Day 11

Today was a split day, half lab work and half field work. In the morning we went to the NTBG lecture hall to begin recording spectro data on the rocks we collected yesterday. I am very glad that I do not have to use a field spectrometer, the blasted thing would freeze every 4-5 samples requiring a full restart which, including calibration, would add 10 minutes each freeze. In the end I decided to break off from the spectro analysis and work on some data collection for my portion of the project. I will be working on creating drainage basins for groundwater discharge. I’ve never worked with the hydrology groundwater tools in ArcMap, so this will involve some learning on my part.

After the spectro data was collected we began preparing for data collection a little later. Today’s collection would involve getting salinity and temperature readings from part of the Kauai coast. We got on the good side of a local outrigger canoe racing team who agreed to tow a pair of our sensors behind each of two of their canoes during a practice today. We attached GPS units to each canoe set to take a waypoint every few seconds, hopefully we will be able to combine these two sets of data and have location, temperature, time, and salinity in a single database.

After the rigs were set, we had an awesome opportunity to learn a little bit of canoe paddling.  Our team split off among the two remaining six man canoes and the holes were filled with experienced paddlers who weren’t part of todays practice. While we were at it we set up the final sensor behind one of the remaining canoes. After a brief lesson of the basics we set off into the harbor and did a few laps. Paddling is an excellent exercise I must say, by the end of our tutorial I felt like I could barely lift my arms!