The Accidental Archaeologist
The official on-the-go adventure blog
I’d like to say the lack of posts the last couple of days was because I was too busy celebrating the end of a successful dig. This is not the case. Well…let me rephrase that. The dig has been pretty successful, with new information found about the last 100 years or so of Indian occupation on the island. Again, I’m afraid I can’t be too specific yet, since none of our finds have been made public yet, but I’m happy that I have enough data to get started on my dissertation research now. No, the reason for my silence is, as many of you may have guessed, the fact that I’m going through my own personal hell as a dig leader. Trapped. AGAIN. Last time we were trapped on the island by a hurricane; this time we’ve been trapped in the country by a volcano (of all things!) I didn’t put “volcano” in my risk assessment. I wasn’t even remotely considering it. If you’d told me when I left the UK that two weeks later I’d be stranded in my “home” country wanting to get back to my other “home” country, but unable to because of a volcano erupting in Iceland, I might have referred you to a good head doctor who specializes in paranoia. That’s how surreal this whole situation is.
So, to summarize: Thursday was Day Ten of the dig, and (theoretically at least) our last day. We spent the best part of the day chucking dirt back into the large tetris whole of trenches. When it was done and all was cleared up, a few of our local hosts took the team, still filthy and exhausted, out to the end of the Cape for a little relaxing at the beach. They hadn’t been to the beach here yet, so everyone was thrilled, and came back sunburnt and grinning. I stayed behind and worked on organizing and cataloguing with Mark. We all went out to dinner at the local restaurant and celebrated the end of a great dig.
The next day brought us the first snippets of worrying news. UK airspace closed, lots of flights delayed or cancelled. Mark and Andy, who were supposed to fly out that afternoon, read the headlines with grim faces and checked airline news obsessively. However, we couldn’t get through by phone to reschedule or find out any updates, so it was decided to make the three hour trip to Norfolk anyway. Two of our students needed to go up there anyway to get a rental car and head south for a few days, so we loaded Mark, Andy, and another student into one rental car, and I hopped in the other with the other two students. We were planning on dropping off one of our two rentals that day, so I had to be on hand to take folks back if their flight was cancelled. A few miles up the road we all stopped for gas in a nearby town. When we pulled out of the station, Mark was ahead of me, and, since I got stopped by a traffic light, I soon lost him. This is where it starts to get a bit like Groundhog Day…
A few more miles up the road, I see a sherriff’s cruiser cut a tight U-turn ahead of me a speed ahead, lights flashing. We all looked on for a minute until he disappeared from sight. All had the same thought, which I eventually voiced: “I bet he’s snagged Mark.” Sure enough, we got a little ways up the road to find Mark negotiating with an extremely angry looking deputy. He’d been pulled over for speeding. For the third time. In ten days. To make matters worse, it was the SAME deputy who had pulled him over the first time. He tried his “I’m terribly sorry, I’m British” line on the guy, and the reply was “I know. That’s what you said the LAST time I pulled you over.” Unbelievably, Mark made it off the hook AGAIN. But he was warned that one more time would see him heading to jail in Manteo, no questions asked. We’re starting to refer to him as Mark “Blue Lights” Horton. By the time I met up with him in Norfolk airport, he was well and truly in the doghouse as far as all of us were concerned. It didn’t help matters that he then spent the better part of 45 min. trying to negotiate with the ticket agent any conceivable route back to England upon hearing that his flight was cancelled. He had her checking everywhere but Siberia, for Pete’s sake.
We left the airport with Mark & Andy rescheduled for a Tuesday flight and the other student rescheduled for Wednesday. The drive back was a little tense, as I was still mad at Mark and everyone was worried about the logistics of not making it home in time. Mark was confined to the back seat and told he wouldn’t be touching the steering wheel of the rental car for the rest of the trip. Occasionally, we would hear a rather small voice from the back saying, “You know, I really am AWFULLY sorry. I’ll never, ever, ever speed in America again.” Like the “Mom” that I’ve become on this trip, I replied, “You got that right…that’s because you won’t drive in this country again if I have anything to say about it!”
That evening, we arrived back at home base and broke the bad news to the crew. They didn’t seem that concerned, but it may have been because they had had their first real day off here, and had spent the whole day on the beach. When we got back, they were well into a case of beer. This might explain everyone’s reluctance to get up the next morning, but I was at the restaurant on the internet just after the sun was up to check for a status change. There was none. As of yet, we’re still in limbo. I got more and more depressed as the day went on, trying to figure out how to take care of this group for the next few days. They were all supposed to be out of my hair by today so I could get my last bit of work done and relax a bit. Now, some of them are actually rescheduled to fly out AFTER I leave on Friday. And the hotel is totally booked from Wednesday on through the weekend, so it’s back to camping for some of them. I desparately want to escape up to DC or down to Charleston until my day to leave, but we only have the one car.
So, we sit here. We spent yesterday with some folks trying to sort out the gigantic puzzle that is the bags of Native American ceramics we’ve recovered. They were trying to match pieces and reconstruct pots out of them. We managed to get almost a complete bowl at one point. I worked on illustrating most of the day. Throughout the day, folks would disappear across the street for an online update, but the news just kept getting more grim. It looks like it could be a few more days. In the meantime, Mark is keen to do some more digging of test pits. Not everyone is so enthusiastic about that idea, but they’re getting bored enough that they might go along with it. Besides, it’s too cold to go to the beach today. If anyone knows of a spare merchant ship that’s going transatlantic in the next day or two, send help.
