Travel – The Solo Geographer

She’s Coming in 12:30 flight

Africa!

Way back in July, I booked an amazing trip through a company called G Adventures. This trip was a 3 week tour around 4 countries in Southern Africa. I actually added a 5th country, but I’ll talk about that in a later post. I hadn’t taken a trip this long since I went to Hawaii/Australia/New Zealand several years ago with an old friend Kayla. And this one wasn’t going to be in my friend’s cushy Hawaii house or in cute cabins and hotels in NZ. This was going to be a camping trip.

And friends, it was amazing. I left two days after Thanksgiving. I was nervous right up until I got to the airport, really. So many things can throw a wrench into the logistics, but it worked out well. I went to a travel doctor, got shots, saw my GI doctor who prescribed me a steroid in case I had a Crohn’s flare (spoiler alert, I didn’t need it), bought a compression bag for my sleeping bag, packed like mad, and counted down the days.

When I arrived in South Africa, it was amazing. The main reason? It was HOT! I flew into Cape Town on November 26th (I traveled overnight) and crossed into the Southern and Eastern hemisphere. This also meant that it was late spring! Or more like summer, meteorology, in most of the places we went to.

It’s always fun walking down those stairs off a plane! I don’t remember too much of the super long flight, except that I didn’t sleep and the food was okay. Also there was no one in the seat right next to me so that was nice!

I did not expect to be put on a shuttle to get to the terminal but there were worse things that could have happened! Thankfully customs was fast and my driver met me past security. He was a cool guy and pointed out cool places along the drive. I didn’t get a photo as I was really tired, but he showed me Robben Island where Nelson Mandel was held as a political prisoner.

I made it to the hostel for my first night in South Africa, right in time for the opening meeting. The first person I met was actually the young woman that I shared a tent with the whole trip. Her name is Laura, and she’s also a geography student! She’s from Berlin, and we got along very well the whole trip. We went down to the meeting and we did some get to know you stuff, and talked about the trip, how things would work with camping/driving around in the Lando/who the leaders were, etc. Lots of logistics I won’t get into, but it was a good meeting. Then we all walked to a restaurant nearby for dinner. I was a bit nervous, but getting to know everyone that first night was great, and I kind of smile at how the relationships developed after that first night! We also learned that first night that the majority of the people on the trip were from Germany! There were 2 others from the U.S. I was also the oldest person in the entire group (not counting our driver/guide Robby). The tour was for people aged 18-39. The next person in age to me (initially) was 33.

After that first meal, we all went back to the hostel. It was LOUD. Not the hostel, but the bar next to us. Thankfully they shut off the music after awhile. That was also the last time we’d be in real beds for awhile too!

The next day we got up and put our luggage outside to be loaded on the bus (see at the top of the post) and went to breakfast. I decided to not drink too much coffee on this trip as I didn’t know if I’d get stomachaches from it (it’s always touch and go with me with coffee) and as the Lando didn’t have a toilet, I didn’t want to be stuck. So I only had coffee a handful of times the entire trip! The breakfast was good, and then we went back to the bus, chose seats, and headed off! We were supposed to change seats every day but that didn’t always happen (though we did rotate every now and then). That first day I sat with Michelle, from Switzerland, and we both discovered we were fans of How I met YOur Mother (that might have been a later day but it all kind of blends together considering how many hours we were on the Lando!)

The first sight we saw was Table Rock!

Check out the parasailors!

We didn’t stay too long, as we needed to get to our first real excursion. We went to a cultural center for the San people. They’re also called Bush people, but they’re trying to move away from that term. They are the last hunter gatherers in the world, and their way of life is disappearing because the governments don’t let them hunt anymore.

It was a very cool excursion, and I wish we’d had more time to look around the museum.

It’s a little hard to see, but this is how their click language is written out. We learned a couple of clicks, and we got to practice a bit! It was SO cool to learn about their language (and other languages, which we learned more about later) and how the clicks are written out. The exclamation point is a click with the tongue against the roof of your mouth and the front teeth. And the double lines are a click on the side of your cheek.

Our guide explained the different plants they grow to make their medicinal tea. It includes wild cannabis (which does not have the same effects as cultivated marijuana).

We also got to sample the tea!

I think I was the first one to actually sip at it. I have a really good poker face sometimes… I didn’t make an expression after trying it so I think a couple of other people in my group didn’t realize it was EXTREMELY bitter! They all grabbed for the honey (I took the rest as a shot, It was not good!)

