First Week in Los Alamos: 6/8 - 6/15

So I've already given a brief description of Los Alamos, but now that I've been here I can talk a bit more about it.  Los Alamos is a small town, but it's not as barren as I feared.  Believe it or not, you can get most of what you need from the local stores, even without a Wal-Mart or Target within 30 miles.  The weather is actually pretty nice-it gets hot often in the 80s or 90s but is very bearable without the humidity I'm accustomed to in the summer.   It does make you wish one wish you remembered sunscreen when you sit outside for lunch.  At 7100 feet above sea level we are almost 2000 feet above Denver.  I haven't really noticed the altitude difference unless I'm doing physical activity, though it is a but disconcerting to get out of breath climbing two flights of stairs to my office/lab.  Apparently it takes about 2-3 weeks to fully acclimate, an excuse we've milked as much as we could to excuse being out of shape. 

Here's a link to a map of Los Alamos.

I am in a program called the Dynamics Summer School.  I work in the Engineering Institute at the lab, which does not require a security clearance.  I do have a government badge to access my lab, and four layers of cyber security to access my LANL email. As part of the program, we have a lecture every day for an hour.  Each week focuses on different aspects of engineering that familiarize us with the topics at a broad enough level to be applied to our projects, (statistics, dynamics, controls, signal processing, etc.)  Twice a week we also have a guest lecturer talking about their particular research. 

There are 21 students total in the Dynamics Summer School.  I live with two other guys in the program who I met through Facebook. We get along very well and carpool for the five minute commute to work along with the two other students in our apartment complex.  It's really nice having a lot of students with similar interests to hang out with.

Our first two days of work consisted of general orientation to our program and General Employee Training, which everyone at the lab must endure.  It's a daylong class with an exam at the end to learn common sense safety procedures for the lab.  We also found out more than we need to know about radiation safety and how our exposure to it is minimal (the largest source of increased radiation for us is due to natural causes, so it looks like I won't be coming home with an extra finger).  This training was located in White Rock, a town over from Los Alamos where there is a picturesque spot of one of the canyons. 

View from the White Rock Overlook

The lab takes up about 43 square miles, which is a lot bigger than you think it is.  It seems like wherever we go, thinking we are far away from Los Alamos, we will see a sign for a different technical area of LANL.

Most of Los Alamos at the Friday Concert

As you can imagine, there's not a ton to do in Los Alamos.  One of the highlights of the week and premiere social gatherings of the town is the Friday evening, free concerts in the park.  This first week we were fortunate enough to see Igor and the Red Elvises, who are a "Siberian Surf Rock" band on their world tour. They've been together since 1995 when Elvis Presley appeared to Igor and told him to play rock n roll, despite the restrictions on popular music in Russia. 

Apparently, they're one of the better bands that come annually to Los Alamos.

My first hike in the Jemez Mountains

Beyond these concerts, the primary thing to do on weekends in LA is hike.  So our first Saturday most of us in the program followed one of the locals in our program to a hiking "trail" along a creek in the nearby Jemez Mountains.  It was a lot of fun and a good chance to get to know each other in the woods, despite getting a bit lost.

On Sunday, I went to Mass at the Catholic Church, which is conveniently right next to my apartment.  There are a ton of different churches in Los Alamos with nearly any denomination you could want.  Afterward, the 5 of us in our apartment complex went to Bandelier National Monument, which is the site of ancient Native American cave dwellings. There are a lot of cool things to see, trails to hike, and ladders to climb.

Cave Dwellings at Bandelier

My first real cactus!

View from the top of Bandelier National Monument

One more thing about work - one of my partners goes to Stanford, which apparently has weirder quarter systems than WPI.  Their finals week was our first week of work, so my partner didn't arrive in town until this weekend.  I met him on Sunday night after getting back from Bandelier, and he's really nice and great to work with.  Without discussing too much about my project, I can say that I get along really well with both of my partners, and am really excited about the work that we are doing.  By the end of the summer we are expected to publish a paper of our work, which we will hopefully be able to present at a conference in Orlando in February.  Here’s hoping for this amazing career opportunity/chance for another blog!

