Happy Labor Day!!

 

A fearless archaeology student crossing the "bridge" we built across the Huanangue River

In honor of Labor Day, I thought I would take a minute to talk about the importance of infrastructure to everyday life.  Many of us take the roads and bridges that we all drive on to get to work, the store, home, etc. for granted.  However, in many of the regions of the world, this basic infrastructure is lacking.  For example, in the Huanangue Valley there is only one dirt road with travels up the north side of the river.  This means that people who live or cultivate fields on the south side of the valley have to find safe ways to cross the river, which is quite dangerous during the rainy season.  Currently, people build what are locally called "waros" (think of them as informal bridges) out of tree limbs, pieces of wood, bamboo, cane and wire.  These "waros" are not for the faint of heart and they can be quite difficult to cross (particularly when carrying archaeological supplies!)

 

As you can imagine, balloon mapping holds tremendous advantages over conventional mapping with a total station or theodolite in these kinds of conditions.  If you loose your balance(which is easy to do, this particular waro moved up and down, side to side, and twisted from edge to edge all at the same time when people tried to cross) and drop the total station in to the river, you are out several thousand dollars and your field season is in jeopardy.  If you drop your mapping rig into the river, everything can be easily replaced for two or three hundred dollars.

This is also why it is important for us to teach local community members how to use the balloon mapping rigs.  The difficultly and remoteness of the terrain makes topographic specialists from Lima leery to come out to the Huanangue Valley as they do not want to risk their equipment.  Once local residents know how to make their own maps, this will no longer be a problem!