Ten-year-old Liam gives fossil-hunting a try.

I’ll be honest, I wasn’t sure whether I’d like squatting in the dirt all day long under the hot Montana sun, chipping away at dirt or at a rock wall with my dino-hammer. PaleoWorld warned me when I signed up: “This is not a tour.” They weren’t kidding. If one doesn’t like heat, bugs, dirt, thundershowers, squatting, sitting on rocks, or hammering until your arm falls off, then maybe a visit to an air-conditioned dinosaur museum would be a better choice.

Some people didn’t tolerate it too well; after five minutes of chip-chip-chipping with the ol’ sweat drip-drip-dripping, they’d sit and yak with their neighbor, or check their watch to see if it was lunchtime yet. Not me, man. Turns out, fossil-hunter blood flows through my veins. I was content to dig for eight hours a day, heat or not, fueled by the anticipation of discovery.

Violators have been warned!

At first, the discoveries were modest: croc teeth and croc skin (called scute), dino dung (coprolite), small therapod teeth, mini-vertebrae, fish scales, weathered fossil bone, hadrosaur teeth, tortoise shell, and pieces of triceritops frill. But then came the day when we went to one of Jessica’s must-watch microsites.

Now Jessica Martin is PaleoWorld’s intrepid, ever-patient paleontologist and field leader. For the past three years, she had been dutifully keeping an eye on this area as it was sloughing off large pieces of rib bone. Three times a year she scouted the area, looking for the source — the dinosaur embedded in a sedimentary layer, eroding off bits of bone as it gradually became exposed and weathered. . . .

So on this day, while prospecting, I spotted a bone sticking out of a hillside and sounded the dinosaur-call. Jessica hurried over to the spot and, while clinging to the side of the hill, announced that it was, indeed, fossil bone. She called for her tools. The excitement was palpable. Would the bone continue into the hillside, or was it just a little piece temporarily embedded in the surface on its gravitational journey to the bottom? Jessica chipped away at the hillside while I stood alongside. At 10 inches the bone was still going strong. At 14 inches, still going. Finally, at a whopping 20 inches, the bone came to its natural end. Ecstatic and anticipating a soon-to-be-completely-exposed dinosaur, we named our discovery, Judy.  We even held a little Judy-celebration party which consisted of big smiles, plenty of woo-hoos, and the dancing of jigs. (Although identification is not yet absolute, we believe the bone to belong to a carnivore. A BIG carnivore!)

The next day, which was to be my final day, we precariously dove back into the hillside with our rock hammers and excitement, officially creating site #4 for PaleoWorld. Seven of us chipped and hammered away until the opening was so large we could stand in it. In the course of the day we uncovered a perfectly preserved tooth belonging, again, to a BIG carnivore! Possibly and hopefully, the same one! It was a thrilling end to what, I hope, is only the beginning. . . . I’ll keep tabs on the team and on “Judy” through their daily logs at www.paleoworld.org (click “2010 Field Investigation” in the upper left corner).

Not all treasures are millions of years old!

Dino-hunters come in all sizes and ages

Hannah preps a fossil for removal from the field

This happened most recently while researching my book, The Case of the Terrible T. rex, book six in my Doyle and Fossey, Science Detectives mysteries series. I was neck-deep researching paleontology, including compiling a list of museums of natural history, and places where kids could go on summer dinosaur digs. As I investigated the dino-digs, I thought, I want to do that . . .

So here I am on the Levrick Homestead, thirty miles north of Jordan, Montana. Which is to say, in the middle of nowhere. This morning I packed sunglasses, sunblock, water bottle, TP, rain gear, camera and video equipment and headed off with a team of paleontologists, students, and amateur bone diggers like myself. In good spirits, we bumped our way along rutted tracks into the far north of Hell Creek basin, where some of the finest dinosaur fossils have been discovered, including the first Tyrannosaurus rex ever found in the world. (Prior to that, we never knew T. rexes existed!)

With picks in hand, we went to work on one of the excavation sites. For a while it was nothing but the soft thuds of our picks. As our intrepid leader, Jessica says, “There’s something about the sound of picks hammering in the early morning.” It’s a musical melody that rings of adventure. You never know what you will find . . .

Every now and then someone would stop and say, “I think I found something.” Sometimes it was nothing more than a rock. Sometimes a rather nondescript fossilized bone. But throughout the day, covered with dust as the Montana sun bore down on us, we unearthed mini-treasures millions of years old: fish scales, a rib bone, a toe bone, turtle shell, dinosaur teeth and dinosaur dung. . . .