We got lunch to take on the Lando after our tour, and headed off to our first camp site. It was at a lovely vineyard!

A few of us decided to do a wine tasting! It was fun (and we got a cheese plate halfway through). Some of the wines were okay, some were good!

It was hard focusing my camera!

This one was infused with rooibos tea! It was interesting. I can’t remember how much I liked it.

Ha, I thought this was the actual toast but, oops! We were with another group for the wine tasting, so someone from each group gave a toast. It was a really nice time and a cool way to start getting to know the other people on my tour.

I have a lot more to write about on this trip, with so many adventures and sight seeing and friendships made! I can’t wait to tell you more about my African adventure!

The Autumnal Equinox

Here comes the sun. . .

I might have mentioned this before, but I’m a seasonal employee at Cahokia Mounds State Historic Site. This place is amazing, and I’ve discovered a lot of people have never heard of it. Even some local folks haven’t actually visited, not even on school field trips.

If you’re one of those folks who haven’t heard of Cahokia Mounds, allow me to give you some fast facts! Cahokia is considered the first actual city in the United States, but it predates the actual country of the United States by hundreds of years. It was permanently settled by a Native American culture that archaeologists call the Mississippians around 800 A.D. They flourished and built a city in this location until the site was abandoned around 1350 A.D. They didn’t have a written language, so we don’t know what they called themselves (although there’s a lot of evidence that it was probably multicultural) or what they called the city. Cahokia came from a tribe that was living here with European settlers came in, the Cahokians. So it’s a bit confusing.

Anyway, population estimates say that at it’s peak, the numbers could be anywhere from around 10,000-20,000 people living on about 4,000 acres. They also built the largest earthen mound in the Western Hemisphere, Monks Mound. It’s 100 feet high and has an estimated 22 million cubic feet of earth contained within it, give or take.

I’m tempted to spout all of my tour information right now, but I’ll spare you since it’s not a general post about Cahokia, but about one specific event, which I’ll get to in a minute. I’ve loved working here since 2021 and I wish my job was a permanent one. I may not be able to work there next summer since I’m applying to grad school, but I’ll definitely volunteer!

Painting by William Iseminger. I see Bill at work regularly and he’s an amazing archaeologist and I’m very lucky to rub elbows with him. This is what Cahokia might have looked like during its initial occupation.

This is the view from the top of Monks Mound. The two mounds you can see through the trees are the Twin Mounds.

One interesting aspect of Cahokia is Woodhenge. Generally acknowledged as a solar calendar, this structure was discovered during “salvage archaeology” in an area that was set to be demolished by highway 70/55 in the 60’s. Dr. Warren Wittry conducted an excavation and discovered, among neighborhood homes that predate it, post pits that formed circles. I’ll spare you the technical details, but these pits corresponded with significant sunrises, and also Monks Mound itself. Those sunrises happen to be the Equinoxes and the Solstices. The equinoxes line up with Monks Mound quite nicely. And this past Saturday was the Autumnal Equinox. At Cahokia, we hold observances of these astronomical events on the Sunday closest to them. So the very next day we held an Equinox Observance. Bill Iseminger gave a little talk, and we got to watch the sunrise. It was a bit cloudy, but the sky was beautiful. Keep in mind, out of respect for Native Americans, we don’t do any rituals or ceremonies or anything, we just watch the sunrise and enjoy it.

I was slightly peeved this person wouldn’t turn off their headlights because the sky was soooo pretty. This was around 6:15, half an hour before the talk started. You can see that flat line in the middle of the trees there? That’s monks mound. Hard to see if you don’t know what you’re looking at.

More headlights, but you can see the poles from our reconstruction.

Selfie!

Y’all, the sky gave us its all that morning. It was so intensely beautiful! Monks mound again just barely visible.

Bill on his Ladder.

Monks Mound is a little easier to see in this photo. It’s just off center.

Now you can start to see the mounds in the lightening sky! There’s a smaller mound right behind the Woodhenge poles, and Monks Mound behind that to the left.

My apologies to Angela for the photo of her messing with her sleeve and her coffee on the ground (and Bill again). BTW she’s wearing the same sweatshirt I was wearing, our new Cahokia Mounds sweatshirts that were being sold at the event. They’re warm and handsome.

The clouds look so beautiful.

