kareina

This morning was the hottest day since we arrived in Cyrpus. It was also the first day we were not in the mountains. I can't really recommend this combination. Our first stop of the day was a "mapping exercise". In this case "mapping" meant measuring a road cut (both sides of the road), drawing the profile of the hill, and then drawing the features of the road cut onto the profile. The students seemed to do reasonablly well with the assignment, but we were all relived whenthey finished and we could get back into the airconditioned cars. It was hot enough that the boys all stripped down to just shorts and shoes and most of the girls were not wearing much more than that. I, of course, wore long trousers and a loose long sleeved silk shirt over my tshirt to keep the sun off my skin (and a hat too). Honestly, I may have been cooler than they were, thanks to the extra fabric.

One of the features of that particular outcrop which made the mapping less pleasant than it might have been was the smell. Some sort of pungent animal dung was along the road, right there between the two road cuts, and in the heat it was rather stronger than I wanted to be around. The mapping took all morning, and then we drove up the road towards our second stop of the day looking for a nice place to have lunch. Not seeing anything really appealing we finally settled for stoping at a small local store/cafe which had a bit of shade. After enjoying my lunch (cous cous, broad beans and zuchini, which I cooked last night) I decided that since it wa so hot I would buy a popsicle at the store. Much too sweet, but the temperature was perfect!

Then the clouds came in, along with some wind, and the day got better. Stop number two wa a cute little mountain peak in someone's backyard. The peak is pillow lava, with a few visible feeder dikes, and zeolites growing in some vessicles. From there we went to an old mine site. Up until they quit mining during a war in the 1970's that location had been mined for about 3000 years. At first just the obvious copper deposits (the name Cyprus and the name copper come from one another), and in recent times the massive sulfide ores.

Then we came back to the hotel early enough to recover from the day by hopping into the pool. The students are now out at a resutrant for dinner, but since I don't eat in the evenings I stayed home to catch up onmail, do my yoga, and perhaps read a bit. Three more field days, and 1.5 travel days left till I get to Double Wars...