The weather finally broke the other day. It has been quite summer-like. Now if we can just get Preamble in the water. It should happen soon.

Julie got me a Big Green Egg, which is a ceramic smoker/grill. I am making a table for it, using my new furniture building skills.

Yesterday I took a group of high school sailors to Boothbay to team race. They did well, winning three out of four races. But now high school sailing is over until next fall.

Rachel leaves for New Zealand and Fiji this week. She will be gone a little over a month.

I've been doing a lot of volunteering at the Owls Head Transportation Museum lately. It's fun; they let me work on old airplanes and old cars.

Julie and Otis and I went for a nice long walk along the intertidal zone this morning. Now Julie and I are headed out kayaking. I have to say, life is pretty awesome these days.

It's cold and grey out today, with an east wind, and the dregs of yesterday's rain just won't seem to leave. I should be down at the boatyard, working on Preamble, but I can't seem to summon the will; perhaps an entry here will atone in some small way.

Julie flew out to Phoenix last night to help Rachel move her stuff out of her apartment and into storage for the summer. 91 and abundant sunshine there today. Hopefully they will bring some of that with them when they fly home Thursday night. Rachel will be home for three or four weeks, but then is off to New Zealand, followed by Fiji. School work for her major.

I am currently teaching an adult learn to sail course. Tonight is our last class. So far, we have had great luck and enjoyed nice weather out on the harbor. Hopefully, things will brighten a bit before class starts this afternoon.

The high school sailing team from Rockland Community Sailing had a nice day last weekend, coming in third at a team racing event in Portland harbor. The weather was truly nasty, but the kids toughed it out and did well.

I am looking forward to next year and teaching at my new school. All of the free time is starting to catch up with me. I am realizing how important it is to have someplace to go every day, something to be responsible for.

Okay, to say it's been a while since I've updated here would be quite an understatement. It has been an eventful year or so; let me try to hit on the highlihghts.

I finished up the year at BHS. Thank you to all of my students, both from last year and from previous years, for all of your kind thoughts and best wishes on my departure. I will always think fondly of my time there, and hope to continue the great friendships I made with both students and colleagues.

After school let out for the summer, I sailed Preamble to her new home in Rockport harbor. I was joined for this trip by an old friend and former colleague, Rob Stanford. We had a nice sail and enjoyed getting caught up on each other's families and lives.

In the beginning of July, our family expanded a bit, with the addition of Otis, our Vizsla puppy. He has since grown to be quite the big boy.

We managed to sail quite a bit last summer, with lots of trips to Isleboro, North Haven and Vinalhaven, islands right out in the bay here, as well as a nice week down Mount Desert way. Otis quickly adapted to life aboard Preamble, but soon proved to be a bit busy and restless for our old dinghy. So this past winter, I built a new one.

Rachel headed back out to ASU to start her second year of college. She decided to major in Global Health, rather than nursing. She will be studying abroad this summer in New Zealand and Fiji, and then is on track to receive her BA in December. Those AP's really can pay off! She is thinking about heading over to France for a while, perhaps to work as an au pair, while deciding if she wants to go to graduate school and, if so, to what end.

Julie's practice continues to grow, but she still enjoys a lot less stress and much more free time compared to her old job. She gets to take Otis on lots of long walks, and we hike a lot and kayak and snowshoe and sail, according to season and weather. Just recently, she was asked to be the new chief of surgery at the hospital.

Last summer I also began teaching sailing to adults through Rockland Community Sailing, a great program that is located at The Apprenticeshop, a great local traditional wooden boatbuilding school. I also help with the local high school sailing teams that are housed there.

Since I had no high school to teach at last fall, I enrolled in a 12 week furniture building course at another great local school, the Center for Furniture Craftsmanship located here in Rockport. I learned a great deal from both the excellent instructors, as well as from my talented classmates. I designed and built quite a few pieces. My favorite was this Shaker inspired wall cabinet.

Just this past week, I have been offered and have accepted a one year position at the local high school (Camden Hills Regional) to teach four sections of honors chemistry. So I will be back in the classroom come August. Hence, the website is getting changed up and caught up. I hope to be be better about updates now that I will be using the site for my new classes.

Well, I'm sure I've left out tons, but that's all I'm good for now. Please keep in touch, I'm always interested in what my friends are up to.

I have just now finished calculating mid-term averages for term 3. The school year is 5/8 over. Grades are decent, overall.

Yesterday, the Braintree High School Academic WorldQuest team won its third consecutive state title. The win was the team's strongest showing to date. Next month, they will travel to Washington D.C. to represent Massachusetts in the national competition held at the National Press Club.

A couple weeks ago, the Academic Decathlon team came in second in the state tournament. Next week is the Science Olympiad.

I went to Arizona a few weeks ago to visit Rachel. She is doing very well. We went to a Giants v Diamondbacks spring training game, and an ASU game. This week, she and Julie are together in Florida.

I sold another article to Points East Magazine, on destination racing. It will be in the May issue.

No leads on teaching jobs in Maine for next year. Perhaps I will find a way to put my captains license to work. A change of pace always does have its good points.

Happy New Year. January has flown by. Julie is all settled in to our rental house in Camden, ME. She has started her new job and is liking it. I have been up most weekends, either driving or by the little plane. We have taken up snowshoeing as a way to be active and outdoors. It is a lot of fun, and the places we hike are beautiful.

The schoolyear marches on, still with a wierd flavor as I know it is my last at BHS. Semester 1 is over and grades are in. My classes have done well, working hard and with integrity to meet high quality standards. Science Fair is coming soon, and then February vacation.

My academic teams have a bunch of events this time of year. Academic Decathlon had a meet for the second team yesterday. They were second at the meet (of 13 schools) and every member recieved at least one personal award.

