A little exploration never hurt anyone

For Tim and I's last trip while I was in Bairoil, we decided to do a little site seeing. After seeing Independence Rock, I was itching to do a little more site seeing. The next place on the list was Sinks Canyon. The canyon has a river of water that disappears into the mountain.

At the beginning of the year, when the snow is melting, the water fills up the cavern completely. Only at the end of the summer and in the winter is the water low enough to see the details of the cave opening. The water level is still to high and fast even during the later months of the year, that the caverns are still too dangerous to explore. 

 

No one knows where all that water goes. All they know is where it goes into the mountain, and in later years figured out where the water surfaces. They placed markers in the water, and found that at least part of it resurfaces only a few hundred feet down the road. However, it takes 4 hours for the water to go into the cave and then surface; the path it takes remains to be a mystery.

At the resurfacing spot, we found the largest Rainbow Trout I have ever seen. The water literally leaks out of the sides of the mountain as well as springs up from the rock. Fresh, clear, and a ton of fish.

The fish of course eat well thanks to all the visitors. 

These are the kinds of things I love to explore the most.

1 Year Down

On my last weekend in Bairoil before heading back to Colorado and on to other adventures, Tim and I celebrated our 1 year anniversary. For our date, we got some sparkling cider ( I know ....kid like, but it tastes so good) and went for a cruise. Tim had said earlier in the summer that he found this heart shaped pond that he would save to take me to for our anniversary date, and so that is where we went.

Sadly the pond has a lower water level than it had when Tim saw it causing it to no longer look too much like a heart. However, the though still counted and the drive was great. Once we got back from the drive we made one of those frozen Chinese meals and attempted a movie marathon. A simple yet great date. It was a good and relaxing way to end the Wyoming part of my summer, and great that I was able to spend our anniversary with my guy rather then celebrating 1200 miles apart.

Off On a Cruise

One thing that Tim and I love to do is go for a cruise, also known as a drive for those that are unfamiliar. A short ways behind Bairoil is Green Mountain. For one of my last few nights in Bairoil, Tim and I went for a cruise all the way up the mountain. On the way up we spotted some wild horses. They were beautiful. It is strange to see an animal seen normally domesticated out in the wild.

As we continued to climb, to Tim's enjoyment we had to go through a bit of mud. 

 

From the start of the cruise till the reaching the top of the mountain, the view only got better.

At the top you can see up to 60 plus miles away. An amazing view that is only possible in the west, and one of the things I miss the most when living in the Mid-west for now.

A Little Spontaneous History Lesson

On the drive back from camping at Pathfinder Reservoir, Tim and I stumbled upon the historic landmark Independence Rock. It was one of the progress land marks for the pioneers as they traveled along the Oregon Trail. The rock is absolutely spectacular.

Once arriving at the rock, the travelers would carve their names in the stone. The rock is covered in names of families and the date they arrived at the rock. It was known throughout the groups of travelers that if you didn't arrive at the rock by the 4th of July, that you wouldn't make it over the pass through the mountains before winter came. If you didn't make it the pass would be blocked by the snow and traveling would lead to death. The oldest name and date we we found was from the early 1830's which is in line with the start of the Oregon Trail time line.

From looking at the pictures it is hard to see, but the rock is smooth and sloped at a low enough angle that you can walk all the way up to the top. Tim and I walked on the trail surrounding the rock and then attempted our climb. On the lower parts of the rock there were many names, but at the top there were many more. Not all the names were from the time of the Oregon Trail, many were from throughout the years adding to the history of the rock.

I love visiting historic landmarks and am putting a few more on the agenda while I will be in Wyoming.

Camping - If it can go wrong it will

Only about an hour from Bairoil, lies Pathfinder Reservoir. For one weekend Tim's family and sister's family in law planned a camping trip out on the lake. Tim's sister Shenah, her husband's family are big into camping, 4 wheeling, boating, and all of the above. Therefore, Tim and I headed up to the lake in the Jeep only to be met by 3 other campers among other outdoor toys. On that note, we were the only ones sleeping in a tent on the ground (the only ones ACTUALLY camping, haha kidding).

