PHI BETA ROCK: THE EOU GEOLOGY CLUB!
The Eastern Geology Club has been on hold for the past few years due to the budget crisis. Hopefully it will start up again soon. Here
are some highlights of our past trips!
KELOWNA, BRITISH COLUMBIA: MAY 2009
This year Phi Beta Rock traveled north up the Okanagan Valley to the GSA Cordilleran Section's meeting in Kelowna, B.C. to give a presentation on the Lupherella fossil locality on Eagle Creek in the Wallowas. The spirit of the students was dampened when one of the students was turned back at the border by Canadian customs, but other than that it was a good trip. We had fun looking at the continental glacial features in the area and examining Precambrian gneisses and other rocks.
Corby Wehymiller, Allison Kuenzli, Kelsey Swanson, Candice Burnette, Russ Waisanen, and Bryan Grimshaw pose with our GSA poster (left); the Kelowna skyline with Knox Mountain in the background (right).
Enjoying the view from the top of Knox Mountain, which was covered by ice during the last continental glaciation, with a volcanic neck visible in the background (left); Allison, Russ, Kelsey, Candice, Craig Byrum, Corby, and Bryan pose for the camera (right).
The group examines Pleistocene varved silts deposited on the floor of glacial Lake Penicton(left); Craig Byrum discovers that it isn't that tuff to love a Precambrian gneiss! (right)
The club ponders the origin of Layer Cake Mountain, made up of andesite flows that are about the same age as the Clarno Formation of central Oregon.
WAIMEA, HAWAII: SPRING 2008
School ended and 7 members of Phi Beta Rock headed to Hawaii to attend the AAAS Pacific Section's meeting in Waimea. This is the third time the club has visited the Big Island! The club gave a presentation on the newest finds at the Always Welcome Inn and Eric Bergey and Carli Morris talked about their senior theses. Three presentations in one meeting-- A new record! We got sunburned on Hapuna Beach, hiked down into the Pololu Valley, visited the tsunami memorial at Laupahoehoe, viewed Akaka Falls, saw steam shooting out of Kilauea Crater's new vent, watched lava flow into the ocean, visited South Point, the southernmost point in the United States, and hiked to the remote and breathtaking Green Sand Beach. The club members had way too much fun for just one week!
Corby Weyhmiller, Tyler Dretke and Allison Kuenzli enjoy Hapuna Beach (left) and Allison Kuenzli, Tyler Dretke and Russ Waisanen test out the waves on Pololu Beach (right).
Carli Morris and Allison Kuenzli highlight the important points of the Club's Always Welcome Inn poster. Note the green t-shirts sporting the logo "Get your aa out of my pahoehoe!"
The group (Ken Brasel, Corby Weyhmiller, Allison Kuenzli, Tyler Dretke, Eric Bergey, Bryan Grimshaw (back), Ken's mom (front left) and Carli Morris (front right) pose in front of the eruption in Kilauea Caldera (left) and the lava entering the sea (right).
The club enjoys body surfing at Green Sand Beach on the south end of the Big Island.
ST. GEORGE, UTAH: SPRING 2007
Off we went to GSA meeting in St. George, Utah, sporting t-shirts with a dinosaur saying "Do it on the Colorado Plateau". The geology club's presentation on the fossils at the Always Welcome Inn was a great success! This year the club did lots of hiking. We had fun in Snow Canyon hiking up the cinder cone and through the sand to Three Ponds. The hike down into Bryce Canyon on a beautiful blue-sky day was a blast! Who do, hoodoo? The high point of the trip was hiking up the narrow, steep-sided trail to Angel's Landing in Zion Canyon and then hiking into Kolob Canyon, camping, and waking up the next day and hiking up to see Kolob Arch, the longest in the world. It was a hard, hot hike out, but well worth it. The pool at the condo we rented in St. George felt great after hiking!
Bryce Grimshaw, Kate Asplund, Carli Morris, Eric Bergey, and Misty Davis pose before hiking down into Bryce Canyon (left); On the way down into Bryce Canyon (right);
The trail up to Angel's Landing in Zion National Park (left); Eric, Carli, Story, Kate, Bryan, and Misty's purse pose after hiking up to Angel's Landing.
ANCHORAGE, ALASKA: SPRING 2006
The Geological Society of America meeting was in Alaska this year, so the Geology Club headed north, sporting t-shirts that read "Do It On A Glacier". We visited Earthquake Park, which was devastated in the 1964 Earthquake, looked at the rocks exposed along Turnagain Arm, hiked on Matanuska Glacier, toured Denali National Park, and capped off our trip with a visit to the Pacific Northwest Earthquake and Tsunami Warning Center. We stayed at a great bed and breakfast, the Denali Lakeview Inn, where we saw bald eagles, moose, and lots of snowshoe rabbits. A great time was had by all!
Hiking on Matanuska Glacier! Photo by Bryan Grimshaw.
Carli, Story, Jay, and Bryan pose in front of Mt. Denali
.
GRAND JUNCTION, COLORADO: SPRING 2005
Our 2005 trip took us to the Rocky Mountain Geological Society of America Meeting in Grand Junction, Colorado, to present a paper on the fossils, stratigraphy, and structure of the Always Welcome Inn outcrop in Baker City, Oregon. While we were in the neighborhood, we visited Colorado National Monument, Canyonlands, Arches, Dinosaur National Park, the Black Canyon of the Gunnison, Dinosaur Hill, and a lot of other neat dinosaur trackway and fossil sites. We stayed in the snow at the Alexander Lake Lodge at 9,000 feet elevation at night and toured the desert in 100 degree weather during the day. We saw a lot of spectacular geology in a short period of time!
