Soundings in Fathoms

Jackpot! Angela's diligent work has located the chart we need for this summer's diving expedition to Ecuador. Housed at the Boston Public Library, scanned by them for us, and sent to me at PSU, the chart was surveyed in 1847 and reports soundings (depths of water) in fathoms (a fathom being six feet). I've been obsessing over this chart for months, now we have it and can make realistic plans for the diving operations. A bit of the chart is shown above.

"The way is long and wild and weird"

A few lines by Oregon poet William Winfield (Billy) Scott (1885-1935), as found inscribed on one wall of the Billy Scott Room at McMenamin's Grand Lodge:

'He's launching out o'er that great bar,
No lighthouse save the evening star,
Or perchance to keep aright
The Milky Way will lend its light
The way is long and wild and weird,
Beset with dangers to be feared.'

Below, a whimsical portrait of Scott above the fireplace, where you can read, or doze, or daydream...

Summer Travels With an Eye on the Arctic

Above, a chart I'm working on getting my hands on; one of these anchorages shows Salango anchorage, Ecuador...where this summer we'll be diving in search of traces of ancient Manteno maritime activity. And after that, through the summer and into the fall, I'll be piloting my paraglider as much as possible, all across Oregona nd Washington--all with an eye on the coming Winter, up in Alaska again...to fly from the peaks you see below, for landings on the sea ice. This secret place--for the moment, for a variety of reasons--is where, native Alaskans have told me, the Immanyarok have migrated in recent years...

Plenty of weird and wild tales in the loom, now!