Field work or the move to the French

Hey there!

Sorry I have been slow to post. It has been pretty busy for the past few days. Yesterday we were in the water for 4 hours, and the day before that we moved to the French research station.

The CRIOBE (the French research station) is located about five miles down the road from the American research station, Gump. It is really beautiful here, surrounded by mountains. CRIOBE is less funded than Gump is, and there are less facilities here. For example, there is no dock here, and less laboratory facilities. CRIOBE is building a lot though, and in the next year or so, it should be pretty fancy. The computer room here is pretty nice, and newly remodeled, completely surrounded by windows.

There are a number of other differences between the two facilities that can be chalked up to cultural differences, perhaps? Most of the researchers at CRIOBE are students, who get paid for their residence by their advisors. Gump, on the other hand, has a lot of professors who bring large, expensive projects into the station, and as such, more money comes into Gump. Here at CRIOBE, everyone eats their meals together in a revolving food group. Most people wake up at 8 or 9, which is a stark contrast to Gump where people leave the dock by 7 AM.

Everyone at CRIOBE is very nice, and they seem determined to improve our French, which, at least in my case, is very poor.

Jada and I are finishing up our tile analysis work, and some of our reef monitoring work, which we have been working on since we got here, so that is pretty exciting. We have a bigger monitoring project that we will start by the end of the week.

As of now, we still need some facilities at Gump, so we are going back and forth for the week. Yesterday we rode our bikes from CRIOBE to Gump in the morning. The ride itself isn't that bad, but it's long, and if we leave too late, it's hot. Between the scuba diving, snorkeling, climbing up and down to the hillside bungalow, and biking, my legs are getting a workout. I expect everyone to comment on how thin I look when I get back.

Today is a computer day here at CRIOBE. My academic credit for coming here is through a paper I have to write at the end of the semester. The paper is due in about 8 days. I have adopted a bad habit of doing any other possible work while I've been here rather than starting on this paper. For example, now I am writing on the blog rather than writing my paper. So I should get back to work.

Love to all,
Emily