See him run

Can you even see in this one photo how he does not run
close to the ground but he is up and skipping more than
anything?

It sure made me smile.

The fennek

Yesterday when it was time to go for my walk I decided to go in a totally different direction. I went somewhere where the lay of the land is slightly different and views are maybe less dramatic but more open. It was probably one of the best walks so far.
Also helping was the fact that the guard -I knowI haven't said anything about the walks and the guards...soon- anyway, the guard was the first guard who did not mind going for a walk in the desert. He was a bit too familliar and taking this more as a walk together than what I would have liked, but I'll work on this.
Anyway it was the best walk mostly because of the little guy in the photo, a fennek. Very cute little guy, shy but not overly so. If anything I thought that really he should be more careful. He stayed quite close maybe because with the open land he really didn't have anywhere to go. Also it was hot and he probably needed to stay cool in his burrow. I always made sure that the path between him and his burrow was open and clear. When he ran, he looked like somebody running on a hot plate...which could very well be the case, the sand is too hot to walk bare feet these days.
It was a pleasure to see him. He was right in the area where I found the best arrowhead so far and some beautifully decorated pot fragment which is why I was there in the first place.

I feel very lucky. There just isn't that many creatures in the desert but there he was!

I know that I didn't kill it

Here is something weird.
I was in bed trying to fall asleep...and not being successful at it at all..when I felt something near my pillow. I was sort of long and somewhere between papery and plasticy? multilayered and a couple of inches long. It could not have been a scorpion but I was sort of squeezing it when it occured to me that in this part of the world you don't go and squeeze things like this if you don't know what they are, especially when you door opens on the outdoors and there is a light right outside your door that attracts all kind of insects.
Well, I know it wasn't a scorpion...probably an big locust...don't know. When I turned the light on there was nothing at all anywhere to be seen, so at least I know that I didn't kill it.

Yesterday on one of the other rigs (there are three within a 40km radius) a guy was bitten by a scorpion who was in his coveralls when he put them on...Four injections and a few hours rest later he was OK.
Apparently summer is scorpion season. I still haven't seen any.

Sand trafficking

If it is illegal to take Sahara sand out of Algeria, I am in deep trouble. Ah ah ah ah!

Yesterday hiking around (and this is when I found this new arrowhead, these pottery fragments and those ostrich egg shells) I was caught in a small sand storm and now my hair is so full of sand that I am cannot imagine that any number of shower with hair washing etc is ever going to get it all out. It is going to take a swim or serious amount of time under water.

What went into my ears is lost in there! Next I'll have sand on the brain.

Stubborn

I am adding a new expression to my repertoire…just what a need, one more thing people won’t understand!...I am going to use: “stubborn as an African fly”.

You know how you watch those documentaries and you see house flies at the corner of people eyes and mouth and you wonder how they can stand it. Well, the flies are just a nightmare, once they find you they never let go. I mean NEVER. You have to kill them. And they are amazingly fast. They are hell to swat and they never quit. You can either loose your mind or just enjoy the moments when they are on you but not on your skin or when they stop walking so you can't feel them.

On the other hand, they are camera shy…In the sense that they don’t want their photo taken, not in the sense that they won’t walk all over the camera while you are trying to take their photos.

the Scarabs

Honestly I am calling them Scarabs because it sounds more exotic, more desert-like but they look like big black beettles!
They too are night creatures, considering how hot it is in day time it is hardly surprising.
All night long they seem to run around, up and down dunes and in the morning the dunes are covered with their tracks. Then in the morning they try desesperately to bury themselves. Those that came to the lights on location find themselves in sand too thin to find a spot and typically end up stomped on anyway. When I see them in the desert in day time, they run towards me. I think that associate creatures with both shadow and potential moisture, I don't know.

Sun Spiders

The locals call those either camel spiders, sun spiders or wind scorpions. I saw one of those in Kaz so they are quite widly spread.
The thing about those spiders is that , first they run incredibly fast, second they are incredibly aggresive and third they have a set of jaw that allows them to eat things like locuses etc...I saw them.
I had one in a jar but she was full of eggs and I released her FAR from the rig, but still in the last couple of days I saw several tiny little babies both in my office (when I was falling asleep on the floor), and in my room in the shower.
All academic information about them says they are not poisonous, all locals in Kaz, Yemen and here in Algeria say that they will make you very sick for one day...I thought I would not try.
I should say that around here they have the reputation of mostly coming out at night during the wind season, and as far as I can tell it is true. In the evenings of windy days we would see a dozen or so adults every night, now they are rarer.