And this was the shot! You can see the glowing sun just to the front of Monks Mound! A day earlier, and the sun would be right at the front of the mound, but because of the rotation of the Earth it was slightly off. Regardless, I was very excited to get this shot. There’s a cloud right above where the sun is so we couldn’t see the whole of the sun once it rose, but I didn’t mind. The sunrise was so beautiful nonetheless.

And the sun has risen and a new season has begun.

If you’re ever in the St. Louis area and want to know more about Cahokia, give us a visit! Sadly our interpretive center has been closed for renovation, but we’re running tours through the middle of November, and hopefully we’ll be reopen next year. There’s also a lot of information online about the site. Some random blogs (like mine haha) don’t always have accurate information, so definitely take some with a grain of salt. Also our website has a lot of resources as well. If you have any questions, feel free to ask. I can provide documentation to prove I am an employee if you’re concerned (again, always gotta be careful if you’re not sure if someone is telling the truth or not!), or you could always call the site or contact the site through the social media avenues.

Okay, I’ll leave you with one final video, if you would like to watch! It’s an award winning video we play in our theater (well, when we’re open!) and it’s less than 15 minutes long. It doesn’t have quite the same effect watching it on a computer as opposed to our theater, but I like it anyway! Thanks for reading, and I hope you enjoyed my sales pitch about Cahokia. 😉

Camping and Quilting

I visit the National Quilt Museum and find inspiration.

Finally, my friends, I got to do some traveling! I didn’t go far. I just went two and a half hours south to Paducah, Kentucky. I’ll focus most of my post on one of the things I did there, the National Quilt Museum!

I love sewing, and a few years ago I got into quilting. I wasn’t sure if I’d like it, but now that I look back, of course I like it. I really like how soothing it is to cut out shapes of fabric and sew straight seams. It’s a lot less stressful (sometimes) than sewing clothes. I have only finished a couple of full size quilts, but I’ve done a lot of smaller quilting projects like wall hangings and mug rugs. I have a couple of quilt tops I need to quilt together, but all in good time, I’m sure.

I left after work on Sunday. I dropped the dogs off at my mom’s and headed for a little campground in the city.

My little tiny tent and my camping chair. I have a bigger tent somewhere, but it’s a bit of a hassle when it’s just me camping. So I brought my cheap little walmart 2 person tent. Maybe I should have brought the higher quality one as it rained a bit, but the cheap one held up, so I can’t complain. There’s a picnic table right behind where I was standing for this photo, and that’s where I set up my cookstove and water jug.

Since the campground was more of an RV park, there was also free wifi, so I spent the first night watching Jaime French videos on Youtube because I couldn’t sleep. Not because I was camping, but because I’ve dealt with insomnia since I was small.

The next morning, I waited out a storm, made breakfast…

Then drove around Paducah looking around until the National Quilt Museum opened. And I am SO glad I went! It was beyond amazing. I’ll share some of my favorite quilts. Unfortunately, I forgot to snag the artists’ names on some of them, so I won’t show them out of respect for their work. I don’t want to share it without proper credit. There were also a lot more quilts I didn’t get photos of, so I highly encourage you to go to the museum if you get the chance. They’re always changing exhibits, and the employees are knowledgeable and very friendly.

The outside.

20230717_102736 — I like how the blocks were turned around to create the twisty lines.

20230717_103132 — These are “common” pineapple blocks, but the color values going brighter towards the center give it a glowing quality. I love the name, Fireflies, as it really evokes that image in my mind!

This quilt is done by Velda Newman and she had MANY amazing, very large quilts. Some of the quilts took up almost an entire wall! I chose this one to share because, well, I love birds (even seagulls). She is a true artist.

This is “Infinity” by Nancy Ota.

This is “Yellow Bird” by Claudia Clark Myers

This is Dragonfly Jacket by Marilyn Badger. I’d love to experiment more with quilted clothing, so seeing some in this exhibit was awesome.

“Geisha and the Serving Girl” by Claudia Clark Myers

“Marie’s Treasure” by Marilyn Badger. I love it because she used crochet elements in her piece and I love to crochet.

“Harlequinade” by Beckey Prior and quilted by Jackie Brown

“The Honeymooners” by Karen Sistek and Nancy Sterett Martin

20230717_110633 — Does it look like there’s a mermaid in this? I think it looks like a mermaid!