From the beginning of the trip, things started to go wrong. When we arrived one of the campers had been visited by a family of mice, and needed to be cleaned out before the family could get settled. A little while later, the little girl fell off of the bunk bed and broke her leg. The poor girl. We weren't sure if it was broken at first, so she was upset for awhile. A little while later one of the dogs ( a boxer) was acting strange. She kept eating grass, hacking stuff up, and rubbing her face in the weeds. This was all in the first night.

Day 2 started a little better off. Most of the family headed to Casper for a relatives birthday party and decided to get the little girls leg checked out on the way. While they were gone most of the day, Tim and I went with his parents to explore the other lakes connected to Pathfinder and the Dam. It was fun to not only explore the Dam, but it was amazing to see something built almost 100 years ago that is still standing and functioning as if it was build yesterday. Thus, the nerdy engineering side of me came out a little while looking at the structure. As we were heading back to the camp site, Tim was picking on his mother and pretending that he was going to drive through the lake with his Jeep.

Once we got back, a few more things went wrong. Everyone that had been gone was one their way back. When Shenah and her husband arrived the dog jumped on the side of a newly painted truck and left a lovely scratch. Her husband was not happy. Later on the family of the little girl arrived after sitting in the ER for hours and hours. Her entire leg was in a temporary cast; nor t fun for a 4 year old. To top everything off the dog was still acting a little weird. That night they looked at her neck and found bite marks. Later on they figured out that she had been bitten by a rattlesnake due to her face swelling (boxers faces usually sag). That night one of the little dogs also became sick. He was having a hard time with his digestive system causing a lot of worry considering his older age. Altogether it was quite a night. One of the more fun parts was celebrating Shenah's birthday and making a cobbler in the dutch oven. Most of the meals were made in the dutch over the weekend and therefore very very yummy.

To finish up the weekend, on the 3rd day Tim and I went for a cruise in the Jeep, hung out a bit with everyone, and packed up to head back to Bairoil. Through everything that happened, it was still a great weekend at a very beautiful place.

Finding the Wyoming Sahara

My first few days in Bairoil were open for exploration. :) Not exploration where people go out and taste the best restaurants and see the top of the line museums. Rather, a little . . .  land exploration, which is my favorite kind. Tim and I, took his Jeep out on some of the BLM (Bureau of Land Management - aka Government Land) roads and went exploring. Earlier that summer Tim had found some sand dunes when cruising around and decided to take me out to see them.

In Wyoming or the west in general, there is a lot of sand. Most people don't actually realize how sandy it actually is; even in Colorado. Some places there is actual dunes, rather purely sandy soil. The hidden Wyoming dunes that we found, actually move. The oil service companies have actually lost entire oil wells in some places. They will go check an oil well one month and go out a few months later and cannot find it.

If you think about it, the fact that they move is actually pretty awesome. Not only is the landscape is never the same twice, but it changes often enough that the fact that it is changing is more apparent. Usually, I tend to think that changes happen over a longer period of time, but in the case of these dunes, that is not the case.

Once we found the dunes, Tim wasted no time in climbing one of the largest ones. Over the sand and though the sage brush we went. For those that don't know, sage brush is not always what someone would call a "small" bush. The farther from the road you go, many of the bushes get larger. Some are about 4 to 5 feet tall.

At the top, there was pure packed sand and a view for miles.

                                             

After sitting at the top admiring the view, and then writing words in the sand with the Jeep, the wind came up and we were caught in the start of a storm. Being pelted with sand is definately not the best feeling in the world. Therefore, we attempted to beat the storm and headed back to Bairoil.

Sibling Squabbles - It's time for a family reunion

After getting to Bairoil, I was on the road again. My car had been having problems and my mothers side of the family was having a reunion back in Iowa the week after I arrived in Wyoming. In order to get my car fixed I had to take it back to Greeley. Since Tim was coming with me to the reunion, he and I traveled down to Colorado to drop my car and join my family on the trip back to Iowa. 

