Hey everyone! Hoping that life is treating you well.
This past week was our last field expedition where the whole group was all together (big sigh). We were at a place called Patagonia Bagual, which is privately owned land directly next to the national park – Torres del Paine. This was a beautiful area where a huge population of wild horses roam because the lack of tourism in this part of the park. It usually doesn’t get very much rain, but it rained for almost 3 days with only a few moments of sunshine haha. We camped outside under the stars and the brightly lit moon. The raindrops were hitting the top of the tent with a tik tik tik sound making a constant rhythm that made you kinda just drift off into nowhere land. Making you remember you are in southern Chile, in the Patagonian region, studying the environment and meeting new people and creating memories that will last forever. It’s important to remember how important the little things are, and to be grateful for everything that you’re currently doing/have.
The main part of coming to Patagonia Bagual was to take our final exams. We did just this in the beautiful outdoors, filled with life everywhere. There are no complaints I can come up with even with the rain, because I would choose this over a classroom any day. The first day was a long hike to look at the various landscapes because the next day we would come back here and be given our exam questions dealing with the geology and ecology of the area. This was probably one of the hardest uphill hikes I’ve done in a while. Though, once we got to the top we were able to see the lakes, mountains, and the peaks of TDP. You could even see the border of Argentina and Chile separated by this huge mountain ridge. You could see 360 degrees around you at the blue sky, the puffy white clouds, and hear the sound of the wind gusting by… and a few students singing some acapella while we ate lunch. Since we were so high up we were able to see a few Andean Condors soaring above, flocks of Austral Parakeets flying by, and some Caracara searching for prey.
Exams are now over which is always such a stress relief. Moving on to our next chapter, which will start tomorrow – DR (directed research). We will be splitting up with the 3 professors to conduct different experiments for an array of projects. I am in the project where I will be collecting macro-invertebrate data from several sites in the rivers and tributary that surround the Patagonia Bagual area. We will be going back there to camp for 5 nights taking two days to collect our data which will consist of putting on waiters and shifting rocks and dirt to collect all kinds of smaller water insects. We will also be testing the dissolved oxygen levels, pH, and a few other variables in the water. The other two-to-three days will be helping the other ecology group who are looking at native tree size. Most of us will be writing our own research paper with the help of our adviser (professor), and creating a presentation to show to our fellow classmates and if we are chosen, the local town. Since this part of the semester is only one month, the paper is much smaller than it usually would. Though, it still contains most of the main hitters that the larger research papers have, just a little more summed up. The cool part of it though it we get to come up with our own hypothesis (or two) to test the data that we will be collecting. I am super excited for these next 3 weeks! It blows my mind how fast this semester has been moving. Before we all know it, it will be time to head our own ways – many which will be joining their families for Christmas. But for me, I will be traveling to 4 other cities and be coming home on the 1st of January. Just in time to celebrate a late Christmas and an early celebration for my moms birthday before I head off to start my last semester of undergraduate. If you have the time and you’re already next to some amazing countries, why not do some more traveling and make some new memories? Just a thought.
I will be keeping an update on how my paper and research is coming along and letting you in on some information about the after program travels. This has truly been such a cool semester, and I have learned so much more than I even realize. Since I plan to go to graduate school next Fall, I am looking forward to understand more about how field research works and the techniques that are used to conduct these experiments in these next few weeks.
Keeping my adventure cap on and only thinking positively!
Smile: because remember, life is short – so do whatever makes you happy.
Luke
Traveling with Luke 