“Reflection #3” by Caryl Bryer Fallert-Gentry

What’s really remarkable was being able to recognize some of the pieces as hand quilted. I did get some close up photos but I neglected to either get the full quilt or the name of the quilter. Others were machine quilted (my preferred method because I am not patient enough to hand quilt and entire one!). It really is remarkable how something that had such a utilitarian function as a blanket has morphed into such an amazing art form. Even simple nine patch quilts were a way for the quilter to express themselves and their artistic creativity, and some have become award winning art pieces.

I’d love to go back to the National Quilt Museum soon, especially as Paducah is so close. I’ll post about my trip to a mound site in a couple days, but before I sign off, I’m going to leave one last photo of my favorite quilt. It’s a miniature quilt, one of my favorite kinds to make, and it depicts a scene of one of my favorite places.

Slickrock and Sun

Sunny day of hiking.

I’m in Moab, Utah with 3 of my nephews! We’re visiting my sister Laura and it’s so dry. It’s not as hot as it usually is when I visit, which is a relief. But it is sunny and we have to drink so much water all the time. Back home, where 85% humidity is the norm, we don’t have to drink nearly as much. I do drink plenty at home because I walk and climb Monks Mound so much for my job. But here it’s even more

Yesterday, our first full day in Moab, some of us went to Sand Flats Recreation Area for a little hike. It was beautiful!

The trail we hiked is called Pinyon trail. It wasn’t too long, only about a mile loop. The sky was so blue!

Appa had fun exploring.

There’s still a lot of snow on the La Sal Mountains. We might go up there to fish later this week.

Damon is thrilled lol.

This is a yucca plant with fruit. The fruit is not exactly what you’d expect, it’s hard and firm like a pumpkin as my nephew Teddy said. They’re pollinated by the Yuccca Moth.

Climbing “slickrock” which is actually super grippy sandstone. I looked it up, and it’s called slickrock because the settlers had a hard time with their metal rimmed wheels and their shod horses. It’s also probably a lot more slick when it gets wet. As for our rubber soled shoes, it’s super easy to climb!

Sand Flats Recreation area is also home to the worldwide famous Slickrock Trail. Mountain bikers come from all over the world to experience this trail. I like bike riding, but I’m not that adventurous! I need more practice so I don’t get tired on my flat streets back home.

Teddy found a Hot Wheels on the trail! He brought the truck in his other hand, and we found this “wild hot wheels” in the sand. It was a cool find even funnier considering he found a hot wheels in Moab last summer in the rocks at the condo we stayed at with my folks. I have his face blocked out because I don’t have his parents’ permission to post it and he’s a little too young to decide for himself.

My sister enjoying the view.

At the top of another slickrock!

This is the ephedra plant, also called “Mormon tea” round these parts. It has medicinal properties. You may recognize the name since it’s pretty regulated as a medicine/supplement in the US. Just chewing it like a piece of straw is no big. Teddy really likes it, though I think it just tastes like a random plant.

Teeny tiny prickly pear cactus! There’s a lot of these plants around, but this one was tiny and cute so I had to show it with my (already small) hand for scale.

I didn’t get as many photos of the trail as I would like, and I completely forgot to get a photo of the biological soil crust, but maybbe I will later on during the trip. We also went to Moonflower to walk about but we got attacked by mosquitos and there was poison ivy all around.

We had to cap off the day with MoYo, or Moab Fozen Yogurt.

The three of us decided independently to not smile for this photo. You can just barely see Jimmy’s bright red hair next to Damon. Yes I’m wearing a different shirt (I was getting a bit chilly as the sun was going down!

Today we’re packing up to go on the river (either tonight or tomorrow) and Teddy CAN’T WAIT. Neither can I!

Spelunking, sort of.

The Solo Geographer goes caving.

There are a lot of caves in Missouri. A LOT. According to Mo.gov, there are over 7,000 of them. To put on my Geographer hat (overlapping with a Geologist hat, as Geography tends to do), I’ll tell you why that is. Missouri has what’s called a karst landscape, that is a lot of limestone and dolomite. These minerals are easily (comparatively) worn away by slightly acidic water. This water slowly but surely dissolves rock, creating impressive underground landscapes.

I could talk all day about different types of caves, the water table, and minerals, but I’ll save that for your Wikipedia browsing. Or, maybe you’ll get inspired by this post and go find a cave to explore! Any cave that gives public tours is most likely going to have a knowledgeable tour guide.

I’ve been to caves a lot in my life. I remember going to Onandaga caverns in school. I’ve been to Meramec Caverns several times. I went spelunking in one of the systems in eastern Missouri during summer camp. That was the first time I got to really go caving. We wore hardhats, long pants, sturdy shoes we could get messed up, and headlamps. It was WILD and awesome! I also went to the glowworm caves in New Zealand, which was one of the most beautiful things I have ever seen.