Tim, the brave soul, traveled 14 hours plus (always more hours with my sisters around) with my sisters, mother, and I, back to Iowa for the reunion. Upon completing the long drive we finally arrived at my grandparents house. One of the best parts about Iowa is the food. My grandfather's family was an Iowa farm family. They know how to eat. My grandpa grew up during the depression and was affected greatly by the dust bowl. During that time, his family didn't always have a lot to eat so it is impossible to leave my grandparents house hungry. They, especially my grandpa always make sure that everyone has enough to eat. Plus, I mean farm food, it's the best kind and always followed by dessert. 

Whitey's Ice Cream is theeeee boommb, and has always been a favorite part of visiting.

                                           

The family reunion was held in Cedar Rapids, Iowa. Both my grandma and grandpa are from the area with most of their siblings still living there or around there. This reunion was with my grandpas family, more specifically his siblings. He is the oldest boy of 8 children from a very loud purely German family. Since they are all siblings there are always ....family squabbles. However, seeing them all through a grand-daughters perspective is actually pretty exciting and entertaining. I have siblings and don't think we act weird when we are together, but after seeing my grandpa and his siblings, grandma and her siblings, or my mom and her siblings, I now know all sibling groups just act a little weird together. 

My Uncle Paul ( the youngest boy in my grandpa's family), wasn't able to make it to the reunion. My great aunt was sick and had been for many years. I think it was the 2nd or 3rd time she had cancer among other issues with her kidneys. Therefore, she wasn't supposed to travel and instead we called them over Skype at the reunion. It was a bummer that we weren't able to see them in person, but I was glad we got to chat with them a little.

My Aunt Joyce is the youngest girl in my grandpa's family. She and my uncle Paul were the only siblings to leave Iowa. Paul lives on the east coast and Joyce lives in Texas. Joyce is pretty chill. She texts me every once in a while to see what's up and if I get where I'm going when traveling. I appreciate the worry since people don't usually worry about me or if they do, they tend to not voice it. 

Seeing these two, the other siblings, as well as spending time with my more immediate family was a lot of fun and a great added adventure to my first week of my summer break. 

About that opportunity . . .

After my awesome experience with Schlumberger, I returned to MSU for the summer to do research and take a summer class. This last spring I was doing research for a professor in the Cardiovascular and Tissue Mechanics Laboratory. Since I was in Indiana, the research was through email which meant that it was proofreading grad students papers. The professor seemed to like me and asked me if I wanted to work for him this summer and to apply for a program called EnSURE (Engineering Summer Undergraduate Research Experience). However, I had to take this one class this summer in order to stay on track and keep my semesters from being cluttered by ....unimportant classes. Therefore I had to convince them to let me take the class while I was working. Hey, I'm Sara, I can handle it. (I actually have done it before, last summer to be exact, and I am never doing that many classes and an internship at the same time ever again)

So come to find out, this program is geared towards applying to and interest in Graduate studies. I did happen to be thinking about grad school when I was in Indiana because of all the engineers that had decided to go back for their upper level degrees. I am still not sure if I want to go to Grad school. I would like a another degree but the research I would have to do doesn't get me very excited. The other thing is that some of the Grad students that have only done research and never worked in the industry are missing some big skills. The industry teaches a lot of things that you cannot learn in a lab writing papers and reading books. I think I would like to eventually get a PhD, possibly skipping a masters. This program and job has made me realize once again, like I already had mentioned before, that I hate sitting in a desk working at a computer. So in some ways this job is driving me a little insane, which is making me question if I could handle doing it for 3 to 6 years to complete a degree.

Everyone works on their own, only on their specific topic, everyone (about 8 of us) sit in this tiny little room completely quiet all day long, and I never know what I'm supposed to be doing. It is lacking a little bit of collaboration and direction that keeps me interested, happy, and completely sane. The research topics are interesting, don't get me wrong. We are looking at the aorta and more specifically abdominal aortic aneurysms which are really interesting. My grandmother has recently been having a lot of complications with different parts of her aorta as well as her carotid artery, which we also look at. Besides aneurysms some of the topics explored are related to strokes and the relationship between the spine and a aneurysm.. In terms of the topic I am always interested, it's the research part that is a little slow.

