Friends of the Pleistocene

Torsten and Matt took the long Labor Day weekend to join the Alaska Friends of the Pleistocene on Prince of Wales. It was great to catch up with everyone, especially Chip, Adelie, Cathy, and UAS students. We got great lectures from Dave D’Amore and Jim Baichtel. Here are the two naturalists on the first day:



Torsten and Matt flew up and met Chip and Adelie in Ketchikan. Due to crazy, constantly changing logistics (standard operating procedures for SEAK), we flew into Klawock early afternoon. Flying over Prince of Wales Island is a fantastic treat! For all of us, and definitely according to Torsten and Adelie, visiting the El Captian cave was the highlight of the trip. Here at the mouth of the cave,



we read up the warning signs:



and got some great info/lecturing from Dave D’Amore on the forest:



Once inside the cave, we learned lots of cave geology from Jim Baichtel and Johanna.. Torsten and Adelie were rapt:



And then Torsten and Adelie got to explore a small side cave (the “kids cave”) that had space for about four people max. Here’s Adelie making the first entrance to the side cave:



From El Capitan, we went to the Beaver Falls Karst hike (super cool!). The boardwalk trails through the sink-holes was fantastic:



Every night, one highlight was S’mores!!! (The other highlight was great geology lectures, and I think Torsten and Adelie did an amazing job paying attention for the ~2 hours lectures!) But did I say S’mores!?!? 🙂



We had a great hike down to Staney Creek, and the naturalists investigated and recorded some fantastic rainforest mushrooms. Amazing early (~3000 years ago?) human habitation was also described during the forest and river-side hiking with Jim.



We had many roadside stops, deer and bear viewings, and saw many spawning salmon. Here are a few more photos of the budding naturalists at work on the hike to the Thorne River erosion site:



After all the fun, we were all very exhausted:



What an incredible experience!! Thanks to everyone that made it possible. Here is the group photo in the front of the El Capitan cave entrance:



And if you desperately need more photos, the whole gallery is available..

3 Replies to “Friends of the Pleistocene”

  1. Very Nice…especially the s’mores and the great people who cooked them! Got to revisit LeConte Glacier after 11 on the mainland east of Petersburg…the Tongass Rainforest Festival
    folks organized a jet boat to go over. Lots of terminus retreat
    but stalwart calving of serracs and shooters very active. Lots of harbor seals hanging out on bergs. Back to Juneau and potato harvesting this a.m.

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