Rachel is back at ASU. I am going out to visit her in a few weeks. We are going to the Giants-Diamondbacks spriong training opener, as well as a Sundevil Game. It will be great to have baseball back.

The end of the year is upon us, at least in a calendar sense. The school year is in mid-stride, just taking on the shape and flavor that will mark its identity in the future. They are all different, of course- this one is looking to be of the easy going variety. It is marked, for me, by being my last at Braintree High School. I am still not sure how I feel about that. I will miss my friends and students. I am, however, very excited about the prospect of change. Chances to reinvent one's life are rare and should be acted upon with care and thought. What to keep, what to discard, what to place on which shelf of memories and experiences.

On the Maine front, we are heading up that way tomorrow to get Julie moved into the house we have rented in Camden. Rachel is home from ASU and will remain in Maine with Julie, helping her to get settled. I will become a weekend traveller, burning up the air-route from Logan to Owls Head. The next six months will either pass quickly or drag on, or more probably, a bit of both.

Rachel goes back to school on the fifteenth of January. This recent dose of winter will make Arizona taste even better, I am sure. I am heading out there to visit in February. I know I am looking forward to being warm.

I am not sure who reads this- friends, students, strangers- but Happy New Year to all. Hopefully 2010 was good to you and 2011 will be more so.

Term one is over. I am pretty much done with the grading. It feels like a good year, all around.

Here is a thing I wrote for the Mass Marine Educators journal about my trip aboard RV Knorr last summer.

Today is Veteran's Day. I am proud to be a veteran, but the day always fits like a stranger's clothing. I plan to keep a low profile, run some errands, and maybe work on my kayak a bit.

I feel that one of the greatest priveleges you can get is to cook for friends; today I am doing just that. I am making a simple beef stew, a wild mushroom rissotto, and roasted beets. We will start out with some smoked bluefish pate, a fava bean puree and a nice soft cheese, served with a fresh baguette. Julie is making her house special dessert- creme brulee. With any luck, the storm will have passed by sunset and we will be treated to a pretty western sky.

We are very busy getting our house ready to sell. Painting, decluttering and starting to sort and pack all of our accumulated stuff. When we moved here, ten years ago, it was from living aboard Preamble and we had nothing save our clothes and a few books, etc. Amazing what a changes a decade brings.

School is going great. I have four classes, each with a distinct personality, each delightful and enjoyable in its own way.

Tomorrow, I am taking six kids over to WGBH to try out for a spot on this year's High School Quiz Show. Hopefully they will qualify.

It's been a while since I have posted here. The school year is one eighth over, as of Wednesday. My classes are all getting into their grooves; my students are starting to get their feet under them.

Big news here on the home front: Julie has accepted a position with PenBay Medical Center in Rockport, Maine. This is right in the heart of our favorite sailing grounds. She starts January first. I will finish the school year at Braintree High, then follow her up. We are very excited to get to become part of the community there. It will be hard to leave here- we both have strong ties to our current situations- but the opportunity is too great to pass up.

Rachel is doing great at A.S.U. She enjoys her classes and is loving sorority life. We were out to visit for parent's weekend two weeks ago. What a great choice she has made. Arizona is a refreshing change for her after fourteen years of small New England independent schools. She is going to be a great nurse and, even more importantly, a great person.

My parents celebrated their fiftieth wedding anniversary yesterday!

Preamble is out of the water and on stands over at A street. Now my weekend efforts will be focused on getting the house ready to sell and getting us ready to move. I think this will be both a long and a quick winter for us.

The new school year is up and running! Once again, my classes consist of the best BHS has to offer. I am enjoying getting to know all of my new students- and I will learn your names, I promise.

I made a paella last night. It was pretty good. Here is how to make it:

Finely dice about a half pound of chorizo and saute it in your biggest heavy pot or pan. (I use my cast iron wok.) Then add diced vidalia onion and diced yellow or red bell pepper. Cover, simmer and let it all cook down so that lots of liquid comes out. Next add six or eight threads of saffron and a few good shakes of paprika. Mix it all up. Now add about three cups of chicken broth and one and a half cups of abrorio or other short grain rice. Bring it all to a boil and then turn down to a simmer until the rice is done.

All up to this point can be done ahead. When you are ready to eat, add a half cup or so more of chicken broth, some uncooked shrimp and maybe some nice scallops or any other shellfish you may like. Also you can add some tiny little green peas and/or some green olives or some capers. Bring it all up to a boil, then turn down and let the steam cook the shellfish how you like it. Stir it all together and serve it up. It is great the next day, too, if you actually have any left over.

Rachel has been at ASU for about a month now. She is doing well and likes her classes. She is pledging a sorority, Kappa Delta, and is having a lot of fun with that. Julie and I are flying out in a couple weeks for parents' weekend.

Next weekend is the yacht club's Spectacle Island trip. Hopefully the weather will cooperate.

I've been working on my kayak a bit more. Below is a link to a picture.

Kayak

Back to school this week. I'm ready.

Last Thursday I went sailing. Then on Friday we went with friends out to Block Island for lunch at Spring House. Saturday and Sunday were all about bikes, as there was absolutely no wind all weekend. And next weekend looks to be a bust as well, thanks to Earl. I guess it is time to get back in the traces.

Just a piece of writing I thought I would share.

Here

I've been back in my classroom this week. Lots to do to get ready for the upcoming year. Lots of traffic on the podcast part of the site- incoming sophomores doing their summer work!

Just a heads up here, any level 1, level 2 or AP incoming chemistry students will need to get a bound, quad-ruled composition book for labs. And a good, three subject notebook works well for class notes and practice problems. Usually one for each semester.

Enjoy the crumbs of summer. Hopefully this gale will let up in the next day or so and some beach weather will return.

