miles in every direction. At the peak there was some snow as well, and we had some fun with that. I've learned the hike back is always the worst. Even though it's mostly downhill, it seems to just keep going and going and all you want to do is be done with the hiking. At least on the way up you have the peak to look forward to.

I'll be working on posting pictures from the trip later today over on Picasa, but for now, another preview.


Baldy... I think it's pretty obvious how it got its name


Looking downwards from the peak, a small lake is below


Snowman we built at the peak


A view from the peak in the direction we hiked up

As for today, my whole body is incredibly sore, so I'll be taking it easy the rest of the day and try to recover.

*EDIT*
4:40 p.m. Pictures from the trip uploaded onto Picasa

Pictures uploaded

Just uploaded pictures from last weekend on the Picasa site. Enjoy!

Tomorrow we're planning on waking up early and heading out for a long hike. Something like 12 miles round trip, including about a mile in altitude change. Should be a lot of fun and produce some more great pictures.

End of week two

Well, I figure that I should update on what's been going on. Work this week was more interesting since we were able to get some work done, instead of just learning about safety and procedures. Did some karokeing Thursday night, always is a good time. Saturday a group of us went down to Santa Fe to do some shopping and eating that isn't available in Los Alamos. The drive down and back is really amazing, I took pictures and some videos of the surroundings that I'll get around to posting eventually. I'll post here when I do. I'll give you all a preview of it here though:





That's all for now

New Picture site

Going all-Google now:

http://picasaweb.google.com/ChineseBeatle