Nepal Trek 2009 - May 17, Dingboche to Loshasha

"Morning! Tea? Coffee?" This was our daily wake-up ritual, although Steve and I were usually awake before the wake-up call. Chirri (on the right) and Mingmar (left) came to our tent each morning at 6 am to bring us hot tea.

"Yes, please - two teas, two sugars, Thank you!"

"You're welcome!" - the latter was always said with a chuckle. Sherpas don't have an equivalent phrase in their language.



Ah, yes - the conveniences of trekking. Sometimes you had access to an indoor porcelain squat hole, but most of the time the facilities were either a toilet tent with a trench dug for the temporary stay, or something along this caliber.














An outhouse with a squat hole. There was always some form of plant material to kick into the hole for composting. The windows in the back provided some much needed ventilation. One trekking rule I discovered was, "don't blow your nose in the outhouse." Trust me on this one.









For the record.











Gathering before the trek begins. There was always someone that needed to use the facilities before hitting the trail.










This is Tendi, our lead trail Sherpa, in his pink "Smurfette" hat. We all got such a kick out of this hat. I'm sure a trekker left it for him from a previous excursion.















The day was very overcast and so the mountain views were not with us this day. I just reread my journal entry for this section of trail and I must have still been very ill. The entry talks about exhaustion and wishing that I could clear my lungs and nose. I had to give up my pack again, so that's a sure sign that I wasn't feeling well at all.






The scenery from here was missed on the way to Dingboche, also. We were in snow that day and so the views were new to me. I hadn't remembered seeing the alluvial fans coming down off the slopes - another clear sign that the Himalayas are eroding away as they are going upwards.







The trail wasn't too bad in most sections - rocky, but following the river for the most part.











From Dingboche on towards lower elevations, there are signs of permanent settlements all through the region. The stone walls are well maintained and you can see signs of agriculture.









The streams are full of glacial milk - the microscopically ground sediments that come off the glaciers that feed them.
















Time for a workshop session - this one on videography, I think.












Chris Marquardt looks like a pirate saying, "Arrrrgh."












Jon Miller












Pasang Sherpa - he always had a beautiful smile.












Sonam Sherpa - he served as our guide for the trek and in Kathmandu.












More workshop tips being shared.












Here's a look back up the alley.













The ubiquitous porter, carrying a load that is beyond belief.











Most of the porters carry a T-shaped stick that is used to take the load off their shoulders during their rest breaks.

















Burlesque music, please! Jon got a bit warm and decided to take off a layer.












As we returned to lower elevation, more and more settlements appear. Every flat surface along the valleys are used.










The "pure" yaks will soon be left behind as we go to lower elevations. They are adapted to the alpine zone. Below 13,000 feet one usually sees the yak-cow hybrids.









Another tea house under construction. This is a sure sign that tourism drives the economy of this region.











All of the construction is done by hand, including the shaping of stones.












We saw more yaks than ponies, but there are a number of ponies in the villages and you occasionally see one on the trail.










I always enjoyed passing through one of these gates. There are prayer wheels lining the walls inside.











Tengboche, perched atop the ridge.












Lovely, lovely irises. I love them all. I should have been an iris systematist.











I didn't notice the suspension bridge that was strung beneath this bridge on our way up the trail. I think that was because we didn't have a clear view of it from the other side. I much prefer the thought of crossing the sturdy bridge rather than the rickety suspension bridge.








A mountain pony - love that curly hair!













One of my favorite pics of Chris Marquardt. He always had a serious (pissed?) face on when I snapped his photos. He told me this was a look of determination.
















The Stupa at Tengboche. We stopped in Tengboche for lunch. I wasn't feeling well and ended up going inside a tea house to warm up while the rest of the group had lunch outdoors. As I recall, it was windy and chilly. I was cold and needed to warm up.














Below Tengboche, we descended into the Rhododendron forest. The smell of the trail was earthy through this biome.









The rhododendrons were in peak flowering near the top side of their elevational range. As we descended, they were well on the way to producing seed and the flowers were past prime.









The decidious trees were leafing out. This valley will have a very different look in midsummer than it had in late spring.









Kancha Sherpa. He had a terrible toothache on this day. He had the tooth pulled the next day as we passed through Namche Bazaar.

Kancha carried my pack during the climb up to Tengboche. He's Pasangs older brother and I really enjoyed getting to know both of them on the trail.







Steve - he was feeling pretty good this day as I recall.











The rhododendron forest yields to a pine dominated one as we progress down the mountains.











One of the legumes in bloom. If anyone has a clue as to the identity, please post a comment.











Let's see, we've done suspension bridges, steel frame bridges, flimsy wooden plank bridges, and sturdier wooden bridges.











A species of dogwood.