I’ll be here for the next seven days. I’ll try to blog, but I’ll admit, I’m pretty wiped by the time we get back to camp. (Plus the Internet is touch-and-go.) In the meantime, I’ll keep playing that musical melody– discovering history, and having an adventure of a lifetime.

I’ll spare you the gory details. Suffice it to say that my new/old PC now lies smoldering in the dust heap, while I type this on my spanking new Macbook Pro. But I couldn’t leave the PC world behind entirely, no indeed. After all, the wheels of the publishing industry turn on PCs. It’s comply or die. So I solved my dilemma with a MAC program that allows me to run a virtual PC in my MAC. It’s literally two computers in one, and I’m loving it. I feel like I’ve awakened from a sweating, gripping nightmare to see the sun peeking over the horizon and hear the birds chirp.

All this has got me thinking. Just how and when did my life became so interconnected with computers, the Internet, and email? Just when did my entire day get flushed down the loo if my computer froze or had to spend a week with Dr. PC? Anymore my days consist of dozens of emails, electronic manuscripts, copyedits in WORD, htmls and pdfs and jpgs and tifs, chirps and tweets. In fact, there’s so much techno “support” for my career that I can hardly get any writing squeezed in there.

I’ve begun to pine for the good ol’ days, days when authors used ink pots and quill pens. When they didn’t have spell checker and actually had to get off their butts to pull the dictionary off the shelf. Mary Shelley was only twenty years old when she finished her novel, FRANKENSTEIN. As the story of its creation goes, it was a contest between friends as to who could write the scariest story. (Apparently they were holed up in some villa near Lake Geneva. The weather was nasty.) Now mind you, the contest was not who could watch the most movies, or who could post the most tweets, or who could text the fastest, but who could write the scariest story. Kind of scary when you think about it. A whole bunch of people choosing to go to their separate rooms and simply write. With old-fashioned ink on old-fashioned paper. Probably illumined by the light of an oil lamp. On a hard chair.

Thinking of Mary Shelley, I sometimes wonder if I’ve lost my center. Any time a piece of machinery can hold the key to my happiness/success/productivity (circle one), then something’s seriously out of whack. I don’t know the answers. I’ll think about it. I think it’s all tied up with future progress somehow. Like we’re all headed somewhere important and only computers can take us there. Meanwhile, I’ve got some tweeting to do. And laundry. But this evening I think I’ll kick back and read FRANKENSTEIN. Should be easy enough. After all, it’s on my Kindle.

As I doubt anyone has the patience to read through a 100-page summary of all my experiences, I’ll be merciful and brief. Maybe in the coming weeks, if you’ll allow, I can share a few more tidbits with you.

Regarding the Orphans Africa portion of my trip, here were some of the more memorable moments:

• Sitting under the stars with one of our young teachers, Stella, while she asked questions regarding the stars, the sun, and whether the earth really orbits the sun, finally confiding that she’d like to be an astronomer someday. (Remind me to mail her a book on astronomy. . . .)

• Doing an impromptu dance after using an outdoor privy. (BTW — cute, seemingly innocuous, little black ants move very quickly. They especially like the inside of pants. Shirts too. And bras. Plus they have a fondness for scalps. And they bite. Hard. And no, you cannot “do your business” faster than the ants can crawl up your legs. Tried that. Not possible. Not unless you’re super dehydrated, which begs the question, what are you doing in the privy?)

• Singing and doing a different kind of dance with a group of African widows as we made our way down the dusty road.

• Eating kuku (chicken) and wali (rice) for the one millionth time.

• Telling someone in Swahili that my friend was feeling ill, but instead of saying mgonjwa (sick person), I said nguruwe, (pig). Seeing the look of confusion, I repeated myself until I was certain they’d understood me . . . (!)

• Giving a speech in front of 130 orphans students at one of the secondary schools Orphans Africa is helping to build. (A year and a half ago, none of them were in school.) Afterwards the students sang their school song (which they’d composed) and danced for us. (Click here to see a video of the Mwaji Secondary School.)

Our fearless team of mountaineers

• My team of friends and our fearless leader — what awesome people! Hi guys! Every one of them was encouraging, supportive, fun, and courageous! We’re BFFs now, no doubt about it.