Rachel is all moved in and has started classes at ASU. We had a great time in Sedona, kayaking, sightseeing, etc. Then we spent a few days in Pheonix. It seems pretty nice, but very different than New England.

Julie and I spent the last few days in Maine- Camden, Rockport. We hiked and rode our bikes and ate great food at a few very good restaurants. Now it is time to start gearing up for school and fall. This has been a strange summer in a lot of ways, but also a very interesting one.

So I'm all back on land and getting on with summer. Last weekend, Julie and I and our friends JEP and Joanne sailed Preamble to Provincetown for the yacht club lobster/beach party. It was great- weather, food, friends, wind. Paul and Karen, some other sailing friends, came along on Caper. Caper is a beautiful boat.

Now it is time to shift to the next event of this conveyor-belt summer: Thursday we are all flying to Arizona for some family time in Sedona before moving Rachel into her dorm at ASU. The vacation time will be nice. Mountains, deserts, rivers, kayaks and hiking. Who knows, maybe even a horse ride.

I went into my classroom yesterday. The school is kinda spooky this time of year. There were boxes of stuff in my room, addressed to me. Usually, that stuff is addressed to Bengi. Weird. It is going to be a good year, though. I am getting ready to get started again.

My level one class beat the national average on the SAT subject test, and this was with fifty percent of the class taking the test. Great job guys and girls! You were by far the most talented and devoted class I have had yet. Future students, take that as a challenge!

Good luck and best wishes to the class of 2010 as you head off to college. You will always be special to me as the class that paralleled Rachel. Please send an e-mail once in a while and let me know how you are doing. Remember, I will always be your chemistry teacher.

Happy Birthday Julie! Have a great day. Enjoy the game. Go Sox!

This morning finds us "mowing the lawn." This is a reference to the pattern we are making across the water as we survey the bottom, collecting bathymetric data. We are about 100 nm southeast of Marthas Vineyard (39 45.0N 69 08.8W.) We will be returning to Woods Hole around 0800 tomorrow, via Vineyard Sound. We have finished coring and will spend the day securing equipment, cleaning the lab spaces, etc.

This has been a wonderful experience for me. I would like to thank Frank Scofield and Lloyd Keigwin for giving me this opportunity. Also big thanks to the coring crew for being so patient with me, teaching me, allowing me to participate so fully, and otherwise being the wonderful, welcoming people they are. Lastly, thanks to the crew of the Knorr- having been crew on a ship years ago in the Navy, I know what a hard job it is. To do it so well, and also meet and support the demands of a scientific party, is quite an impressive feat. They not only do it well but make it look easy.

Slowly making our way north (38 48.4N 69 13.4W NNE @ 9 kts) along Line W, a series of long established moorings. We will soon be stopping for another multicore.

We are scheduled to arrive in Woods Hole Sunday morning and we are about a day's steam out, so this is the last full work day. Maybe we will squeeze in a core tomorrow morning. All in all, it has been a quite succesful trip. Lloyd has been able to realize most of his goals. Nick has gotten some good, useful mud. The graduate students and post docs seem happy with their experience. The equipment has behaved well for the most part (even the long core only had one set of troubles) and no gear has been broken or lost. No one has been hurt on deck. The weather has been decent- we managed to miss the worst of the gales during the string of lows a week or so ago.

While I am ready to get home and see Julie and Rachel, this has been a great experience for me. I have learned about not only the science but also the engineering involved in doing the science. The people have been amazing, both professionally and personally. They have been very welcoming, willing to patiently teach all that they know. I hope to be able to sail with them again.

This morning finds us taking the first of a series of multicores for Nick McCave, again in the vicinity of current moorings, (38 04.5N 68 39.4W) again for the purpose of calibrating his paleocurrent method. We are smack in the middle of the Gulf Stream. Water temperature is 85 F and this morning, while transiting to this site, we were being set 30 degrees from our course by the current.

One of our team members, Tom Lanagan, has been shooting video throughout the trip and has posted his product HERE. Tom is an engineer at WHOI. His primary job on the cruise is to operate and maintain the acoustic release mechanism for the long core. Of course, like all of us, he also does any other work that comes up in the course of the day. Tom is 24 years old and has a degree in mechanical engineering from University of Vermont. He is a local kid who went to Bishop Stang High School. He started working summers at WHOI while in college. When not at sea, Tom's work entails designing and maintaining a wide variety of undersea instruments and devices from sensors and measuring devices to undersea vehicles, both unmanned and manned. Tom is an avid sailor, surfer and rock climber, and he lives aboard his sailboat.

Yet another gorgeous day out here skirting the Gulf Stream. We are surveying the New England Seamounts, looking for sediment to core. It is sunny, warm and flat calm. Fishing lines are deployed in hopes of a mahi or a wahoo or a tuna (sushi? Mmmm.) We are currently surveying around a sea mount named Bear (39 52.7N 67 15.3W NNW @ 9 kts.)

The New England Seamounts are a series of extinct, underwater volcanoes, formed in a line as the North American plate migrated across a hot spot in the mantle about 100 million years ago. This is a time frame that makes the last ice age, a mere 17 thousand or so years ago, seem like yesterday.

The hotspot, known as the Great Meteor hotspot, is responsible for structures as far northwest as Hudson Bay in Canada, and as far south and east as the Great Meteor Seamount, south of the Azores. The White Mountains are a terrestrial product of the hotspot. The New England Seamounts extend in a line about 600 miles long, south and east of Cape Cod. Some of these peaks reach as high as 4000 meters above the sea floor.

We are interested on this trip not so much in the seamounts themselves (though they have just recently been found to provide a fascinating and unique habitat for a wide variety of deep sea species,) but rather in the hope that their presence in current paths might be such that sediment traps will give us well stratified mud layers with useful climatological data from the last ice age.

