Bears: our fuzzy friends, and occasionally a grumpy neighbor not to be trifled with. The bigger of these two bears attacked a co-worker thirty minutes after this photo was taken.
Being a seasonal worker means lots of time off to do our own thing, but it also means lots of time working jobs in the middle of nowhere with other seasonal workers. For the last decade I've been working as a mountain guide and instructor teaching people how to not fall down things and fall into things. Most of the time it went great (with the occasional hiccup) but I find myself wondering what other jobs could be procured with a stong background of walking around in the mountains with ropes on. A brief stint last year collecting rock chips in the foothills of the Todrillo mountains landed me a repeat assignment for this summer doing high-angle geologic sampling for a geologic exploration company named Millrock. We were based out of the Rainy Pass area and flew out into the mountains every day to collect soil and rock samples, looking for the geologic sons, daughters and cousins of gold, which are arsenopyrite, calcopyrite, puritite, hematite, and lots of other metals.
Geologists love to look at rocks, the rumors are true.
Fog means hanging out on the ground.
A co-worker ran into a bear while waiting for a ride home, proving that a bear on a bad day is worth steering clear. Bob had no choice and spent some time in the hospital, but is now on the mend and should be tip-top in a few months.
A post-bear attack gun-toting crowd for sure, everyone had a newfound respect for the firearm. I switched from bear spray to my snub-nosed .44 and felt better about it. We enjoyed an emergency import of ammunition and practiced up until the owners of the lodge requested we stop scaring the horses.
The work grind involved flying all over and chipping pieces of rock into bags in an organized fashion. We got the job because of our tolerance for rotten rock and exposure. A good niche to fill.
Mining camp, aka man camp. The drillers didn't like us, in the john was some grafitti that stated 'mama, don't let your babies grow up to be geologists'. I don't consider myself to be a geologist really, so I'm in the clear, maybe next year the drillers will like me.
It's like 'Where's Waldo' but with geologists.
That orange soil is highly sought after, so we chased it around and collected samples.
The full getup- the rain gear covers about twenty pounds of surveying gear, radio, gun, etc.
I got to tag along with real geologists and learned lots of cool words. I am used to evaluating rock in terms of solidity, if I could climb it safely I wasn't much interested past that. It turns out that there is much more to it than that.
Sometimes the higher-ups come around, and we get dressed up and lay out all the pretty rocks....
Lunch #1 (usually of 2 or more total lunches) of a typical day.
Mellow glaciers for the most part, but the moats warranted full precautions.
Our A-Star and fabulous pilot Mark (a Kiwi) was at our beck and call.
Flying around collecting rocks- it is amazing what the mountains will spit out from time to time. I found 40 lb. chunks of solid metal (puritite) that had just fallen off of some cliff. I never knew such things would happen.
People have accused me of 'being addicted to danger', something which I say is a simple matter of perspective. I prefer to think I have a high risk tolerance, which is unique enough to help me keep getting such jobs.
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