• Being greeted each day after a long hike by our African support staff, who sang and danced as we trudged into camp. Besides bringing tears to our eyes (I know I’m not the only one), it made us feel just a little less tired. What a great staff!

• Scrambling up lava rock. Didn’t think this ol’ guul still had it in her!

• The awesome views of Kilimanjaro and the surrounding valleys.

• Summitting despite not being able to keep down any food or water on summit day. (Sorry, no pics yet. Maybe later. Couldn’t bring a camera as many digitals go kaplooie at 19,300′ elevation. I was using a borrowed camera, so I couldn’t take that chance. I know there were photos taken, so it’s a matter of hunting them down.)
  

  Singing camp songs

• Being up at the top with my friend, Connie.

• Making it down safely with my friend, Connie.

• Taking a hot shower at the end of it all.

• Eating a pizza.

So after five weeks of incredible, yet exhausting experiences, as I was flying over the United States on my last leg of the return journey, I became very emotional. I was finally . . . at long last . . . home. That word has come to mean a lot to me, in ways I find difficult to put into words.

I’m home where communication is easy. Where we pick up the phone and call whomever we want, whenever we feel like it. Where we send off quick emails. Where we Skype or Chat. Where we can send documents across the nation overnight.

I’m home where the water is safe, clean, and abundant. Where I can turn on a faucet in my house and watch it pour out. Where I can take a hot shower whenever I want, or drink a glass of cool water straight from the faucet without getting sick. Where I can fill a kiddie-pool with a water hose. Water my lawn. My flowers. Water, water, everywhere.

I could go on, waxing eloquent about medical care (troubled as it is), our individual freedoms, pizza (oh my God . . .  pizza), life expectancy, pizza (did I say pizza?), transportation — but you get the drift. As I flew over Washington State I had to tell myself not to start bawling. But when I finally made it into my husband’s arms, I couldn’t contain the tears any longer. He wondered if something was wrong — maybe some kook had been bothering me on the plane, maybe I’d stubbed my toe — but I finally choked out that I was simply glad to be home. Glad to be back. Glad to have done it.

Yes, I’m home.

After weeks of scurrying around trying to get everything ready, I am still scurrying around at the eleventh hour. I have yet to gather all my vital paperwork, or organize anything. I then need to cram a mountain of stuff into my suitcases and backpack (sit on them first), and then drive the two hours to Tacoma, sleep, and fly out in the morning. So, please understand that this will be a shortie.

I’ll be doing Orphans Africa project work in Tanzania through August 13, at which time I’ll fly from Dar es Salaam to Arusha to climb Kilimanjaro. You can stay tuned to our expedition’s progress via a cybercast at www.AlpineAscents.com/kilimanjaro-cybercast.asp. Each day there will be a summary of what we’ve accomplished, where we’re at and how we’re faring, plus brief daily dispatches given by the team via phone and then relayed through the cybercast. (FYI — the lack of a current cybercast does not indicate a problem with the team. Mom . . . don’t panic.)

Thanks to all of you who’ve sent me your well wishes and who are offering your prayerful support for me, my OA team, and the expedition. I am truly humbled. You are the best, and I love you all.

Michele

But the real reason has been brewing for more than forty years. When I was a little girl, for some reason, the name “Africa” seemed to quiver with mystery. It was remote, exotic, and foreboding. . . . I’m not alone in my mysterious imaginings. Historically, Africa was known as the “dark continent,” not because of the dark skin of the inhabitants, but because the interior was so inaccessible that the Western World really didn’t know much about it beyond its boundaries. Though calling Africa the “dark continent” today is definitely not PC, and though the interior of Africa has long since been explored and exploited, the continent is still shrouded in mystery, conjuring up images of adventure, danger, and “other world-ness”. At least it did for me as a child.

Today, Africa is a continent in turmoil. I could go on and on about its troubles, but I’ll just mention one here that is germane. Due to AIDS, malaria, tuberculosis, and other diseases, there are currently over twenty million orphans in Africa. It is estimated that by the year 2010, there will be fifty million orphans. Africa is in the throes of a vast humanitarian crisis– a crisis that will only worsen unless the world awakens to its cry.

I first visited Africa in 2007. I’d agreed to climb Mt. Kilimanjaro with a friend of mine, Connie. But while we made plans, checked schedules, and tightened the straps of our backpacks, something kept bothering me. How could I just waltz into Africa (Tanzania), climb the mountain, and then leave with only a “thank you very much”? Didn’t I have a responsibility to effect positive change? Didn’t I have a responsibility, as Emerson wrote, “to make one life breathe easier”? This was the continent that had beckoned me all my life. Perhaps there was a deeper reason for that beckoning, a purpose beyond curiously fathoming its mysteries.