It's a beautiful morning out here- the sun is shining, the barometer is climbing, and the northwest wind is starting to back off. We are located a bit south and east of Nova Scotia, steaming (40 10.8N 65 19.2W sw @ 11 kts) towards the New England Sea Mounts. Once there we will survey, looking for mud deposited in the sea mount lees by current (kind of like how snow gets drifted up around structure by the wind.)

To see a track of our trip, check out this link

Knorr Track

Also check out

Official Blog

Coring commenced around one this morning and was wrapped up by shortly after breakfast. We were on a spot about 30 nm south of Sable Island, just southeast of Nova Scotia. We took a gravity core, a multi core and a long core. We were able to do so much in such a short time because the water depth was a mere 965 meters.

We are currently steaming (43 04.3N 61 00.1W WSW @ 10 kts) towards our next station, about 20 nm away, where we will perhaps take multi? gravity?

It is Monday. We have less than a week left at sea. Routines are established to the extent possible, while still using time efficiently. We all fill whatever roles are needed- the flexibility among the group is pretty impressive. I have to say this is one of the finer groups I have ever been involved with, what with their good attitudes and sheer competence.

We completed coring operations at about 0300 this morning and are now underway (43 26.7N 55 42.2 W W @ 12 kts) and headed for Sable Island off the coast of Nova Scotia, around 200 nm away. There we will do a bit of surveying and then some sampling.

I spent a bit of time yesterday with Lloyd learning about the Laurentian Fan, the structure we were sampling yesterday. It is a glacial deposit on the continental shelf, one of two major places where debris from Canada was deposited during the last ice age. There are a couple deep canyons through this delta-shaped feature that carry the water from the present day St. Lawrence system. Most of the heavier run-off tracks out through these canyons or channels, but the lighter stuff gets deposited up on the fan. This happens at a significant rate, giving us a nice pile of mud to deal with. Lloyd had quite a few gravity cores from this area, taken about 12 years ago, but because of the high deposition rate he didn't have the chronological depth needed to learn about the last ice age and the interesting climate events that took place then. (Google younger Dryas to learn just how fast climate can completely change.) The long core we took yesterday should be very useful in his ongoing work.

Last night was gorgeous- a full moon, calm seas, cool but not too cold. Today we are steaming into another low pressure system, though not as severe as the one a few days ago. Hopefully we will poke through to nice weather on the other side.

Yesterday we ended up taking not only another gravity along the Tail, but also a long core and a multi. There was a slight lull between the two low pressure systems and we took full advantage. This morning we are underway (43 03.3N 52 43.9W WNW @ 13.5 kts) about 100 nm from our next station at the Laurentian Fan. Coring there will be dependent on both survey results and weather. Hopefully we will be able to get a complete suite of cores again today.

Our run of beautiful weather is over. Two gales are out here with us. One has passed 600 miles to the north and is a bit east of our current position (42 40.0N 50 25.0 W, NE @ 6kts) while the other is about 100 miles north and is a bit west of us. We should experience 25-35 kt winds and seas to 14 ft in the next 24 hours, if the forecast is to be believed. We will not be long coring or multi coring in these conditions, but if good mud and tolerable weather coincide we will probably take a gravity.

And since Steve just sent for Lloyd, I would guess that some promising mud has shown up on the 3.5 kHz sonar. Even though I am not in the current watch, since I am up I will help with the deployment should it happen. I will update later today.

**** Update- we did take a gravity and are now steaming west. We may take another this morning, while we are still skirting the edge of the Tail. Then we will be on our way to the Laurentian Fan, about a day's steam to the west.

We are multicoring today, three sites up a slope feature. The data we are gathering is for Nick McCave, a scientist from Cambridge University in England. Nick is interested in determining the vigor of deep western boundary currents. Deep western boundary currents are the paths by which dense (salty AND cold) water in the polar regions sinks and travels back toward the equatorial regions, where it then rises and is heated and feeds currents like the Gulf Stream.

These currents can be measured directly by mooring current meters at appropriate depths. What Nick is interested in doing is to use the paleo record to determine the strength of these currents in the past, as well as whether they were northern sourced deep waters or southern sourced deep waters. Here in the North Atlantic, the vast majority of the deep water is currently (and usually) northern sourced, but during cold periods (ice ages) the flow of northern sourced deep water is reduced, and southern sourced water moves in to fill the void.

The way Nick will determine this deep water boundary current history is by sorting the silt by particle size at different, dated, levels in the mud. Smaller particles are more likely to be swept away, larger particles more likely to be deposited. As current strength increases, the size of what constitutes large vs. small increases. Therefore, the larger the mean particle size in a layer of mud, the stronger the current was at that time. Radio carbon (14) analysis and the measurement of the ratio of the stable isotopes of oxygen, 18 and 16, allow for dating the strata, as well as determining both temperature and salinity (which are the major factors determining density.) This information can be used to determine, among other things, the source (northern or southern) of the current.

The samples we are taking today are to be used in calibrating the method. We are sampling in an area where the current has been measured directly for some time. Nick is interested in using his method on the very top layer of mud, and then comparing his results with the existing record of direct measurement.

We are also preparing for a few days of weather. There are some sequential low pressure areas heading our way. We are expecting winds approaching gale force and seas approaching 12 ft. Up until now, we have experienced very calm seas and only light to moderate breezes. Hopefully the coming weather will not be too severe and will not interfere with the science work we are here to do.

We are coring at 40 18.0N 48 28.0W. The gravity came back full, the multi is out, and we will long core here, our first in quite a few days. We are still in shifts, but the long core requires a combined crew effort to launch, recover and extrude the sample.

I am doing some homework, reading a book called 'To Follow the Water' by Dallas Murphy. The author spent time riding vessels similar to the Knorr, doing similar work, and explains the ties between physical oceanography and climate, especially those involving ocean currents. This is very timely, as we sit working in the Gulf Stream. Water temperatures on our present site are down a bit, perhaps meaning we are on the northern edge of the stream.

