Briana's Travels

It's great to be back in camp. I was immediately struck by how quiet it sounded when I opened my car door upon arrival - ah, leaving the city far behind! (Well, about an hour and a half behind, technically). But then I realized there are lots of sounds here - the constant chatter and chirping of birds; the tinkling of cow bells, as herds of Maasai animals wander by in the valley below our camp cliff; and the occasional vehicle driving on the paved road, which our camp is located a few hundred meters from, on a dirt road. As Kay (one of the researchers working with us) put it last night, at the dinner table on her first night in camp, it seems like the whole year is just working towards getting back here. Here's what the camp looks like from the air; I took this picture from a small plane, flying low overhead, in 2005. The first few days always consist of a lot of setting up, including all of the tents(here are two pictures of my tent from last year).

After a hectic last day doing all the last minute things I left until... the last minute, I made it to our field camp on Monday. A few days before that, we dropped off our Kenyan crew members, who would work hard to set up our fantastic camp on a cliff overlooking eroded hills. Here's a view of the lorry - uh, truck, in American - which drives all our gear down to the site. One of our oldest excavators, Vincent, loves to climb on top of the lorry and be at least partly in charge of unloading. He has amazing energy, even at the end of the day as the sun is starting to hide behind some clouds. Here are several of our crew members, carrying one of our gas-powered refrigerators from the lorry. Having a fridge on a dig is quite a luxury; it means cold water in the middle of the hot days, and the ability to keep food for days on end. One of our drivers normally goes back to Nairobi once a week to buy fresh food. We don't have any electricity in camp. All our food is cooked on gas sto...