Today marks the second day of classes , so instead of taking the next hour before class to, oh, work on those manuscript edits, I’ll tell you my tale of work in California.

The SparkNotes version of my week in and around Cucamonga Canyon is this: there’s a reason why we don’t have a lot of data from steep scree and bedrock cliffs but by golly the DiBiase Dream Team went to get some! Al Neely’s sampling campaign mainly consisted of collecting sand for cosmogenic 10Be and taking many photos of cliffs and channels to create photogrammetric models. That meant a lot of hiking for us, and while the San Gabriel Mountains will always be wondrous and special to me, Cucamonga Canyon did its best to change my mind about that.

I’ll never take a trail (or bouldery, vegetation-free channel) for granted again after bushwhacking through stinging nettle, poison oak and rattlesnake lairs. Likewise, I’d recommend the Butts and Guts classes through Penn State Fitness to prepare for a day that might involve ascending 1000 meters with 3 gallons of water on your back (or wet cosmo samples…same thing). For those of you in State College keeping track at home, that’s five Mt. Nittany ascents, and you don’t even get to go to Cafe Lemont at the end.

But at least you get these views!

Even on the Literal Worst Day Ever, we had a sweet sampling spot:

Of course, the week was rounded out with obligatory visits to Donut Man, In-N-Out, Pho Ha, Taco Man and Baldy Lodge (and even some time in Claremont’s Starbucks #tbt).

Oh, and my shift was over before the Blue Cut Fire began (though I was in San Antonio Canyon hunting some sweet corundums with my PoCoGeo partner in crime Anne Fulton).