You thought this would be easy, I'm sorry you are mistaken.

This summer, for the first class session ( first session - 6 weeks, second session - 6 weeks) I took ME 391 which is also known as Mechanical Analysis. Don't let the name scare away the non-engineers, it is only ....maybe . . calculus 4 1/2. In the range of mathematics in engineering it is a very basic and intro level class. Anyways, I did the usual where I asked my other ME friends how difficult they thought the class was and if it would be possible to take while I was working as a Undergraduate Research Assistant over the summer. All of them were like, "o ya, it's just like calc 4 all over again, except the end." (Calc 4 = differential equations) So I was like, alright I can do this....no biggie. Then I realize which professor was teaching my class.

The professor that was assigned to teach the summer session is known for being extremely challenging. The average final grade in his Thermodynamics course was a 1.5. (4.0 = A, 3.5 = B, 3.0 = C, 2.5 = D, 2.0 = passing most of the time). Now understand that I said AVERAGE FINAL GRADE not the average grade on the final exam. Ya, tell me about it. He is also known for having test averages in the 30 and low 40 percents.

Come Monday afternoon, first day of class, in walks Prof. W. After explaining who he was and the mission to be completed by the end of the 6 week semester, he holds up the book used for the course, Advanced Engineering Mathematics (2.5 to 3.5 inches thick)  and says, "While this book my bring you to believe that you are doing advanced mathematics, you are not, in fact nothing about this class is advanced. This course is a very small introduction to the mathematics that you will do in up coming classes but it is nothing close to the challenging mathematics you would do in Grad school or other higher education." He continued with "I don't believe that everyone is above average, therefore if everyone is doing extremely well in the course that reflects poorly on my knowledge and teaching abilities" This is the moment where everyone in the class, all 15 or so of us, gulps down hard and stares straight ahead thinking " what the hell have I gotten myself into?"

All engineers and engineering students know that quite often you ask yourself this question, especially in moments previously mentioned. Engineering is hard and in order to stick with it you have to continue even after asking yourself "what the hell am I doing? I could be a business major and sleep 8 hours a night, or even a week." (true story) (no offense to business majors) So I asked myself this question, and then brushed it aside like I have since I became and engineering major.

As strict and difficult as Prof W. was I did better in his class then all of the engineering classes I have taken so far at MSU. He is very, very, very (x10) smart and really knows the material for this class as well as many others. This class is actually really important in doing well in the rest of my classes that I have left, which is why I am glad I had him as a professor. Preparing myself for more difficult classes I have to take next spring will only add to my success and enjoyment of those classes.

Sometimes the more challenging the situation and the less the teacher b.s's the material the less I slack and am more determined to understand and work to get it right. I get bored very easily, especially when I am not challenged, and this can make learning the easiest things very difficult. I know many other people with this problem, it's most likely another way to describe "over-thinkers". If you look at the classes where I did well in high school and the teachers that taught those classes, the teachers that had a similar demeanor to this professor are the ones where I enjoyed their classes the most and worked the hardest at.

The last week of the course we had our final. I had been going to his office hours 3/3 times a week and started studying a week early (that's not me being nerdy, it really requires that much studying). I turned over my test, looked at the first question in which he asked for a "really simple" transformation before starting the problem. I could not see it and figure it out. I tried everything and the problem itself was easy but I couldn't start it without the Transformation. So then I moved on tried to complete the other 3 questions as much as possible only to run into some problems with them. After taking the final I was so mad that I couldn't figure out the transformation to start the first question, especially since I knew that it was simple. After the exam I wasn't even able to look at him, I was so disappointed in myself. A few days later, as a class, we received an email from Prof W. "The first question was one that I thought was really easy, however, not one person got it. All you had to do was  .blah, blah, etc. and there was your answer." I was like shit, if that's how the first question (the easier one) went, then I don't even know how the rest of the exam went.

I ended up doing well in the class regardless even after feeling like I completely failed every quiz along with the final exam. I also now have a professor with a very logical way of thinking that I am planing to ask some career related questions. Yes, it all ended up working out, but there was quite a bit of stress throughout those 6 weeks in order to get to that point.