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| I hike and surveyed from where I am standing to past the point of land on the far shore in the distance - over 7 miles total |
On Monday I got to go on another work-related Helicopter ride. This time to Viekoda Bay. The museum did an archaeological survey of the south shore of the bay for the landowner - the USFWS. But, rather than hike or kayak the whole thing, we experimented surveying by helicopter and did the survey in one, rather than multiple days. I got dropped off at the head of the bay and hiked the shoreline making my way west. Meanwhile Molly and Alex stayed with the helicopter and surveyed the other direction starting at the outer bay. At the end of the day we met in the middle.
The survey method worked pretty well and together we found 5 new sites and documented the condition of another 5 already-known sites. We covered somewhere around 18 miles of coastline. That's a pretty good stretch of coastline for one day, but not a whole lot of sites. However, I don't think we missed any sites either. There are just not all that many sites in the bay and certainly not the big villages I found a couple of weeks ago in Kiliuda Bay.
In Kiliuda Bay pretty much every suitable place for an archaeological site had an archaeological site. In Viekoda Bay I found a number of places that just seemed perfect, but yet - No site. I think Viekoda Bay just lacks the biological resources so plentiful in Kiliuda Bay. Also I think there is a cold west wind that blows up the bay in winter. It's just a bay where I don't think people spent a lot of time. And this is true even today - people do go there but it sees no where near the traffic of neighboring bays.
Anyway, I thoroughly enjoyed myself walking alone along the shoreline in the sunshine. I listened to the nesting fox sparrows singing their songs and looked at all the pretty blooming flowers. It was a gorgeous day for a hike.
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