Because water has a much higher specific heat than air, the movement of heat by ocean currents is far greater than that moved by air masses. While there are fluctuations in both water and air movements and properties, those in water are considerably dampened. Both the movement of air masses and the movement of water mases are driven by the spin of the earth, modified by the Coriolis effect. Air masses are more important in the formation of weather, but ocean currents are the backbone of climate.

Polar easterlies, mid latitude westerlies and the trades (duplicated in both north and south hemispheres) are typical wind patterns, very important to weather. In New England, for example, our weather systems typically move in from the west, while in the tropics, storm systems (like tropical storms and hurricaines) come from the east.

Likewise, the pattern of ocean currents in the North Atlantic move in a circular fashion with the North Atlantic Current carrying warm water east in the temperate latitudes, from North America to Europe (making England, France and Iberia warm, even though they are quite north) and the Canary, North Equitorial and Carribean Currents carry water west in the tropics. The loop is completed by the Gulf Stream, which is a very concentrated flow of water northward and then to the east. In a longer term way, these currents help determine the climates of Northwestern Europe, Northwest Africa, and to some degree the Eastern U.S. and Canada.

These patterns, both wind and current, are repeated in each of the Earth's five major ocean basins: North Atlantic, South Atlantic, North Pacific, South Pacific and Indian.

Another day, more coring. We are working in shifts and taking gravity and multi cores around the clock, all in the area of the Tail of the Banks, all in 3500 to 4000 meters.

Right now we are steaming toward our next station, 25.2 nm away. Our current position is 40 29.8N 47 19.7W, our course is 327, speed 10.25 kts.

Use the link below to keep up with the official blog.

Official Blog

We are steaming north towards a feature called 'Tail of the Banks' which is a ridge that runs down from the Grand Banks towards the deeper ocean, transecting the Gulf Stream. The long core winch is still ooc, but we will make up for it by sampling more sites with the gravity and the multi.

Yesterday we were seeing lots of flying fish and, sadly, trash. Today we hope to see more large marine life, as we are nearing the stream. Our plan is to sample along the ridge, across the stream. I will post more when we arrive on station.

****Update- We arrived on station at 1400 and took a gravity core (40 10.7N 46 35.4W) in 4015 meters. Also the long core winch control problem was found to be a faulty ground wire. It was repaired and tested and the long core is back in business. We are now (1730) steaming to our next station where we will take a gravity core. We should be on station by 1930.

Still on same station (36 24.3N 48 31.5W) with a problematic long core winch. We are currently taking a second gravity core, 1 meter longer than yesterday's, while troubleshooting the control problems.

Last night we took a CTD at a depth of 5400 meters. CTD stands for conductivity, temperature and depth. We also had an array of 24 sample bottles aboard, which could be triggered shut at various depths to collect water samples for dating (via carbon 14) and other things. "Older" water (less carbon 14) is typical of cold water extending up into the North Atlantic from Antarctica. "Newer" water is indicative of water that has recently been in contact with the atmosphere. This data can help us understand deep water currents and the long-term global movement of water (and energy,) among other things.

Hopefully, we will get the big winch running and get a long core at this site before moving on to our next station.

Arriving on station around 1100 (36 24.3N 48 31.5W.) We will survey around a bit, looking for some mud Steve had found about 10 years ago. Then we will do a gravity. If it comes back looking promising, we will follow it with a multi and a long. Yesterday's gravity was so good that we did both a multi and a long. At this depth a sample can take four to five hours to complete. We were working til past midnight last night, and will probably do so again tonight.

****Update- the gravity core came up very full of good mud. We set up and launched the long core, but are having control problems with the winch. Hopefully, a replaced encoder has fixed the problem and we will continue. Unfortunately, the delay means we will be working on deck until tomorrow morning. If we are lucky, the sky will be clear and we will see a lot of stars. The long core will take about five hours to complete, and the multi core will take about five more.

Yesterday, I was working out in the 'man basket' which is a basket on a crane arm that places you out in the air, beside and behind the ship. While I was out there, a squall hit, followed by the most complete and perfect rainbow I have ever seen. It went horizon to horizon, unbroken. It was very affirming.

We found a small patch of mud on the way to our next station, so we have stopped to take a gravity and maybe a multi (36 39.10N 46 11.12W.)

I spent a bit of time this morning talking with Lloyd, our PI, about his work (long run) and his goals for this trip (short run) and how they coincide. Paleoclimatology is a way of using the physical climate record to better understand how climate change occurs. The core samples we are collecting contain chronological markers such as carbon 14 for radiocarbon dating (generally in the form of organic remains,) things like ash layers from known volcanic events, and, I'm sure, other things. These samples can also be analyzed to find the climate conditions (ice ages, more temperate conditions) at the time of deposition. (This is a bit more complex; I'll need to process these ideas more before explaining here.) Cleanly startified mud layers give a clear picture of these things, higher deposition rates give the information in greater and better detail. Samples from a wide range of locations on the earth will ensure we are talking about global climate events, and not just localized phenomena.

The past few days, while we have been transiting, I read a book called 'Tree of Smoke' by Denis Johnson. It's about CIA ops in Vietnam, but it skids all over the place, in a biblical or oracular voice. Kind of a combination of Pynchon meets Conrad. The characters are reminiscent of Bodine, Slothrop etc. The parallels to Heart of Darkness/Apocolypse Now are heavy handed enough that they must be intentional. Yet there are definietly an additional factors, perhaps because of the family ties among characters (the Houstons and the Sands) reminiscent of those of Neal Stephenson, but also due to the tangental positioning of the story, the way it dances on the margins (of everything?) Anyway, much like with the ideas of paleoclimatology, I am still processing it.