Wild strawberry.














Something in the Asteraceae. Pussy toes comes to mind? Any guesses as to ID?













A species of wild rose.













Another legume species - anyone know this plant?


















This one is a puzzle - I could use some help identifying it.




















Iris - they're so beautiful!











I think this is a cotoneaster.














Euphorbiaceae.














Tea time!















Nap time! Jon Miller and John Coleman are studying the insides of their eyelids.

Nepal Trek 2009 - May 16, Gorak Shep to Dingboche

Ten days up, but we had only four days to get back to Lukla. We would have had five days if our schedule hadn't been discombobulated from being snowed in an extra day in Dingboche on the way up. You'd think going downhill would be much easier, and it was from the point-of-view of being able to go faster, but downhill is very tough on the joints - especially knees.

Our morning companion was the Khumbu glacier as we hiked along the lateral moraine. I really enjoyed the scenery up here near the glacier. The mountains were so majestic and the views were stunning everywhere you looked. I just can't get over the impact this area has had on me. Watching the mountains erode in real time - all those boulders flowing down the valley on the glacier. The Himalayas are still rising, but they're being torn down at the same time.



It looks like these yaks are carrying loads of potatoes - probably on their way to Everest base camp.


















We took a rest break at the same spot we rested on the way up the glacier. Steve draped some prayer flags around this memorial cairn. He wanted to honor the memory of Tendi's brother, who died on Everest just a week or so earlier.








Another look at Nuptse before we lose the view to clouds.










Some of our Sherpa staff, taking their rest break while Steve is having his picture taken at the memorial cairn.











I'll always remember the sound of yak bells from this region. They are essential to the economy of this area - everything moves up the mountain either on the backs of yaks or human porters.








We arrived at Lobuche at mid-morning. I hadn't really paid much attention to Lobuche on the way up to Gorak Shep since that was one of my low days in terms of how I was feeling. It was interesting to see it from this angle - it's a very small village that seems to be there just for the traffic from climbers and trekkers.






We took a rest break here. There were some temporary shelters scattered amongst the rocks. The fellow on the right is using an overturned satellite dish as a clothes drying rack.







A lammergeier, or, bearded vulture. These majestic giants are old world vultures, but they have feathered heads rather than bare ones. There's a small tuft of feathers at the base of the beak, which is why they are called bearded vultures. The last time I saw one of these in flight was in 2003, in South Africa's Drakensberg range.





I think this might be a female rose finch, but I have to take a look at my birds of Nepal book to get the identification sorted out.











There goes the lammergeier again.










One of the Lobuche peaks - maybe Lobuche east?











Another view of the temporary camp in Lobuche.











A yellow-billed Chough.













Robin accentor













Another view of the robin accentor
















We again passed through the memorial cairns at the terminal end of the Khumbu glacier.












What is so sobering to me is that there are so many cairns here.












This is the one dedicated to Scott Fischer, an American climber who lost his life in the 1996 disaster that is described in Jon Krakauer's book, "Into thin air."










































It really felt good to have a rest break here before we tackled the knee buster terminal moraine down to Dhukla.











Newly draped prayer flags are very colorful and not too frayed. The ones that have been there for a while are faded and ragged.










This is the terminal moraine for the Khumbu glacier. I think it's about 200 meters in height, but maybe it just feels that high as you're climbing it - going either direction. It's definitely a knee buster coming down.







We had our lunch outdoors at Dhukla. While we were sitting outside the tea house, a group of trekkers passed us by on their way up the terminal moraine. What was so unusual about this group is that they had two wheel-chair bound members who were being carried on the backs of porters.

After lunch it began to snow and mist and so I put away my camera for the afternoon and concentrated on trekking. Here's my post from that day of trekking, sent from Dingboche.

Snowbird, Utah for Botany & Mycology 2009 - my last day here

I'm heading home this morning, one day before the conference ends. That's the problem with timing I have given the travel time and the Dublin Irish Festival this weekend. Next year looks to be the same or even worse timing - depends on when the festival weekend will be.

At any rate, yesterday was a very full, but productive day. I chaired the morning session on Lamiales and Gesneriales. It was a great session with a lot of good talks, including the one by my co-author on the Penstemon low-copy nuclear gene phylogeny. A quick break for lunch and then I had a talk scheduled in another great session on hybridization and speciation questions. My talk went well, which is always nice, but I have to admire Pam Soltis for her amazing handling of the technical difficulties that resulted in her slides not working. She was talking on the polyploidy of European Tragopogans and her slides just quit changing (Mac incompatibilities with the equipment in use). She was calm and collected and just did the talk sans slides. I know she thinks it was a disaster, but it came across as an amazing display of professionalism. Kudos, Pam.

