We planned to hitchhike back to St. Arnaud today and walked to an ideal spot with two young men who were hitching in the opposite direction. They assured us that two girls with obviously heavy loads would have no trouble catching a ride, and they were right. The only trouble was fitting our oversized packs into the already stuffed car. I ended up having to untie my violin and hold it in my lap, but it all worked out in the end.
The man who picked us up was an American grad student studying bird malaria, and we learned several interesting tidbits of information from him. For example, sand flies, those horrible demons of itchiness (10x worse than mosquitos, if you can believe it) detect their prey by the CO2 we emit from our skin. He told me this to explain the cooler of dry ice that was smoking in the trunk of his car, which he uses to load his bug traps. Bethany wondered how long we would have to hold our breath before our bodies stopped converting oxygen into carbon dioxide, and whether the little fiends would stop biting us before we accidentily killed ourselves through self-induced asphyxiation. Seems worth a try...
He also told us that when he is catching birds to tag and monitor them, they let out alarm calls. So far, so normal. However, due to the traditional lack of predators in NZ, the other birds have lost a sense of their own mortality. Rather than fleeing the scene, other birds in the area apparently flock inquisitively around to see what the hullabaloo is about. Silly birds!
The last coffee in St. Arnaud before setting out into the wilderness was, as always, a poignant affair.
The man who picked us up was an American grad student studying bird malaria, and we learned several interesting tidbits of information from him. For example, sand flies, those horrible demons of itchiness (10x worse than mosquitos, if you can believe it) detect their prey by the CO2 we emit from our skin. He told me this to explain the cooler of dry ice that was smoking in the trunk of his car, which he uses to load his bug traps. Bethany wondered how long we would have to hold our breath before our bodies stopped converting oxygen into carbon dioxide, and whether the little fiends would stop biting us before we accidentily killed ourselves through self-induced asphyxiation. Seems worth a try...
He also told us that when he is catching birds to tag and monitor them, they let out alarm calls. So far, so normal. However, due to the traditional lack of predators in NZ, the other birds have lost a sense of their own mortality. Rather than fleeing the scene, other birds in the area apparently flock inquisitively around to see what the hullabaloo is about. Silly birds!
The last coffee in St. Arnaud before setting out into the wilderness was, as always, a poignant affair.