Hi Dan,
Wow. Sounds like quite a hike. Would love to hear stuff sometime.
You need some sherpas or maybe just more interns to carry all the gear ;)
Danny
--- In Dan Dugan <> wrote:
>
> I survived my Haleakala expedition, barely--both technically and
personally.
>
> When I was offered the chance to stay at two ranger cabins in
> exchange for volunteering to do soundscape recording, I knew that I
> was in no shape for a 2-1/2 day backpack up and down mountains at
> high altitude. I didn't want to pass up the opportunity, however, so
> I trained for three weeks carrying ever-heavier backpack loads up
> Bernal Hill, a 400-foot hill right near my lab, every other day. That
> training paid off. I'm sure I couldn't have done it without it, but
> still I was challenged to my limits.
>
> Mike stands and my artificial head & shoulders rig were out because
> they would weigh too much. My intern Brian and I rigged up the
> windscreen domes that I usually use on my vest on either side of my
> backpack instead. My Sharp MD recorder was in a camera case on the
> pack's waist belt. That way I could stop for a recording opportunity
> on the trail, and also use the backpack as a front-channels stereo
> array for fixed four-channel recordings.
>
> Monday morning I signed my research permit and got a Park Service
> radio for emergency use. That was almost the straw that broke the
> camel's back; it was heavy. My load was about 32 pounds. I said
> goodbye to Sharon and started off down the Sliding Sands Trail. On
> the way down (10,000' to 7,000') I paused to record a couple of air
> tour helicopters and a passing trail ride group. Other than that
> there was nothing--the west end of Haleakala is mostly a volcanic
> moonscape.
>
> By the time I got to the bottom my knees were hurting. I thought the
> rest of the way across the crater would be easy, looks that way on
> the topo. It was easy to Kapalaoa Cabin, in the middle. I enjoyed the
> only spot of shade in the crater resting on its front step and
> enjoying four resident nene.
>
> After that, the rest of the way to Paliku Cabin at the east end is
> over lava beds, a lot of small ups and downs that don't show on a
> topo. I was thoroughly wiped out by the time I arrived. I greeted the
> people renting the cabin and went on to the Patrol Cabin, nicely
> appointed with chemical toilet out back, solar lighting, and propane
> stove.
>
> I had hoped to scout the area and set up some distance away, but the
> shadows were long and I was pooped. I set up the backpack with the
> stereo array in the back facing the strip of jungle at the bottom of
> the cliff. I found a spot on the corral fence for the right rear mic,
> and perched the left rear in a tree. I was using two Sharp MD
> recorders for surround.
>
> The evening recording was slim on species and full of the
> conversations in the public cabin a hundred yards away. I suppose it
> has scientific value, but there isn't much I can get from it for an
> aesthetic composition.
>
> In the middle of the night I woke to dripping sounds. I checked the
> mics and it was indeed raining. I got dressed, grabbed the mics, and
> hauled in the cables, looping them on the cabin floor to dry. This
> strip of a few hundred yards has a cloud forest climate due to clouds
> that roll over the cliffs.
>
> I got up at 4:45 to listen for a dawn chorus. There wasn't any. I
> dried out my pack and windscreens over the stove, and started hearing
> birds around 6:00. It was clear, so I set up the mics again. By the
> time I was done it was soaking mist again, but I went ahead and made
> a long 4-channel recording which was probably the best of the
> expedition, quite a few species. No voices in the morning.
>
> After breakfast, documentation, packing and cleaning up I got off on
> the Halemau'u trail west. It took me all day to hump my pack back
> across the crater, with many rest stops. I recorded helicopter tours
> now and then. They're supposed to stay outside the ridge lines, and
> almost all did, but one came right over me. Helicopters were every
> twenty minutes or so, high-altitude jets just a few a day. Otherwise
> it was the quietest place you can imagine. I took a lot of pictures;
> from mid-crater the island of Hawaii was visible through the Kaupo
> Gap.
>
> Again it was late afternoon when I got to Holua Cabin, and the "Holua
> Hilton," a ranger cabin nearby. I was pleased my cabin was around a
> ridge from the public cabin, but the family in the cabin made up for
> it by being very loud, reverberating off the lava field. Again I was
> in pain and exhausted and chose to set up from my cabin as base. I
> propped my pack up again facing the cliffs, put the left rear mic in
> a juniper tree at one corner of the cabin and the right rear on the
> water tank.
>
> As soon as I was ready to record I discovered a popping noise in my
> right front Telinga EM-23 mic. I changed the extension cable to no
> avail. I had to go ahead with three good channels anyway. I'm
> guessing that it might have been moisture from the exposure the night
> before. I had dried out the windscreens, but didn't think to warm up
> the mics themselves. It also might have been the way I had threaded
> the cables through the pack frame. I realized that the cables were
> under pressure at points while I was hiking. Today they sound fine
> and the cables aren't sensitive, so I'm not sure what happened.
>
> While I was troubleshooting a couple set up a tent about a hundred
> feet away on the blind side of my cabin and immediately went inside
> and had sex. I was so tired it wasn't even interesting. It may be odd
> to talk about omni mics having "reach," but the Telingas are quiet
> and really do reach into the distance.
>
> There wasn't much wildlife action there in the evening, either. But
> something unexpected happened. After the almost-full moon rose, there
> was a quite dense but low-level background of bird chatter. A
> moonrise chorus? I also heard some wonderfully weird wing swishing
> sounds in the night.
>
> In the morning I got in some good recording before the neighbors got
> up. It was sparse there in the scrublands.
>
> Wednesday I continued on the trail to where it rises 1500' out of the
> crater in switchbacks. Sharon met me a little ways down from the top.
> Back at our hotel in Lahaina a shower was very welcome.
>
> Thursday we went out to Hana. I put the troubled mics from my pack
> away and put the rear mics on the shoulders of my vest. We
> investigated a short nature trail called Waikamoi Ridge, the only
> publicly accessible part of the huge preserve that the Nature
> Conservancy administers. I got some birds and wind sounds there.
>
> Friday morning at sunrise I went out in the large vegetable garden of
> the native family that rented us our tourist unit in Hana. Three dogs
> chained by their separate houses started a terrible ruckus, so I
> continued out a trail in the back into the bush. When the dogs
> quieted down I was able to get some more morning birds. When I came
> back the dogs woke up the neighborhood again, and a woman came out to
> give me a hard time about the disturbance. I apologized.
>
> That afternoon I hiked the wonderful trail from Oheo to Waimoku
> falls. Part of it goes through a bamboo forest, and the sound of the
> wind in the bamboo was delightful. I got some good takes of that.
>
> -Dan Dugan
>
"Microphones are not ears,
Loudspeakers are not birds,
A listening room is not nature."
Klas Strandberg
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