We trawled for plankton last night, and then looked at our haul through the stereo microscopes in the lab. We also turned back the clocks an hour, as we are transiting westward. We have left Azorian time (GMT -1 (+ 1 for DST)) and are now in the same time zone as Recife, Brazil (GMT -2(+1 for DST)) though we are now about two and a half degrees into the GMT-3 zone, geographically. (37 0.05N 41 05.56W) We are scheduled to arrive at our next station for sampling at about noon tomorrow.

Another early morning gravity (37 21.64N 35 26.0W) in 3000 meters. There is talk of just a gravity and a multi at this site, then 2 days steaming to the next sample site in the northeast Sargasso.

Deciding where to core is the big task faced by Lloyd Keigwin, our principal investigator (head scientist.) He confers with Steve Swift (see yesterday's post) and Nick McCave of the University of Cambridge in the UK, an experienced colleague who is also aboard ship. They consider not just the stratification of the mud, but also seafloor topography, currents, and other factors that may contribute to significant and consistent sediment deposition. These things lead to a core sample with a good chronology. If the sample is jumbled or mixed by undersea avalanches, the timeline is disturbed. Such deposits are termed turbidites. Other disturbances to the chronology of the mud are also undesirable.

One of Lloyd's goals for this trip is to find good sampling sites in areas which have not been sampled extensively (or at all) to date.

The gravity just came back up and was not very successful (only a small penetration.) We will take a multi (I will explain the various types of cores and how they complement each other over the next few days) but then move on. Right now Lloyd and Nick are discussing options.

This morning I spent some time with Steve Swift, the guy who does the bathymetry at night. He explained the two sonars the ship uses for studying the seafloor. One operates at 3.5 kHz and is very good at penetrating the seafloor, giving not just topography but also an idea of the various layers of mud. The other operates at 12kHz, which does not penetrate as well, but because of the higher frequency of the pings, it gives perhaps a better model of the seafloor topography, especially in a situation with steep variations.

Today we are coring at a site on the western flank of the mid Atlantic ridge. (37 11.99 N 34 15.90 W)

We deployed the gravity at 0700 and the multi at 0900. We will do the long core upon recovery of the multi. The depth here is close to 3000 meters, so the wire time for each sample is about half again as large.

****Update- It's about one and the long core is going down. The gravity and the multi came back with good mud. I've spent the morning working on long coring component maintenance. The wind is up a bit, building a small chop, but the sun has come out and it is another beautiful day here in the mid Atlantic.

Another day of coring, similar to yesterday. We started with a gravity at 0700, followed by a long core and a multi. The gravity and the long were both not as deep into the bottom as yesterday's, but the multi was much deeper. We were working at a site a bit south of yesterday's and the seafloor seemed a bit tougher to penetrate. The depth was about 2180 meters. (37 05.46N 31 56.06W)

We just set up for a possible evening gravity core and are also planning a plankton trawl for 2200 tonight.

The scientist who played a major role in the development of the long core, Jim Broda, spent quite a bit of time with me today showing me about the system, its construction, and how it functions. He told me he has been making trips aboard Knorr since 1974.

Time for chow, then more work. Staying busy with work is the norm at sea. There are always plenty of chores and repairs to be done.

We began to collect core samples this morning at 37 51 N 30 17.6 W. First we collected a giant gravity core (see the link in yesterday's post) then a long core, followed by a multicore. The first two appear to have been quite successful, but the multi came back with only shallow samples so we are repeating it. Meanwhile we rerigged the gravity core and the long core for tomorrow. We will also do another multi tomorrow.

Overnight, the ship engages in surveying the seafloor, collecting bathymetric data both for immediate and for future use.

The people on board belong to either the ship's crew or the scientific party, but all work very well together to complete the voyage goals. I have been able to work with quite a bit of the equipment so far. It is quite impressive how many of the science people are such excellent applied engineers, able to think out solutions to problems and then implement them right on the spot.

We departed Ponta Delgada on time at 0800 this morning and steamed 3 hours, now we are deploying the core release mechanism (called the dogdish because of its shape) for testing. The mechanism has an active sonar that works in sync with the ship's sonar to track the depth postition of the equipment. It also triggers the release when it receives a coded sonar signal.

Now, at 1600, we are underway towards the first coring site. We should be sampling tomorrow morning. I spent the afternoon helping to load the core liner, piston, etc. for the long core. We will also be taking gravity cores and multi-cores from each sampling site. Click on the link below to read about various sampling techniques and equipment.

WHOI Sensors and Samplers

Also, see the link from 3 July to learn about the long coring process. And the following is a link to the official blog

Official Blog

Arrived in Ponta Delgada, Azores on Sao Miguel Wednesday morning. I have spent the past couple of days exploring the island and meeting members of the coring crew as they have arrived. Yesterday we drove down into a volcano crater on the northwest end of the island. The landscape here is quite impressive. Today we visited a tea plantation and explored the east side of the island, including some fumeroles- these are places where hot magma heats ground water causing it to boil up and escape through cracks in the ground. All sorts of gasses come up as well, most noticeably ones containing sulfur.

It seems as though I will be able to keep up with these entries while at sea, and also include links to another blog about the trip.

We sail tomorrow at 0800 and have about 18 hours of steaming until we reach the first core sampling site.

The Fourth was awesome. We watched the constitution turn around and fire a salute at Castle Island, then headed up into the Charles for the Esplanade concert and fireworks.

Now I am finishing up with my packing. There will be no chance to run out to a store if I forget something.

I hope everyone has a great July. I will be back in Woods Hole on or about August 1st.

We are taking Preamble in to Boston for the weekend, tying up at our friend Paul's Marina, Waterboat on Long Wharf. JEP and Joanne are coming up from Newport in their power boat, Escape Artist, and we will lock into the Charles for the Esplanade concert (Toby Keith!) and fireworks.

