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29 January 2015
More pillow basalt at Rodeo Cove
I promised photos of the second part of my trip to see pillow basalts at the Marin Headlands, and here we are, just as the fog was lifting in the early afternoon. After exploring the Point Bonita lighthouse and its vicinity, we decided to hike down through the abundant succulents (Carpobrotus edulis, if I’ve got it right) to Rodeo Cove and its beach.
19 January 2015
Pillow basalts at Point Bonita
It’s amazing how quickly I’m capable of abandoning my blogging resolutions, really. Here we are, a couple of weeks into the new year and I’ve failed to a) post more often and b) talk about my research. (I swear I have a post in the works about that, but it’s gotten long and unwieldy and in desperate need of editing!) But this weekend I’m going to keep a couple of the other resolutions, and blog about the trip I took yesterday to the Marin Headlands.
24 November 2014
Primitive camping and serpentinite
There are field trips that make me very glad I drive a car with a reasonable amount of clearance, and my camping overnighter to the Los Padres National Forest south of Big Sur was no exception. Driving the Coast Ridge Road wasn’t the most harrowing trip I’ve ever made, but it certainly merited the description of ‘gnarly’ that one of my camping buddies applied.
21 October 2014
Standing on the San Andreas Fault
Having just arrived in California and still in the process of unpacking boxes in my apartment, I decided the most productive thing to do was go on a hike. Silicon Valley is near a lot of Open Space Preserves as well as various local and state parks, and I was really eager to get outside and explore. And because I’m in California, I was hungry to finally set eyes (and foot) on the biggest fault I could get to.
29 September 2014
Cross-country recap, and a brief hiatus
So I’ve made it across the country, and I’m now happily settled in California and getting used to my new job as a postdoc with the USGS! However, being a federal employee means I have different regulations to follow while using social media, so I’m going to be taking a break from blogging while I sort those out. To tide you over, here are some of my favorite photos from the cross-country drive, which was a great (though long) experience.
14 May 2013
Benchmarking Time: San Pedro Breakwater, Los Angeles, CA
Time to get caught up on the benchmark queue! I’m a few submissions behind, but this summer should be a good opportunity to get caught up on them. This submission comes from Marty, who has taken some great photos of the Los Angeles Harbor Light (or the Angels Gate Light) and San Pedro Breakwater in the Los Angeles Harbor.
Jessica Ball is a volcanologist at the U.S. Geological Survey, researching volcanic hydrothermal systems and stability, and doing science communication for the California Volcano Observatory. She previously worked at the Geological Society of America's Washington DC Policy Office, learning about the intersection of Earth science and legislative affairs. Her Mendenhall postdoc and PhD focused on how water affects the stability of volcanoes, and involved both field investigations and numerical modeling applications. Her blogging covers a range of topics, from her experiences in academic geosciences to science outreach and communication to her field and lab work in volcanology.