Milk, maps, and my brush with death (just kidding about the death part).

Most research students can relate to the stress that accompanies recruiting participants for our studies.  So, in the interest of good karma, I've tried to sign up for studies when I can.

A while ago, I participated in a study that examined how our mind relates to an artificial limb.  The goal with the research is to help people with prosthetic limbs.

For the experiment, I sat down with both of my forearms inside a black box and watched a video of the fingers of a prosthetic arm being stroked with a paint brush.  At the same time, the researcher was showing me a video of him stroking my fingers with a paint brush.  He was trying to see if my mind would accept the fake arm as my own.  I could tell which arm was mine, so I thought the experiment was boring. BUT, the student explained that in the original experiment (where he got the idea from) the participants saw a video of a hand getting stabbed with a knife and even though they knew the fake hand was being stabbed, not their own, they still jerked their hand back.  That was kind of cool.  So was getting a huge bar of chocolate for participating.

Last week, I participated in a milk tasting study.  The researcher strongly emphasized that we should NOT swallow any of the milk.  He also emphasized that an ethics committee did approve the study, so anything we tasted wouldn't cause harm.

Alrighty...

I sat in a cubicle and was presented with a pair of milk samples.  I took a swig of one, swished it around, and then spit it out.  Then I did the same thing with the other sample.  I repeated this for 12 pairs of samples.  My job was to identify the milk that I liked better and explain why.  I'm not a huge fan of milk, so I may or may not have sniffed some samples, decided they smelled HORRIBLE and poured out a wee bit of milk into the spit cup so it looked like I tasted it.

Yes, I am a cheater.  But, in the end I still got a $20 gift card to a local grocery store chain.

The most recent study that I participated in was really fun.  A guy from the tramping club was comparing our ability to locate ourselves on a map of Woodside Glen track, one that none of us had been on before.  The weather was craptastic and so our easy/moderate hike turned into a hardcore sliding down the mountain mudfest.  We had to scramble up the side of a mountain, sometimes on our hands and knees, for nearly 3 hours.  I fell into a stream at one point and ended up getting lost with a group of students (all with their own map mind you).  And you know what?  When we realized we had completely lost the track the first reaction wasn't hmm, maybe we should turn around and go find the track.  Nope. Someone suggested we photo-document being lost.

Like I said, the weather was craptastic.  The fog made it really hard to stay on the right track, especially when we walked through this tussocks. 

So, the leader of our little stroll decided to can having us find the last few points where we needed to locate ourselves on the map.  This was fine by me!  I was tired, cold and hungry.  He promised us lunch, so quitting meant we'd get to eat sooner.  We all looked like dogs on ice on our way to find a place to sit for lunch.  It wasn't a matter of if someone would fall on their rump.  It was more a guess of how many times we all would fall.

Oh, the things we do in the name of research!

Dear Mt. Xenicus, You Kicked My...

On Friday around 6pm, the Tramping Club headed towards Paradise (past Queenstown).  We were in "bed" (in a sleeping bag under a tarp) around 1am, up at 5am for breakfast (muesli, milk, and tea) and on the trail listening to owls and finding glow worms in the dark around 6am.  The sunrise picture above was taken from Routeburn Flats about 1 1/2 hours into the hike.

Our group included Jaz (leader), Tiff, Joey, Pete, Sean and myself.  We knew we were in for 12-14 hours of hiking.  I was not aware that I should have appreciated the nice flat trail up to this point.

Last view of Routeburn Flats for a little bit...

So, you can tell the stream looks a little farther away at this point.  There was a LOT of effort that went into getting to the point where this picture was taken.  We crossed through the stream and then started bushwhacking to the top of this mountain.  I wore gaitors to protect my shins from the prickly plants that covered the rocks and boulders we crossed over.  

In hindsight, it was really cool to scale a mountain and see up close and first hand how the landscape changes.  In the moment, I was scared as hell that I was going to slip down to the base and a) get hurt and b) have to start over trying to get to the top.  Luckily, there was a lot of a grassy plant called tussocks that I could grab ahold of and use to pull myself up... I probably spent a good hour and a half on my hands and knees (and belly) getting up to the top.  Supposedly, this would cut a solid hour off of our hike.

I took a quick break to "chocolate up" (refuel with yumminess) and noticed my poor leggings!  I got holes in the knees from army crawling up the mountain.

I'm pretty good at pretending to be happy, huh?  It's hard to tell, but there is considerable distance to go to get to the bump of rock just below that little bit of blue sky you see in this picture.

I was victorious getting to the top of the first mountain. YAY!

You can see the perfect line where the snow ends on the mountains in the distance.

Getting happier!  This is about as far up as I was willing to go.  The rest of the group went on to the Mt. Xenicus summit.  It was too icy for me to dare attempt it.

Time for the group to chocolate up one last time before the 2 hour trip to the summit of Mt. Xenicus.

Dad's backpack in New Zealand... Dennis Boucher was with us that day!  Yeah, and, for anyone who has read my recap of Ironman Lake Placid, I saw a butterfly!  Coincidence? I think not.  Not quite a monarch, but it was orange and black (probably a moth of some sort, but I'll pretend it really was a butterfly).

Here's the last of my ascent towards Mt. Xenicus.  I'm out of breath, my nose was running because it was windy and cold, and it had been about 7 hours since we had breakfast (I was a little hungry and dehydrated at this point).

So, what's a girl to do when she hangs back while the rest of the group moves on to risk life and limb just to say they reached the top?  Perhaps a little test of the self-timer feature on the camera is in order!

Perhaps a little exploration of my own to see what views I can find for myself...

Lake Wilson on the right.........

When the group returned from the summit, it was time to get out of the cold and wind so that we could relax for lunch.

At last, it was time to head back to the Routeburn Track, but first... a view of Lake Harris...

.... and a closer view of Lake Harris...

All we had left to do was turn around... and follow the water...

Follow the water down to the valley...

I see FLAT land ahead!!

 

(We climbed that mountain on the left!)

Flat land makes me very happy.

The rest of the hike would be super easy if our bodies weren't beat from the previous 10 hours of hard work!

One last bridge....

Back at camp...

On Sunday, we did an easy 40 minute walk to Sylvan Lake.

The only thing left to do was hit the road.  We stopped in Queenstown to get AMAZING food from Fergburger.  But, not before one last look at Lake Wakatipu.