Survey crew: Sherie, Josh, and Aimee
My struggles with Ingrid started in a 35 km/hr wind, but perhaps I should start at the beginning. For Day 3 and 4, I’ve been working with Josh; taking measurements on a robotic theodolite, called Ingrid. She’s a Total Station Leica T515, who swivels like a Darleck from Dr. Who. Her handheld remote has an hour glass figure, but don’t let her dulcet tones deceive you: she can lie and be temperamental if not treated right. Be nice. Basically treat her like she was dripping diamonds or a being with powerful connections to influential people. When she is upset, she lets you know. A woman’s voice comes on; to beep at you or even scarier, she might say “locked to target”.
Embedded into her hour glass remote is some sophisticated software. Unfortunately, I couldn’t see much of it in the glare of the sun. Also, I brought the wrong kind of shades. It turns out my shades are great for the beach, but too dark for archaeology. So, it was hard to perceive subtle colour changes in the soil layers. It was also really difficult to read the remote touch screen properly. So, I kept hitting the wrong thing on the screen, causing my recording attempts to take longer. Josh was very patient in correcting my errors. Then tumbling around in between thistles and gorse (the only route to get from the drop off point to the site), I managed to break them. Fortunately back at HQ, Rod brought out the ever trusty duct tape and fixed them. Eye protection is an equipment essential, here on Ahuahu / Great Mercury Island. Firstly, there is the fierce sun. Secondly, Ingrid emits a laser light to a prism on a pole to measure distance and points. This way the theodolite triangulates a third point from two known co-ordinates.
Speaking of the prism, it rests on a long pole. It’s really cool to look like Gandalf in Lord of the Rings, stalking innocent archaeologists with this huge wand thing, ready to zap in the location of any of the artefacts they find. The hard part is trying to keep the bubble in the level where it should be in high winds. On Day 3 I worked with Holly and Day 4 I worked with Aimee. We all rotate tasks at Field School, so we get to learn a little bit about the different aspects of archaeology in the field.
Our team took lots of readings of rocks, because there are numerous stone walls along the terraces on the site. Some people seem to think that there is very little for archaeologists to do in New Zealand / Aotearoa. This couldn’t be further from the truth, as we are discovering from our investigations into Ahuahu / Great Mercury Island at Tamawhera.
Sherie Crosby