P-MAN XIV Update #02 - Dan arrives in Palau

17 March 2012

Alii & Yahoo! It's sooooo good to be back in Palau!

The ride over the big blue pond was uneventful from San Francisco to Narita, Japan & direct to Palau.

Day 1 was full of little errands getting things set up for the arrival of Pat Scannon on 15 March and Flip Colmer on 19 March and 15 folks from Stockbridge High School on 22 March and finally Derek Abbey on 30 March. Jolie Liston will be here sometime to play with us but she is mainly working her other job as an archaeologist doing research work in the Rock Islands.

Joe Maldangesang called to check in. He will stop by later today or first thing tomorrow morning. Oh, and a new twist: Joe no longer works for Neco Marine like he has for the past 20 years. He is now a State Conservation Officer for Ngarchelong, the state at the top tip of Babeldaob, patrolling the crystalline blue waters keeping folks safe and the conservation area pretty.

Joe, in his Ngarchelong State Conservation Officer's regalia.

The advance-team checklist:

• Unload the broom closet at the hotel (West Plaza Malakal) where they allowed us to store a few things and unpack them into the team "ready room". This is the double bedroom with kitchen and living area that Flip and I will share and be the base of operations. At last count there are 12 boxes, 2 backpacks, a metal detector and a bag full of 2-way radios that we left in storage.
   
• Check for mold, mildew, powdered Gatorade that is now a solid block of Gatorade, etc., and let all things air out. Now where is that inventory list?
   
• Check in with Mason Whipps from Surangel Construction and pick up our ride for the next month. Surangel Construction has loaned us a vehicle for the past 5 years.

• Check in at Neco Marine, our base of operations for dive boat usage, and start our order of 1-gallon jugs of drinking water, 15 to start. We take back the empties and get refills as needed. The suggestion is to not drink the tap water in Palau...even the locals don't...so from morning coffee to filling up your Camelback water pac, the team goes through several gallons per day.
   
• Go grocery shopping at Surangel & Sons grocery store (yes, part of the family business in #3 above).
   
• Arrange the hotel "ready room" and request the coffee maker, large conference room desk, start charging all the radios, etc.
   
• No visits to government offices to include looking for Flip's 70 pound gear bag via US mail since today is a National holiday, Youth Day.
   
• Stop at Coral Reef Research Foundation and say Hi to Pat & Lori Colin, see how our Side Scan Sonar is doing (they babysit it for us during the year when most of us are back in the States) and find that they have a very full office/lab. They have 3 research teams working with Autonomous Underwater Vehicles (AUVs) working out of their facility for the next 10 days. Scripps Institute, California Polytechnic University and University of Hawaii all have their own AUVs. They're doing "research stuff" with them...basically terrain-following torpedoes with a lot of high tech gear encased in a 5-foot-long, 6-inch-diameter, 5-knot tube with a propeller on the end. More later as I figure this one out.

Wall-to-wall exotic toys (autonomous underwater vehicles) in the lab
at Pat Colin's Coral Reef Research Foundation.

Just about time to head to Sam's Bottom Time Bar & Grill to have my first Red Rooster beer of the year and catch the sunset, then off to dinner tonight with old friend David McQuillen, of Cleared Ground Demining at The Taj. Most excellent food and conversation!

Night after night after night...same boring old sunset view
from Sam's Bottom Time Bar & Grill.

Time to dash to the airport and pick up Pat Scannon...Pat arrives safe and sound SFO - Hawaii - Guam - Palau.

- Dan O'Brien

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