Phi Beta Rock 2005 at Black Canyon of the Gunnison . Front row: Rob Ledgerwood and Sarah Smith. Middle row: Amber Jamison, Zach St. Lawrence, Russ Waisenen, Kristy Piper. Back Row: Calvin Davis, Craig Berryman, Kelby Killgore, and Ben Holtby.
The group starts to hike around the rim of Canyonlands National Monument.
LA GRANDE TO BANDON: SPRING 2004
This was a historic year: Our first trip with another geology club! On our first day, we traveled from La Grande to Fossil, the Clarno Palisades, and Smith Rock State Park (no relation to Sarah!), and then stayed the night at Calvin Davis' grandmother's beautiful house overlooking Lake Billy Chinook and Mt. Jefferson. The next day took us to Balancing Rocks and Crater Lake, and we slept over at the spectacular Treesort in Takilma, Oregon. The next day we toured Oregon Caves and the California coast near Crescent City, which was devastated by the tsunami of 1964. We camped at Jedediah Smith Redwoods National Park, whre we met up with the Southern Oregon University Geology Club. Then we traveled up the southern Oregon coast to Bandon, where we stayed at Tintagel-By-The-Sea, a beautiful beach house. We arrived back at EOU the next day, tired but happy, after traveling over 1500 miles and seeing some spectacular geology!
Lea Over, Bryce Budlong, Rob Ledgerwood, Kim Muir, Calvin Davis, Klista Starner, Sarah Smith, and Lynna Fischer pose at Crater Lake!
PUERTO VALLARTA, MEXICO, GSA MEETING: SPRING 2003
The GSA meeting in 2003 took us to Puerto Vallarta, Mexico, where two of the students presented a poster on recently discovered glcial moraines and faults on the floor of Wallowa Lake. The weather
was warm and beautiful. Riding the buses back and forth between the fabulous villa the Geology Club had rented north of Puerto Vallarta near Punta de Seca and exploring the nearby town (especially Filo's, run by an American who plays music at his restaurant by night and teaches English and other subjects to local kids by day) taught the students a lot about Mexican culture.
A good time was had by all!
Bryce Budlong, Calvin Davis, Jayne-Leigh Thomas, J.R. Collier, Andrew Jones, Bill Miller, and Jay and April Van Tassell pose in front of the pillars at the Hotel Krystal, where the GSA meeting was held in Puerto Vallarta. Photo by Lisa Collier.
Two ornery bandidos, Bryce Budlong and J.R. Collier, pose in front of their very successful Wallowa Lake Poster.
WALLA WALLA, GSA, AND THE SOUTHERN OREGON COAST: SPRING 2002
Professor Robert Carson of Whitman College led us on a fascinating tour of the Touchet Beds and clastic dikes near Walla Walla, Washington. The next day, the geology club headed to Corvallis for the Geological Society of America Meeting (hang onto your slides, Jay!), and then traveled to Bandon and toured the southern Oregon coast all the way to California.
Everyone looks cool in front of the spectacular angular unconformity at Shore Acres State Park, south of Coos Bay.
HAWAII: THE BIG IS LAND: SPRING 2001
We had a great trip to the Big Island , continuing our "hot spot" tour! Puu'oo was erupting and we got to see lava flowing into the sea. We also had a great time studying the reefs and wave action in the Kona area.
Mark Peterson, Tim Schwehr and his sister Karla, Ann Bloom-Dickison and her son Nick, and Tanager Stanhope pose in front of the lava entering the sea near Kalapana, Hawaii.
CRATERS OF THE MOON-YELLOWSTONE: SUMMER 2000
Phi Beta Rock traveled to Craters of the Moon and Yellowstone, chasing the hot spot that used to be in the Owyhee area 15 million years ago. Paint pots and hot springs and rhyolite, oh my!
April Van Tassell helps extricate James Hasse from a lava tube at Craters of the Moon, Idaho.
GLACIER NATIONAL PARK TRIP: SUMMER 1999
In July of 1999, the Geology club, Phi Beta Rock, traveled to Glacier National Park to look at the spectacular Precambrian rocks and glacial features of the area. We arrived just as the Going-To-The Sun Highway opened! A great time was had by all, as the picture below will illustrate.
On the edge along Going-To-The Sun Highway east of Logan Pass. Reynolds Mountain and Clements Mountain,
glacial horns, are in the background. From left to right, Jay Van Tassell, Jenny Campbell, Sara Cartmel, Sandra Staab, Parker McKinley, Jennifer Keene and Kim Haynes.
GRAND CANYON TRIP: SPRING 1998
Phi Beta Rock traveled to Flagstaff, Arizona, for the Rocky Mountain GSA section meeting in May of 1998. The trip included visiting Sunset Crater, Walnut Canyon, and Wupatki National Monuments, and, of course, a hike down into the Grand Canyon!
Sandra Staab rejoices after completing the hike down into the Grand Canyon!
HAWAII TRIP: SPRING 1997
The week before the last week of classes...what better time to go to Hawaii! A great time was had by all as we toured the Big Island and visited Volcanoes National Monument!
Matt Pidcock, Maggie Swanger, Glenn Fromwiller and Amanda Johnson relax on the beach at Kailua-Kona after a hard day of fieldwork.