Fast forward several years, and I ended up on one of the best trips of my life: Costa Rica. The travel agency I used hooked me up with a spelunking expedition in Cavernas de Venado. This was the most hardcore caving I’d ever done!

Me in Cavernas de Venado. This was in 2021, so masks were still enforced. My tour guide spoke little English, I spoke little Spanish, and the two other people I was with translated as best they could, and we all had a wonderful time. Next time I won’t wear skinny jeans spelunking! We got SOAKED as we had to crawl through feet of water and duck down to avoid hitting our heads at the same time. Somehow my phone survived!

I work as a seasonal interpreter at Cahokia Mounds. Interpreter as in I interpret the site, sharing history, the culture of the people who built the mounds, and helping visitors understand the importance of the mounds. Sadly I am not fluent in another language, so not that type of interpreter. My main duty is to give tours, though I’ve also written educational materials and made some props for education bins. Anyway, that’s a roundabout way of explaining that I have a different work week than many people (thought not too different from owning a bakery!). I work Wednesdays through Sundays, as opposed Mondays through Fridays. Our bakery is Tuesday through Saturday so kind of a middle ground. ANYWAY, since it was Memorial Day on Monday and my nephews were out of school, they went with me to the Lake of the Ozarks.

Packing up with two teenage boys, two dogs, and all our stuff was a bit cramped, but we made it. At least we weren’t camping and I didn’t have to lug my huge Rtic cooler! My parents have a condo right on the lake, so we got to enjoy free lodging. We took it pretty easy on the weekend, though I forgot my swim suit like a doof so we couldn’t go swimming. And I didn’t really have the money to rent a boat or jet skis, so we couldn’t do the lake stuff (maybe next time!). We did do go karts and mini golf.

But the highlight of the trip was when we went to Bridal Caverns. I wasn’t entirely sure want to expect since I hadn’t been to any of the caves in the Ozarks. I wondered if it would be as polished and built up as Meramec. Meramec, by the way, is significantly bigger than Bridal Cave. Also the infrastructure of the walkways is a lot more built up. Bridal Cave was super cool. Our tour guide Hattie was marvelous, and we chatted a bit before the tour about being tour guides.

There’s just something about the natural world that gets to me. I feel the same way when I go out west, or when I went to New Zealand, or even when I went on an ocean cruise. I just love it. I guess my chosen field makes sense, then.

We actually had to stoop down to get through part of the caves!

When you have 2 teenage boys who are cracking 6 foot, that presents a problem! My 5 foot tall self had no problem. There were also a couple places we had to turn sideways but I didn’t get photos.

That wooden plank is actually an old ladder! You can just barely see the “rungs.” I’m not afraid of heights, but I’d probably break my neck climbing that thing.

It’s remarkable with a little water can create, isn’t it? The teeny tiny stalactites are my favorite. They’re called soda straws since they’re hollow. The saying is “stalactites cling tight” to tell the differences between them and stalagmites. But when I was a kid, they told us stalaCtites, C for ceiling; stalaGmites, G for ground. So I still think of them that way.

Bridal Cave has this really cool underground “lake.” If I recall the tour correctly, it didn’t exist until they created the Lake of the Ozarks when they dammed the Osage River.

If you are ever at the Lake of the Ozarks and need something to do on a rainy day, I highly recommend Bridal Cave. It’s really interesting with some unique features, and has some great stories. The gift shop isn’t quite as big as others I’ve seen, but we did indulge in rock candy and the boys got fun stone necklaces. We’re going to Utah in a couple weeks and we’re for sure going to hit the rock shop when we go, and that entire store deserves it’s own post! I can’t wait.

I’d also like to check out Stark Caverns next time I’m out at the lake. I don’t know when I’ll get out that way with work and my other summer plans, but I always enjoy going to the condo and relaxing for a couple of days. Even if I don’t do anything at all, it’s nice to go someplace different to clear your head.

We left for home soon after our cave tour, but it was fun, and I always love geeking out over interesting landscapes, above or below the ground. Just you wait until we go to Utah! I don’t know if I’ll take my fancy DSLR camera with me since I need to fix some settings, but I’ll definitely take lots of photos of our adventures. Before that, I think I’ll make a cooking post or two.

Til next time!