Friday, July 03, 2009

We have arrived!

Yes, we made it safely into camp last night. Dale Gnidovec, Collections Manager & Curator at Ohio State University also arrived in camp to be part of our crew. After a slight run in with a deer he still beat us to camp. Don't worry, Dale is fine, but his car will need some TLC. He will be prospecting for new fossil sites while in Montana. We will eventually run out of fossil specimens and will need to relocate our efforts, whether we like it or not.

This morning, Pat, our cook, triumphantly entered camp and will start cooking tonight. Then the crew unloaded our trailer and started opening the site, not an easy task. Every year we have to recover the site completely to prevent looters and/or exposure to the elements.

Today, Dale, William, Dr. Storrs and myself went up to YBRA (Yellowstone Bighorn Research Association) to collect field items that we had stored away last year. We filled our van and truck with buckets, field toilets, coolers and more. After trying with no luck to establish Internet connection at YBRA we headed into Red Lodge for lunch to get better wi-fi. An added bonus is the annual Red Lodge 4th of July parade is happening right now outside our cafe. You know you're out west when every parade participant is on horseback.

I will post pictures Sunday!

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Hi Mike Papp,

It's your wife Tina back in Kentucky. How are things going? Did you uncover any dinosaur bones yet? I can't wait to see some pictures. Hope everyone is having fun. Write me back when you get a chance.

Love ya,
Tina

Lauren said...

Tina - I gave Mike your message. All is well and he has been a great help at the site. - Lauren