Time flies when you're at HBS apparently, cuz somehow it's already September and the leaves are gonna start turning soon! As someone who enjoys a good little journal, I definitely appreciate the time and space to reflect through the 2024 crew's inaugural blog post. I am a little sleep deprived because I woke up relatively early today to spend 4 1/2 hours in the lab helping to dissect, weigh, and digest shrew organs for microplastic research, which was fun but I am TIRED, therefore my writing style will be even more chaotic than usual.
My head has been all over the place since getting here what, three or four weeks ago? It's nice to be in such a beautiful place when reading the news these days. I always have to fight the urge to run away because staying informed often means seeing or reading about war crimes, climate change, "the election," more SCOTUS rulings, and the like. That plus mental health hygiene plus homework and research= needing ways to stay centered and decompress. So far, it's been my most calm semester at UNC, but has been stressful in unexpected ways. I have been having to take more time than I expected to re-center myself, to remind myself how far I've come and how proud I should be that I made it here, even if the people around me don't have that context. Rest is resistance, spoon theory, growing pains, and all that.
So the space and time to relax a bit and explore provided by the long weekend was much appreciated, even if I wasn't as entirely present as I wanted to be.
Some highlights:
Friday night: We were sitting in the kitchen when someone said something about going to Dry Falls to see salamanders as per Rada's suggestion, so we packed into a couple cars after dark and headed over.
We parked and walked down the steps in the dark towards the falls, which you can hear almost immediately. As soon as you get close enough, you can feel the spray from the waterfall, and have to watch your step to avoid crushing all the salamanders. They were lounging on the wooden railings, splayed out on rocks, in the moss, and running across the path under our feet. While we had to wait to ID most of them via picture once back in the kitchen later in the night, there were gray cheeked, maybe Carolina mountain dusky, one extremely fast possibly Blue Ridge two lined, and many others. Just imagine a bunch of twenty-somethings running around in the dark behind this waterfall like little kids shouting above the noise of the falls and getting giddy every time they see another salamander. Every now and then, you'd have to take a break, turn off your flashlight, and stare at the constellations that filtered through the water in front of your face making you appreciate the decision to take Angie's advice and wear a rain jacket. After we saw enough, we laid on the picnic tables in the empty parking lot to stargaze.
Saturday:
We head to Bust Your Butt falls for an afternoon of wading, swimming, diving, hopping from rock to rock, and stopping to see if that sound was thunder or just another motorcycle. Friday was our first rain since coming to HBS since the drought, and there was a fair amount of thunder and lightning, which held out for our little trip. The colors are already starting to turn down there, too! As someone who is afraid of diving, I was content to just take photos and wade in the shallow sections.
Monday: Just took some time to sight see around the station and rest and relax, take photos of the hummingbirds that always hang around the jewelweed by the Pavilion, talk to friends back home, and run up to Sunset Rock.
This time walking up the gravel road, you could see the sunlight reflecting off of the trees and rocks and lighting everything up in a way that the camera just can't capture. But I still tried. There was not a bear at the top this time, but there was an older couple sitting together on the rock face. The guy stood up once the sun sunk below the mountains and smiled. " Isn't it amazing that we get to see this every night."
Tuesday: Had to get up early (7 AM, which feels ungodly early if you're me,) and pack up for PANTHERTOWN! Had no idea what this was actually, I just heard 8-mile hike and got in the car. Nice hiking and camping area about 40 minutes away from the station with lots of birds and bears (though we didn't see any). This 8-mile hike ended up being a bit under 12 miles, and we definitely would have gotten lost without the GPS and digital map (we may or may not have gotten lost in the rhododendron once or twice). We spent some time putting our botany skills to the test trying to ID trees that Jason taught us at Tremont ( striped maple, white vs. red oak, sassafras, birch, pine, etc), and with the help of iNaturalist, discovered that young sourwood actually has smooth bark. After the little green mountain overlook, we stopped for lunch at School House Falls.
Turns out standing under waterfalls is really cool! For some reason, the streams and falls in this area are brown. Tannins?
After lunch, we walked around in the valley to see the Granite dome cliffs above us, the same exfoliation domes we talked about in Costa's class. We got to the car around 4:30 PM and drove back to the station. And yes, I was dreaming about my ice cream in the fridge the whole drive home. Excited to see where the semester takes us next!
-EF
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