Road Trip Day 5 – Santa Fe and Breaking Albuquerque

Route 66 in Santa Fe

Downtown Santa Fe

We got to sleep in for once on this Saturday.  Chris and Jeff’s flight from Albuquerque back to Philadelphia would leave at 7:30 AM on Sunday.  We planned to see Santa Fe, New Mexico’s capital and of course, Albuquerque. 

I have a hard time calling Santa Fe a capital “city”.  It’s a very nice town (like West Chester or Nyack) with adobe buildings.  We had our first taste of New Mexican cuisine in Santa Fe.  With most food down here, which is often enchiladas or burritos, you have the option of getting it smothered with either red or green chili, or both (Christmas style as they call it).  You can order anything from burgers to breakfast with green chili.  If you’re unfamiliar with green chili, it has less of a tomato base and more of a green pepper and avocado base.  It’s quite good, and typically not as spicy as red chili. We walked around Santa Fe for a bit, and visited the Cathedral Basilica of St Francis of Assisi.  Apparently we just missed the ordination of Santa Fe’s newest priests.  We also tried to visit the Loreto Chapel, site of the miraculous staircase (more on this in a later post, when I actually see it), but there was an event there. 

Enchilada smothered with
"Christmas" chili
(yes, there is an enchilada under that)

Cathedral Basilica of St. Francis of Assisi 

Downtown Albuquerque

We went on to Albuquerque, which is more of a city than Santa Fe, but in my opinion that’s all it’s got going for it, besides being the filming location for the TV show Breaking Bad (which is a fantastic show incidentally, I highly recommend watching it).  It was the first city we visited where we had several people ask us for money, which at a rate of 5 times in 2 hours, is more than I typically experienced in Cape Town, where the national unemployment rate was 25%.  The streets of Albuquerque were otherwise more or less deserted, and the sun beat down incessantly.  We stopped at a small diner to cool off with ice cream and watch the Belmont Stakes.  Then it was back to the heat of the city for our exploration.  For a mere $65 we could have gone on the official Breaking Bad tour, which would have killed 3 hours showing us around various film locations. Instead, after dinner, we did our own unofficial Breaking Bad tour using addresses provided by a helpful blog.  Jeff navigated, sparing Chris and me from spoilers (I’m only on season 3, Chris hasn’t seen it yet but should).  Being avid fans, we geeked out over seeing Twisters, the inspiration for Los Pollos Restaurants, the car wash Walt worked at, Saul’s office (now actually a nightclub), and Walter and Skyler’s house.  The blog we followed said that the people who live there now are understanding of people creepily taking pictures of their house, and just ask that stalkers like use respect their privacy.  After casing out the house like Tuco’s cousins, we went to the nearest KOA where we slept for a few hours before Jeff and Chris got on a plane and I drove the 1.5 hours back to Los Alamos.

Inspiration for "Los Pollos"

Car Wash Walt worked at

Better Call Saul!                                                                 Walt & Skyler's house

Road Trip Day 4: Oklahoma City - Los Alamos, NM

This was probably the most exhausting day of the road trip.  We started out in Oklahoma City.  The main thing to see here was the federal building, the site of the Oklahoma City bombing on April 19, 1995.  Our GPS took us to the rebuilt federal building, where we were eyed suspiciously by the security guard until we realized that the memorial was across the street.

A reflecting pool sits between two large archways, one inscribed with the time 9:01 and the other 9:03, the minutes flanking the 9:02 blast.  Empty chairs, with their heights corresponding to the ages of those killed, border the pool. 19 of them are small, representing the children who attended a day care at the federal building.  A wall of ceramic tiles painted by Oklahoma City children pays homage to the peace that was disturbed 19 years ago. 