Click on the link below to learn about R/V Knorr and the long coring process I will be doing this month on the Mid-Atlantic Ridge.

WHOI Long Coring

Happy Fourth of July!

Back from sailing yesterday. It was a great trip: lots of wind, lots of sun. Rachel and I left Hull on Saturday the 19th and sailed to Provincetown (because Rachel had a hankering for dinner at Bubbala's.) The next morning we tacked our way across Cape Cod Bay through some nasty squalls, transited the canal and anchored in Onset Harbor for the night. From there we dropped down Buzzard's Bay to Hadley's, then over to Oak Bluffs for the next couple of days. On Thursday we beat through yet more squalls to get to Little Compton, where Rachel met up with her friend Maddie for some girl time. The next day we sailed in a beautiful, cool, gentle north wind over to Newport, where Julie met us for the weekend and a nice dinner with some friends. On Sunday, Julie and Rachel headed back to Hull by car and I took a few days bringing Preamble home, enjoying some me time.

Now it is time to get ready for the Azores and my cruise aboard R/V Knorr as part of the scientific party. Hopefully, I will have access to some bandwidth and will be able to post here fairly regularly. If not, I will post it all when I return.

I have heard from a few of my students, reporting in their SAT subject test scores. So far they have been pretty good. If any of you read this and haven't sent them, please do.

I just downloaded an old Elvis Costello and the Attractions Live album. I can start buying more music now, since I am getting a new phone with 32 GB! Julie already got hers (on the day they came out) and she loves it.

Rachel made her schedule for next year. She will be starting classes in about six weeks.

Oh, and the Dinhs have a new baby, Chloe Esme. Welcome to the world, Chloe.

Wow, it has been quite a while since I have updated here. The school year is practically over, Today is B.H.S. graduation, and tomorrow is Prize Day at Groton (that is what graduation is called at Rachel's school.)

Rachel is graduating!!!! She will be attending Arizona State University next year, where she will be entering the nursing program. Julie and I are proud and pleased with her decision.

Also, congratulations to all of my B.H.S. Seniors. Good luck in all of your future endeavors and send an e-mail once in a while to let me know how things are going.

It has been a very busy spring. I was travelling a lot- Vegas, Florida, Washington D.C. Preamble is in the water. I did some trout fishing. I didn't manage to finish the kayak- hopefully next winter.

One cool thing- I will be flying to the Azores next month and joining the R/V Knorr (Knorr is a research vessel from Woods Hole Oceanographic Institute. She is actually the vessel that found the wreck of the Titanic.) I will be crossing the Atlantic as a member of the scientific party. We will be taking core samples from the ocean floor, along the mid-atlantic ridge, to collect long term climate change data. We will also conduct a few other studies. I will post info, links, etc.

About two weeks left in the school year, then Rachel and I will go sailing for a week or ten days. We will be heading for the Vineyard, Newport, Block Island, Cuttyhunk, etc. We sail together most summers. It is always some nice time together. With her heading off to college and adult life, maybe it will be the last time. I hope not, but...

Congratulations to Braintree High School's Academic Decathlon Team for finishing second in the state tournament yesterday.

Loving this weather!

Julie and Rachel are off to Arizona this week, and then to Barcelona next week.

Check out the Pi Day Challenge

Congratulations to Braintree High School's Science Bowl teams. Both the A and B teams competed yesterday at U-Mass Lowell. The A team went 4 and 2 in regular competition, qualifying for the tournament rounds, where they fell to a smart and fast Phillip's Exeter team. The B team, comprised of underclassmen, went 2 and 4 and gained some great experience for next year.

Sailing was great. I keep wondering why I don't live in the Carribean.

Check out the Pi Day Challenge

Congratulations to Braintree High School's Academic Decathlon Team for finishing first at Saturday's Landry Invitational. The team consisted of the up and coming talent, mostly sophomores, and they were the class of the event. This bodes well for our competitiveness for the next few years.

Only a week until vacation. I will be sailing in the British Virgin Islands with Julie and friends Pam and Steve.

Congratulations to Braintree High School's Academic WorldQuest Team for finishing first at World Boston's third annual AWQ competition on Saturday at the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston. The team will travel to Washington D.C. in April to compete in the Nationals.

Mid year exams this week! And the days are getting noticeably longer. Hopefully I will have my new kayak completed in time for trout fishing this spring.

Today Bengi and I had the chance to teach some of our colleagues about Websites and podcasts. The powerpoint for the website presentation is HERE

Long Weekend! And no plans! Finally, a chance to relax and do all of the little things. I think I will get a bit of work done on the kayak, get the snorkeling gear ready for our upcoming sailing trip, and maybe read a book. I probably should get caught up on my correcting, too.

Mid-year exams in just over a week. I think my kids are in good shape.

Lots of hunters on the bay this morning, or just a few who are lousy shots. It's a beautiful day out there, unless you are a duck.

Happy New Year, to all of you who mark time with Gregory XIII. I prefer school years, and not just because I teach, though I do like my years to be marked by change and growth. I like the way that school years start and end on different dates in different places, according to local needs. I also like the fact that summers seem to be a time unto themselves, marginal times.

Florida was great! We rode and paddled and ate good food with my parents. Now it is time to get back to work. Six weeks to finish the semester, take mid-year exams, and have a science fair. Then it's sailing in the British Virgin Islands with Pam and Steve.

It's been a while since I wrote anything here. Lots going on, though. The school year rolls on. Christmas break is here. Mid-years are coming soon, then science fair.

Julie got into a car accident yesterday. She was hit head on by a car that randomly decided to cross into her lane. Luckily, nobody was hurt. Her BMW was totalled, but it crumpled in front and the airbags deployed just as designed. She went out and bought another one and had it by four in the afternoon, when she then returned to the hospital and removed an appendix.

