Flowing Water in the DRY Valleys

Kathy and I took a trip up to the Wright Valley on December 10 in another search for windblown sediments. We set down near the Stream Team's gauging station for the Onyx River. The Onyx is the longest river in Antarctica. It actually flows away from the coast, as there is a glacier blocking the exit. The glacier forms Lake Brownworth, which in turn feeds the Onyx.


We had five hours of ground time, so we spent it hiking in a big loop from the Onyx east to Lake Brownworth on the south side of the valley and back on the north side. We came across some pretty impressive windblown formations against the lee side of the hill slopes. There were also some pretty impressive ventifacts in the area, which I also sampled.

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After talking to the Limno Team about their bundt pan experiments, it was decided that I would be the one to collect them this year. In doing so, I also get direct access to the samples. I was emailed a series of coordinates for each of the three transects of 9 pans: one at each of the major lakes in the Taylor valley (Fryxell, Hoare, & Bonney).

On my first run, Lake Fryxell transect by the F6 camp, two of the nine coordinates I was given were incorrect and one of the bundt pans set ups and been completely torn apart by the wind.
The transect at Lake Hoare went swimmingly. Lake Bonney, however, had it's own trials.

At Lake Bonney, technology failed me. Both my in-use batteries and the back-up batteries for my GPS died by the time I got to the fifth (of nine, again) bundt pan. I attempted to find the rest by line-of-sight and was successful, except for the ninth pan. In the end I had to call it lost because I was cutting it close on time to make it back to Lake Bonney in time for my helo flight back to Lake Hoare.

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By the time I started hunting for bundt pans (and really from the time I went to Bonney the first time...) the moats on the lakes had started to open up in earnest. This makes crossing the lakes a very treacherous and, more often than not, a wet one. There's nothing quite as surprising as stepping on what appears to be solid ice, only to fall through and be wet above your boots in icey, glacier-fed lake water. There are even waterfalls coming off the glaciers!

It is around this time of year that the boats come out to get to the solid ice for those that find themselves needing to cross the lakes. It is also this time of year that the ATVs are no longer used, making lake walking take even longer.

Hoare crystals form along the margins of the thicker ice and where the lakes and the glaciers meet. These appear to be a function of the melting and refreezing of these relatively shallow portions of the water