After leaving this poignant display we got back on the road.  We crossed the border into Texas , the land where everything is bigger, including the speed limit.  Shortly thereafter we stopped at the next Route 66 attraction in Groom Texas – the supposed largest cross in the world. (As later research would find, it is not in fact the world’s largest cross though it may have been at one point.) At 190 feet tall, it could be seen from 20 miles away.  We thought it was one of the most ridiculous things we had ever seen, likely built by some crazy Texan trying to prove his state’s superiority. However upon our arrival, we found that at the foot of this obelisk was a religious shrine, adorned with beautiful statues of the Stations of the Cross, the Last Supper, and the Crucifixion.  A

religious gift shop sold Divine Mercy medals, rosaries, and books on Pope Francis, indicating 

that this was monument was Catholic.  I didn’t know whether to be proud or ashamed.  Walking around the grounds, I would be moved by a particular statue or grotto, only to burst into a fit of giggles at the ridiculous structure luring in unsuspecting travellers.  But hey, whatever works.  

Once we reached Amarillo, Texas, we took a detour to the Palo Duro Canyon. We hiked for 3 miles, halfway down a short hiking trail in order to get a good view of the canyon.  I also saw my first tumbleweed.

 

After all this travelling and hiking, we had worked up an appetite worthy of a Texan, and we knew exactly where to go.  We had seen dozens of signs along Route 66 for the Big Texan Steakhouse in Amarillo, home of the 72 oz steak, free if you eat it and all its fixings (roll, salad, and shrimp cocktail) in a hour.  This fine establishment was recently featured on the popular TV Show, Man vs. Food.  Just a few weeks prior to our arrival, the record for this feat was broken by Molly Schuyler, (who also recently won the Philadelphia Wing Bowl). She finished her steak in 4 minutes and 58 seconds, and proceeded to eat a second in 9:59. 

The challenge area

Even with my appetite, I didn’t dare try to do the full challenge.  I ordered the 1/4 version of the challenge, an 18 oz steak with fixings, which took me well over an hour to eat.  The meal was delicious, and definitely worth the experience.

Our stomachs full, we got back on the road.  We almost missed our next attraction, the Cadillac Ranch.  Someone buried ten Cadillacs face down in the dirt, for the sake of art.  Graffiti on these structures is actually encouraged.  We did not leave our mark on this structure, and in fact kept our distance to stay out of the puddle of mud surrounding the cars.

Storm clouds were on the horizon as we left the ranch. After a little ways of driving we hit a very severe patch of rain and a bit of hail.  It didn’t last more than 10 minutes, but was a bit perturbing.  The skies started to clear as we neared the New Mexcio border.  My phone proceeded to give me a Tornado Warning alert, advising us to take shelter immediately, which did not calm my nerves.  However, with the skies clear ahead we proceeded into New Mexico, the Land of Enchantment, where there was an abundance of clear weather. A look at Doppler radar showed us that we were in fact very lucky, to have passed through a small break in an otherwise massive storm hitting Texas. 

The worst of the storm

 

Clear New Mexican skies

About an hour past the border, we stopped in Santa Rosa, New Mexico, site of Blue Hole, a clear, natural pool that remains at a constant temperature of 64 degrees Fahrenheit.  It is a great body of water to dive into apparently, which Chris and Jeff confirmed while I took pictures of the attraction at sunset.

After my friends dried off, we got back in the car for the last 2.5 hours of our journey to Los Alamos. It was here that I realized I was starting to feel a bit homesick since we had crossed the New Mexico border, arriving in the state that would be my home for the next two months.  We drove for miles along a deserted highway with no lights and very sparse traffic, which would have unnerved me had I been alone.  Eventually, we turned off on another highway, past Santa Fe, through what seemed to be an Indian reservation, and along a cliff that surely would be beautiful in the daylight.  Around 11 pm (now Mountain Time) we arrived at my apartment in Los Alamos.

Road Trip Day 3: St Louis – Oklahoma City, Getting Our Kicks

We left the KOA in Granite City, IL and went back across the Mississippi River/Missouri State Line to see St Louis in the daylight.  We walked around the outside of Busch Stadium and their large memorial to Steve Musial (I didn’t know who he was either until I saw it).  We also passed a familiar looking chain with a different name.  Apparently the restaurant chain known as Panera Bread started in Missouri as the Saint Louis Bread Co, and kept their name in this area.  Overall I really liked St Louis – it’s small (I’d say about Worcester-size but cleaner) and easy to drive in. 