Rachel got in to nursing school at Northeastern. She will hear from Penn in the spring. I think she will go to one of these.

We are headed for Florida tomorrow, to see my parents at their new house in Hobe Sound. It should be warm there! Kayaking! Fishing! Biking!

I am re-reading "The Tin Drum" by Gunther Grass. It is pretty epic. I read it before when I was a senior in high school.

Congratulations to Braintree High's Women of Science. The two teams of three young women competed against twenty some odd other teams last weekend at Bedford High School and came in sixth and second.

Middle of term two this Friday. 3/8's of the school year done! It's hard to believe.

Rachel adressed her school last Friday morning. She did a great job.

Congratulations Braintree High School Acadeca Team for placing second in the Eastern Mass Regionals Large Schools Division Yesterday. Team members also were awarded ten medals for individual performances.

Thanksgiving is coming up soon. The first since my parents sold the family house on the Cape.

Congratulations Groton for winning St. Marks Day.

Nice job to BHS Volleyball. The girls had a great season and were just barely beat in tournament play after taking Marshfield to match point.

Acadeca Regionals on Saturday. Hopefully all will go well and we will qualify for states. All of the kids have worked hard, and the older kids have provided us with amazing leadership.

Grades are in for term one. They were higher than normal, across the board. I hope I'm not getting to be too easy. I suspect that I just have some very strong classes this year.

I'm braising short ribs today, to be served with Julie's most excellent mashed potatoes, brussel sprouts, and roasted red and golden beets.

I am also reading John Irving's newest. I have been a fan since discovering Garp during my junior year of high school. This book, 'Last Night in Twisted River' seems to be a career retrospective of sorts for Irving, revisiting all of the themes and inventing a cover or somewhat autobiographical life story, kind of a la Paul Theroux. I'm not sure how I like it. I wonder if he is pleased with it. .

Term one is over. My classes are all still doing well. This is turning out to be such a great schoolyear. Hopefully I'll get my grades done soon and be ready for term two.

Friday we went and saw Pippin at Groton. Rachel was a production person. Saturday we got a bunch of of the chores done. Preamble's systems are all winterized. The Porsche is put away. And Sunday we went for a nice long hike with some friends in Wampatuck.

I can't believe it is November already. Acadeca Regionals in three weeks. Term 1 ends Friday. The school year is well underway. The newness has worn off and everyone is getting down to work. It feels good.

I sold another magazine article last week! Points East again, coming out in the mid-winter issue.

Another week has flown by. Another rainy Saturday has arrived. A good day for kayak building. A nice easy weekend.

Rachel is off to visit Penn tomorrow.

What a great week! Lots of labs with my classes. We are one eighth of the way through the school year now. Very hard to believe. I am still amazed at how great my kids are this year.

Rachel is home for fall long weekend. She has college essays to write; I have college Recs to write. Julie is on call. There is a little north east thing going on outside. Time for a fire in the fireplace and a focus on getting things done.

Tonight is a friend's birthday party at Tosca. Go BDG!

Annapolis was great. We met a lot of very nice and interesting people, both at the show and at the Cruising World debrief session.

I am still a bit stunned at the Sox going out like they did. And a bit bummed because we have four tickets to a now not happening game four at Fenway tonight.

Still, it is a beautiful day. The air is so dry today that I can see out my kitchen window all the way to Thacher Island off Cape Ann, twenty some-odd miles away. I need to go pull my dinghy off of the dock and put it away for the winter. Then it is time to start focusing on getting my shop back in working order and finishing the kayak I started building last winter.

Rachel is 18 now. We had a nice weekend: out at Groton Saturday for football in the rain, then on to Fenway with some of her friends for a nice Sox win.

Preamble's sails are off and her systems are ready for winter. She will be hauled out Wednesday.

Saturday, Julie and I are off to Annapolis for the boatshow.

School is good. Each of my classes is finding its pace, and the kids seem to be getting comfortable with how we do things. I think it is going to be a great year.

Happy Birthday Rachel!

Click on the link below to read my feature article in the October issue of Points East Magazine.

Points East Magazine

I'm bringing Preamble off of her mooring and over to Nantasket Pier today to be hauled for the winter. It's way too early, but we are so busy that we probably won't get out sailing again this season. Still, always a sad day.

Tonight Julie and I are hosting dinner for all of the surgeons and spouses in the new, combined practice at the hospital. I started cooking last night and will be busy with it all day. Here is the menu:

Starters: Smoked Bluefish Pate and Lumpfish Roe with Rice Crackers; Crab-dip on Baguette Rounds; Waffle-cut Handmade Russet Potato Chips filled with Lobster Salad; Salmon and Cilantro Pesto filled Rice Paper Wrappers

Dinner: Cold Green Bean and Grape Tomato Salad with Lemon Juice and Olive Oil; Grilled Vidalia Onions, Yellow Peppers and Portobello Mushrooms; Mixed Grill of Kebobs- Marinated Lamb, Chicken and Swordfish; Steamed Basmati Rice

Usually Julie does dessert, but we found out that it is one of the physician's birthday so a big Cake from White's with Vanilla Ice Cream and Fresh Raspberries

Matched Beverages with each course, and we have arranged for the sun to set over the harbor and into the Blue Hills at about 6:30 PM

Went sailing this weekend, over to the new docks on Spectacle Island. There were six other boats from HYC. We built a fire on the beach and ate s'mores

Back to school now. Starting to get the routines going.

Julie and I have been invited by Cruising World Magazine, a national sailing magazine, to go down to the U.S. Sailboat Show in Annapolis, MD and be judges in their 2010 Boat of the Year contest.

First Acadeca meeting today, then back to school night.