Note: I convinced my Geokittehs co-author Dana Hunter to fly from Seattle to New Hampshire to visit me for a few days. I handed in the final version of my PhD thesis on Friday May 4th, and Dana arrived the next day to help me celebrate. This is Part VI of my description of the fun georneys we had together during Dana’s visit. This is also the last post in my series about Dana’s visit. Dana and I will have to meet up again for more fun georneys!
When Dana came to visit, she told me that she had never been kayaking. I adore kayaking. From ages 12-22 I was very active in competitive whitewater slalom racing, in both kayaks and canoes. During grad school on flat Cape Cod, I didn’t do as much whitewater kayaking, but I’m hoping to return to the sport over the next few months. Since I handed in my PhD thesis a few weeks ago, I’ve been regularly going out on flatwater kayaking trips, which are excellent for building up those kayaking muscles. Anyway, when I learned that Dana had never been kayaking, I just had to take her on a kayaking trip! Fortunately, the lakeside geologist lair (aka my parents’ lakeside cabin) is well-stocked with 4 kayaks.
One of the kayaks at the lakeside geologist lair is a nice tandem flatwater kayak that is excellent for pairing a novice kayaker with a more experienced kayaker. We call the tandem kayak “The Family Wagon Truckster” because it is large and slow and can fit 2-3 people. For our kayak adventure, we took the Family Wagon Truckster and put Dingo, my parents’ dog, in the middle of the big kayak. Dingo is seven now, and he loves kayaking. When Dingo was a puppy, he was terrified of the water, but I spent several weeks training him to go kayaking. Now, Dingo is happy as can be in a kayak. He’ll even bring you his life vest when he wants to go kayaking.
We didn’t see too much geology during out kayak trip, but we did take a look at several large boulders, which are most likely glacial erratics.
Here’s some pictures from Dana’s first kayaking trip:
Georneys 