World's Largest Rocking Chair

 We spent the day driving along Route 66, seeing what attractions it had to offer. We got to see the world’s largest functioning rocking chair, in Fanning MI.  Built in 2008, this masterpiece stands 42’ 1” tall and 20’ 3” wide. Unfortunately, they apparently only let people sit and rock on it one day a year in August. Still, we got our first classic Route 66 experience.  Jeff bought a Route 66 tour book with many different attractions to visit, though none nearly as exciting as this rocking chair.

We got off the turnpike and followed the original Route 66 through the Southeastern corner of Kansas, to check another state off our list.  The tour book told us we would pass the Field of Dreams.  Come to find out, this baseball field shares nothing with the movie beyond a name.  The tour book also brought us past the largest McDonalds in the world, which is a large glass structure that spans over the Will Rogers Turnpike in Oklahoma.  This too was a bit of a disappointment, since it was undergoing a complete renovation. We did at least get to see the world’s largest totem pole in Foyil, Oklahoma.

Finally we reached Oklahoma City, though to be honest, I’m not sure it deserves the name “city”.  I couldn’t see any skyline worth taking a picture of.  The people we interacted with at toll plazas (which didn’t accept EZPass anymore unfortunately) and at dinner were very friendly though.  With not much to do in town at night, we found our KOA and closed another day of driving.  

Road Trip Day 2: Chicago - St Louis and "All That Jazz" in Between

"The Bean"

 Even though we left at 5:30 am (Central Time now), we still got stuck in traffic going into Chicago that made what should have been a 45 minute drive take almost 2 hours.  Still, going in at that hour on a weekday allowed us to see the city’s attractions without many other tourists.  We went to one of the main parks in the city that features the “Bean”, a large, bean shaped mirror that curves in such a way to get some cool, distorted pictures of the skyline. And of yourself.  We also visited Navy Pier, a large tourist center with small museums overlooking Lake Michigan.  Even though it was a bit rainy we had fun spending the morning wandering the windy city.  I really like Chicago.  It has a large city feel but seems fairly clean and the people quite friendly.  After a lunch of classic Chicago deep dish pizza we got back on the road.

Navy Pier

Skyline view from the "Bean"

Lake Michigan from Navy Pier 

Abraham Lincoln Presidential Library

This day was our shortest driving day to St Louis MO, and stopping in Springfield IL, home and burial place of Abraham Lincoln.  We got there a little after 4, just too late to go to the Abraham Lincoln Museum.  We were able to walk around in the Presidential Library which apparently features some of the museum exhibits when they are not on display.  From the look of things, we didn’t miss too much.  We also were able to visit Lincoln’s tomb. As we left Springfield, we picked up Route 66.  We could have done most of the trip from Chicago to Albuquerque along this historic road.  However, many turnpikes these days run parallel to the road, and allow one to travel at a speed limit of 75 mph instead of 55 mph on the classic road.

Lincoln's Tomb

Outside of Lincoln's tomb

Cahokia Mounds Display

We also stopped at the Cahokia mounds, a Native American burial place that was incredibly buggy.  (I got over 20 bites from this sojourn). We were able to climb one of the mounds to get our first glimpse of St Louis.

View of St Louis from the mounds

One of the mounds

St Louis, MO

Then we arrived at St Louis. We got there just around sunset, a perfect time to see the city.  We went to the arch first before it closed. It’s situated at a picturesque location on the bank of the Mississippi River. Going to the top of the arch is really fun – the “elevator” is more like a roller coaster that curves along the sides of the arch.  And of course, the view from the arch.  Enough said.

The St Louis Arch             

The Mississippi River 

View of St Louis from the top of the arch

After that we got dinner and went back across the Mississippi to our lodging for the night, at a Kampgrounds of America (KOA) in Granite City, IL, 15 minutes outside of St. Louis.  Never having been to a KOA before, it took us a while to find our cabin and figure out how to get our key.  Finally, we closed the day on all that jazz.