The genomics talks were interesting. I'm not in that field of systematics, but I sure do appreciate the results of the investment NSF has made into those projects. I also enjoyed meeting Ken Wolfe, the Karling lecture speaker. He talked about genomics of yeast - another topic far afield from my work, but I'm interested in how others are mining the huge genomic databases that are now available.

Genomics is a field of study where whole genomes (all the DNA in the nucleus and organelles) are being sequenced. The information is analyzed for content - genes, repetitive DNA elements, control regions, etc. and the data are deposited into databases that are available for everyone to use. There's a whole new field of science called bioinformatics, which involves the mining of those databases.

I think most people have heard of the human genome project. It's that investment in science that has led to a cost-effective way of sequencing the genomes of other animals, plants, fungi, and microbes. We're learning so much about how life evolved and how it 'works' in terms of development and growth of the organism, and the timing and location of gene expression that makes it all happen. It's a fascinating area of science all on its own, but its particularly interesting in the comparative framework of evolutionary biology.

I also enjoyed visiting with students who did their PhDs with me and are now out on their own, training the next generation of scientists. I'm an academic grandmother and all of my 'progeny' have been pretty impressive. That's a great feeling, to know that I've contributed to our knowledge base through my career as a scientist. It's also incentive to stay current with what's going on in my field - it changes so rapidly. Genomics wasn't even a word when I started coming to these annual meetings in the late 1980's and now this field of study dominates funding priorities and research in systematics. Pretty amazing.

Ok, this 'interlude' is done and I'll resume my Nepal trek posts later in the week. Then I'll have another interlude for the Dublin Irish Festival - coming this weekend. One of the biggest and best in the world - don't miss it!

Snowbird, Utah for Botany & Mycology 2009 meeting - day 2

Yesterday was very, very busy, but also very productive. I have to confess that I honestly did not want to take the time to come to this meeting for a variety of reasons. First, the timing of this meeting is really awful for me, personally. This coming weekend is the Dublin Irish Festival and having to take four days out of my schedule ahead of the biggest gig of the year for Aisling is a real pain. Second, I've felt disconnected for the past couple of years and really didn't think I would be comfortable back in the thick of things. Third, I've been away from home way too much this year already.

Thus, I had a lousy attitude going in, but the first day of the meeting was a tonic of sorts. I had some fantastic conversations, received some invitations to do seminar visits, plus the start of a new collaboration. All those things are what these meetings are about, plus getting to sit in on some great talks and see where the cutting edge in my field is at the moment.

So, let that be a lesson to be learned - just do it!

One of the highlights from yesterday was a talk given by Noel Holmgren of the New York Botanical Garden. He presented an overview and history of the Intermountain Flora and I truly enjoyed seeing the slides of Art Cronquist, Art Holmgren, Jim Reveal and Noel and Pat in the field, plus the amazing landscapes of the intermountain flora region. It's such a fantastic project that was conceived seven decades ago.

ps - the scenery here isn't hard on the eyes, either.

Snowbird, Utah for Botany & Mycology 2009 meeting

My Nepal posts will be interrupted for this brief interlude to my annual scientific conference. I'm in Snowbird, Utah for the Botany & Mycology 2009 meeting. Snowbird is a lovely setting for a meeting; a ski resort with the conference center sitting at 8,100 feet. The top of the resort is at 11,000 feet, I think. It must be higher than the mountain I'm looking at from my room, because the tramway goes up and over that spot.

Here's a picture of my view, taken with my cell phone.



I'm watching the sun work it's way down from the peak this morning, so my view is to the east.

I arrived mid-afternoon yesterday and it was pretty hot outside. I enjoyed watching ground squirrels on the grass - they must have dens in the slope down to the stream. There are a lot of plants in bloom up here as well and I photographed a couple of different Penstemons yesterday in the calm air at dusk.

I went to the Plenary lecture, given by Nancy Turner, on the ethnobotany of Pacific Northwest indigenous peoples. It was pretty interesting and I learned a lot of new things about the use of plants in those cultures. The mixer was afterwards - well attended, but I never enjoy those kinds of things. I don't know why I haven't developed a social ability after all these years in academia, but I'm always uncomfortable in a mixer setting. I need to bring Emma, my miniature dachshund - that would make it bearable. She doesn't have any trouble approaching strangers and distant acquaintances for some social interactions.




Doesn't this picture just scream, "Love me! I'm adorable!" ?







One thing I didn't know about Snowbird is that the bird doesn't go for the early worm around here. This place is shut tight until 7 am. That's pretty hard for an early riser on east coast time, especially with it not getting light until well after 6 am. Oh well - off to my first session this morning. Should be an interesting couple of days for the beginning of this week and then the Dublin Irish Festival is next weekend.