I began to search for volunteer opportunities — you know the kind: fly in for a couple of weeks, teach at a school, sing songs, clap, smile a lot, and then show’s over. The schools were pristine, the uniforms pressed and gleaming-white, the students smiling and healthy. While this was all well and wonderful, I felt a deeper calling. After more searching, digging the dregs of the internet, we discovered a small, grassroots organization called the “Marilyn Orphans Projects Foundation,” founded by Zambians and Tanzanians. This ragtag group of nobodies went around building schools for orphans, staffing them with volunteer teachers, and putting orphans (yatima) in the care of kindly widows (wajani). This ragtag group had nothing and yet they were making a difference. Their vision, their passion, moved me to tears. I signed on to volunteer and managed to talk my husband, Carl, and my friend, Liza, into going with me. By this time, I no longer desired to climb the mountain.

We spent two weeks there. No running water, no electricity, no clean uniforms, no nothing except the extreme need of the orphans and the heartfelt goodness of the adults who were trying to help. We came home exhausted, but on fire. They needed our help and we were going to give it.

Since 2007, the three of us have founded a 501 (c) 3 nonprofit charity called Orphans Africa (www.orphansafrica.org).We have helped to construct three schools, each at various stages of development, educating several hundred students. In just a few short weeks, the dormitories will be finished in one of the schools, and we will then be able to house forty orphans. We have sent hundreds of books and countless school supplies and equipment. We’ve planted hundreds of trees on 80 acres donated by the Tanzanian government and will soon break ground on a self-sustaining K-12 school where orphans will learn agriculture and animal husbandry. Someday the orphans will be able to raise food to put on their table, while selling the excess in the market. Someday it is even our dream to send the most academically inclined orphans to university, and others to our on-site vocational training school, to help them become productive leaders and members of a struggling society. We have big plans.

In a few short weeks, we leave again — Carl, Liza, and me (Connie’s coming too — but later). This time we’ll travel to interior Tanzania, near Zambia, where it is even more primitive. There is little infrastructure, no medicine, no running water, and no electricity. Communication is by word of mouth, by bicycle, or if you’re lucky, a rickety car. Once there, we’ll meet with community leaders and revisit our strategies for the orphans. It is our hope to see new buildings rise out of the dust, witness hope spring anew on tired faces, and to see lives transformed. It’s the highest mountain I could possibly climb.

In five weeks and one day, I leave for Tanzania. The closer I get to July 25, the more nervous and excited I become. Nervous because there are so many challenges in Tanzania, culturally and physically, and excited because I’m only going to climb Kilimanjaro once, so here’s my chance. (Actually, that last thought makes me nervous too. Egads!)

With the exception of a few articles here and there, I’ve got all my equipment. But I’m baffled as to how I will cram everything into two suitcases and one backpack. If I over-cram, I pay a hefty $150 fee per over-crammed bag. Now, I know what you’re thinking: Don’t take so much. An ingenious thought on its own, but in reality it’s a recipe for disaster. You see, I’m not just climbing a mountain; I’ll also be living in the toolies for several weeks, with no clean water, no electricity, inadequate medical facilities if any, no linens, no internet, no communications, etc. I’ve simply got to be prepared for life in a vacuum — a disease-ridden, poverty-stricken vacuum. Of course I plan to do my laundry frequently (in a bucket), and I bring only a little travel towel, and teeny-tiny travel washcloths no bigger than tissues, but still, there’s my sleeping bag, my down parka, my insulated self-inflating pad, a second insulating pad (required), my hurkin’ kick-butt boots, two sets of long undies, three pairs of pants, six shirts (cool and warm), a light jacket, a sweater, six pairs of socks (3 thin/3 thick), thick gloves, headlamp, wool hat, baseball cap, sandals, tennies, my travel guide(s), water bottles, medicines up the ying-yang, etc., etc. (This is in addition to the volumes of books that I’ll be leaving behind in Tanzania, along with the bottles of Advil, bandages, extra clothing, laptop computer, pencils, . . . more on the whys and wherefores in another post.) Believe me, the packing is daunting. I’m not complaining, mind you, I’m just baffled by the logistics of it all.

