Julie Andrews and the Art of Small Motor Repair

We started today bright-eyed and, in Kathryn’s case, freshly-shorn. Hair getting a little scraggly, and naturally, Donovan has a barber set. The muskoxen will no doubt approve of her new ‘50’s bob. When Donovan was done putting away his hair clips and scissors, Kathryn asked, “so, do you have any other tricks?”

“Get me a banana.”

We’ll leave the details to your imagination.

So, fashionably coiffed, we set out cheerfully for our day. Why so cheerful, you ask? : only two lakes left to go in this round of sampling! We’d be done by early afternoon, and ready to get started on Heidi’s research (finally).

Ah, fools we be.

For this sampling, our boat is slung by helicopter from one lake to the next. This involves a net around the boat, carried on a long line under the chopper. One of the ongoing problems we’ve had with our boat (other than the leaking….) has been finding an anchor that will keep us in one place while we’re sampling – we just drift if it’s at all windy. Our burlap bags full of rocks are only moderately successful, since if they’re heavy enough to hold us, we can hardly lift them back into the boat. Anyway, we finally found a thread rod grappling hook that we’ve attached to our burlap bag of rocks.

Well. An unfortunate incident involving the grappling hook, the sling, and an unbalanced boat tore a tube from our motor.

9 am. Arrival at PO Lake. “Let’s take stock,” Heidi said. “We have one non-functional motor. We have no anchor. We have a GPS that rarely functions. Excellent.”

Not to be deterred, we examined the broken piece – a random grey tube that connects to a seemingly dead-end screw-cap.

9:15 am. “Let’s take stock. We have no tool kit (yes, we know we should have a tool kit). We have some duct tape wrapped around Kathryn’s water bottle.”

9:27 am. “Let’s take stock. It is raining. Duct tape does not stick when wet. What else do we have?”

We remember that we have sport tape and pro-wrap, randomly tossed in Heidi’s pack after taping up Paul’s sprained ankle yesterday (yes, we know we should have a full first aid kit).

9:35 am. "Let's take stock. Turns out that sport tape works much better than duct tape when it’s wet." Meanwhile, Heidi has deduced that the random grey tube, since it goes nowhere, must somehow create a vacuum for the motor. We must recreate this seal.

10:23 am. Ingenious field repair complete: sport tape, a latex glove, a layer of prowrap (since sport tape doesn’t stick to latex), and then some serious sport tape wrapping. Voila! MacGyver, we miss you.

Okay, okay, so the hose did leak and smoke. But hey, it got us around the lake. For a while, anyway.

Did I mention the pouring rain?

Our day ended as we carried the 80 lb motor up a hummocky, steep, clay-slick slope to lurch it into the chopper. We have a new repair system now, though, involving a piece of washing machine, and a drywall anchor. Don’t ask!

Today’s field song, to the tune of “My Favourite Things” from Sound of Music. Ahem.

Sunshine on tundra and not being bitten
Zippers that zip up and warm woollen mittens
Brown paper packages sent up by mom
Days that I don’t have a wet, itchy bum! (ever gotten wet while INSIDE neoprene waders?)

When the fly bites,
When the motor calves,
When everything’s messed up
I simply remember my 10 lbs of chocolate
and pour some spiked coffee in my cup*

Chocolate rice krispies and smores with marshmallow
Batteries that charge up** and lipbalm with aloe
Outflows he’s marked with some bright orange flag***
Donnie, our medic, the dancing Newf gag!

[chorus]

Silky glove liners and peppermint tea
Warm sunny days when we sample the sea
Anchors that hold us in the deepest spot****
Veggie bean curry in my camping pot!

[chorus]

Shelters that heat up and Sharpies that write*****
Tents that don’t burn down and choppers in sight
Neoprene waders and warmers of fleece
Motors that start up and stay in one piece!!!!

When the fly bites,
When the motor calves,
When everything’s messed up
I simply remember my 10 lbs of chocolate
And pour some spiked coffee in my cup!

* actually, we’re dreaming here: it’s a dry camp
** actually, we’re dreaming here: even with charged batteries, the radios can be a tad spotty. Although we still love our radio.
*** dreaming, again; we have spent a lot of time walking along creeks trying to spot a piece of blue rope to mark the sample site
**** see comments above
***** dreaming! the danged things don’t work in the rain