The Locusts

I just have not be saying much about the insects I see in the Sahara.
We have a few locusts around, usually not many but some are big enough and some of the birds around are small enough that from far sometimes it looks like small birds are flying around the lights.
Last night was a locust night.
Now, don't go imagining a flood of locust of biblical proportions, this is not a movie we are shooting here. Still there was quite a few. Mostly the annoying part is that they do not seem to be able to control where they fly and keep in bumping into people.
Their wings make a loud "flap flap" sound and under microscope, take my word for it, they look weird...mostly their eyes seem like a combination of a compound eye and an eye with an iris that moves around as they look in different directions.

I only blame myself

Last night was a busy night all while being slow...picking casing point...It is a little bit like being force to watch paint dry to prevent an emergency. I did manage to sleep two hours...on the floor of the office so I could face the screen displaying all the information. I slept on the pile of yellow "curtains" you see in the picture. Good job I am not smirkmish of spiders. It seems that it is the season for Sun Spiders to hatch.
At lunch today, still watching paint dry, I had a delicious lunch brought to me by the company man and I eat it with a ruler as a spoon...I have been meaning to get spoons from camp!
........I live like a dog and really I only have myself to blame for it.

I am not a viking

OK, I am not saying a thing about temperature for a while because today is in the 50C.

Yesterday I went with another geologist for a hike and she actually had me worried. She suffered quite a bit from the heat. I ended up pouring water on her head. I was totally fine. At one point I could just feel a sort of a cool breeze, but I don't think she did.
It is a question of body type. She is a northern viking type. Me? what ever I am, it is not a viking!!!

hotter than I thought

Let me change my statement about temperatures...I asked somebody who actually has a thermometer!
Low 40s is normal, high 40s is high!
I was close the first time!
Did I mentioned that I was getting tanned?

Sahara arrowheads

I finally found some arrowheads in the desert today, and some pottery fragments. The arrow heads I found are broken, but now I know what I am looking for.
I was quite happy about it.

The guy who was with me found one unbroken arrowhead, but I found the first one.

you give some and you take some

I should really say some more about the "stand off" so you don't go on thinking that there is a problem.
The Algerian chief of the guards came to see me afterwards and apologized. He said that he didn't know why this man did what he did and assured me that it was against procedure. He also agreed with me that there is no creature more dangerous in the desert than humans.
He asked if I wanted that guy fired and I said "no".
I have now an unspoken agreement with the guards. Every night (or most nights I should say) I go for a short walk on the dune right above the rig. I let them know that I am going so they don't shoot me on the way back in and they just let me go....Now, this is not "procedure" either.

W7

My new signature is W7.
It stands for " wretched weird wandering wicked witch of the western world" or something like that...the jury, ie. ME, is still out on what to choose out of the proposed W words by all asked.

I was W5 for a while but I wanted a "7"!

How can you guess that work is slow...the slow before the crazily stressful fast part with critical casing points and near impossible core points...I'm looking forward to it.

it is getting warm

I'm doing Ok.
The weather is slowly getting warmer and warmer, but so far it is bearable. I tell you though it is dry. The inside of my nostrils are in complete disbelief. SO far high thirties (celsius) is normal. Low fourties is high....I am told that in a month low fourties will be nice and cool. I've seen +52C in Kaz.
I found out that the same way the wind makes cold that much colder, it makes the heat that much hotter. But I am still able to go for walks in the afternoon...My hands and upper arms (the only part of my body always out) are starting to look brown / baked.

the stand off

This is a blog from May 3rd.

Here is the situation: I am walking far away from the rig in the desert (looking for ostrich egg shell fragments) when one of the security guard decided to leave his tower and started walking towards me. Eventually he stood between me and the rig (my home) "pumped" his rifle giving me the impression that he was now ready to shoot if needs be. We have no common language and I have my hand wide open palm out as a barrier betwen me and him as a gesture that he should stay away from me. We start "The Stand Off". Me standing one hand up between us my head down feeling like a stubborn creature. Him???? standing there staying between me and the only path I would concider.
After a long while he moved a little out of my way and slowly I moved, slow like a stubborn beast and I passed him growling.. feeling like a crazy angry beast I walked head straight up back to the rig.
We have no idea why he did it.
Security had been harrasing me about the danger of scorpions, snakes and touaregs in the desert.
After this I explained to them that nothing is more dangerous to a woman than a man in uniform.....that I would rather face a tribe of touaregs or a swarm of snakes than ONE man in uniform....Let's be honest I wasn't nice about it. I offered war if they wanted it...but apparently no, they would rather not.
They said he did it on his own and that they did not send him after me.
If this is supposed to make me feel better it is not working. Now I know that the head security guy does not control the local guards!!