On the physical front, I’m equally stymied. Last month in an effort to motivate myself and in a delusional belief that it wouldn’t take me long to bounce back from pneumonia, I signed up for a half-marathon on July 4 at Sauvie Island, Oregon. No problemo, I thought. Plenty of time. Well, that was before I realized just how far thirteen miles really is. (Why didn’t anyone tell me?!?) I’m now up to 8.25 miles running. (FYI, “running” is a relative term. It has nothing to do with speed, really. It’s merely a linear progression from Point A to Point B using feet and legs while huffing and puffing.) Eight miles is considerably shy of thirteen miles, and time is ticking. But it will be what it will be, and my health takes priority. I must not get injured. I’ll let you know how I do on the half-marathon.

I wish I could blog whilst (don’t you love that word?) in Tanzania. Alas, it’s Tanzania. The likelihood of my blogs getting posted are about as good as me running thirteen miles without stopping, walking, or collapsing altogether. But I promise to keep a journal, hopefully daily, and will blog my journal when I return. Meanwhile, I hope you will all keep me in your thoughts and prayers as I continue to prepare.

Tuko pumoja! (“We are together!” in Swahili.)

Michele

But, hey, I’ve a mountain to climb. So last Thursday I hauled my weakened carcass out to the river trail and walked two miles. Way too far. With still a half mile to go, I was hurting, trembling, feeling sorry for myself, and cursing life in general. After spending the weekend coughing out all the crud in my lungs, I tried it again on Monday, this time on the treadmill in the gym so I could stop if things got the better of me. I had determined that dressing up in my gym clothes was totally not necessary, that I could not possibly break a sweat while merely walking, so there I was on the treadmill in my red sweater, jeans, and pretty red beaded jewelry, garnering more than one raised eyebrow from fellow exercisers. Did I say I broke a sweat?

Today I’m in the Tacoma/Seattle area. I’ve got an equipment list as long as my arm, everything from headlamps to long woolie underwear. I spent yesterday at REI in Tacoma. Did you know you can easily drop $175 for a set of long woolie underwear? I had no idea. (This may be the big lesson in all of this mountain climbing stuff — that I had no idea.) In a little while I’m heading to the REI in Seattle (bigger selection) to hopefully find some boots that love my feet (oh, please), a tiring process even when I am in shape. Later today, I’ll hit the treadmill again. This time in my gym clothes. Oh yes. I’m back on track.

Like many challenges, whether it’s losing weight or getting a college degree, the bumps in the road of life can derail us if we’re not careful. I could easily allow this bump to demoralize me, “proving” to myself that I really wasn’t up to the challenge after all. But that’s what challenges are, aren’t they? If they were easy, they wouldn’t be challenging. Bumps and bruises and the temptation to give up are all part of the journey. So, while I am extremely disappointed, I am hoping that this illness is merely a bump in the road to Kilimanjaro, not the end.

I’ll continue to keep you updated on my progress toward Kilimanjaro. The dates of my climb are August 13-26.

Well, preparing for a five-week trip to Africa to climb a mountain is much more than throwing clothes in a suitcase. It’s airline tickets, travel visas, passports, immunizations, travel insurance, accommodations reservations, yada yada yada, not to mention the constant physical training, blah blah blah. Right now I’m in the middle of it all, up to my eyeballs. I’ve purchased my airline tickets, purchased my travel insurance, reserved my expedition dates with Alpine Ascents, double-checked my passport, scheduled myself to become a human pincushion and swallow copious amounts of preventative drugs replete with side effects, reserved a hotel in Arusha for a night here and a night there with someone who took my money but hasn’t yet given me any reservation confirmation . . . Ai yi yi. (Now you can raise your eyebrows.)

And the training. OMG. Did I mention the training? I’ve been running and working out like a monkey on steroids. My poor little feet were starting to revolt, pestering me in oh-so-many-ways that they were just going to fall off if I didn’t lay off. So two days ago I went to see a foot specialist and spent a huge gob of money on orthotics and super elite running shoes. Now my feet are really aching, but the foot specialist assured me that it was like getting dental braces. There would be an adjustment period. Ai yi yi.

And now I’m thinking of running the Tacoma City Half Marathon on May 3. Hmm . . . will my little feet (not to mention my legs and lungs and willpower) be up to it? Hmm . . . you know I do love the challenge. . . .

Next year? I’m thinking maybe Mt. Vinson in Antarctica. My husband just rolls his eyes. Ai yi yi.