Best day at work ....Offroading babe :)

i totally disagree with whoever said "you can't have fun at work" ... I did ... yesterday..part of what I do for a living is to design a mobile network ..(for the layman, who's rolling his eyes...I basically get to decide, where I want big black boxes that help you make that call on your cellphone...)...and yesterday I got to go an island 25 miles off coast of Santa Barbara, called the Santa Cruz Island to figure out where in the wilderness would I want to put a cell site to provide the only means of communication to the permanent residents of the island ....

I had so much fun yesterday, that decided to blog it .. so I dont forget it ... not that the ton of pics i took yesterday will let me do so...:)

(courtesy nature.org)

Santa Cruz in short is any nature lover's dream ... it's full of steep cliffs along the coastline, coves and the central valley that splits the island along the Santa Cruz Island fault... it's almost 21 miles from west to east and home to some species of flora and fauna found nowhere else in the world ... Some quick facts on the island:

1. Main mammal (apart from the official population of 3 people) - the island fox that's supposed to be as small as a house cat and is a cross between a cat and a dog (figuratively speaking..).. these are pretty territorial and they'll eat anything from oranges to plant to mice ... we did see lots of half eaten oranges...I have to tell you ... these would be a pretty healthy bunch of foxes ...given all the vit C they consume :)

2. Mice - aggressive bunch according to an inside source ... these are scared of none ... and they have a sharp set of teeth to chew through almost anything ... and tons of them on the island

3. A typical kind of bush called island buckwheat is found nowhere else in the world and is a prolific and beautiful bush....

4. The tallest flowering tree in south and north america is found here ... Eucalyptus trees .. some of them more than 200 feet tall .... there's a big grove of them near the central valley ... big hunkering trees that consume at least 300 gallons of water each day...

5. Most of the buildings on the main ranch in central valley were built in 1880-1891...out of bricks made on the island ... limestone quarried from the northern coast and carried inland on treacherous and steep trails by wagons ... there's a small chapel, two three barns..

6. The only source of power is solar energy ... harnessed by huge solar panels ... that produce surplus energy ...

7. Windward ho!! - the western end of the island has a cooler climate, is windier ... thanks to all the coastal breeze that gets channeled into the valleys and peeks ..pine forests are in abundance at this end ...

8. Grass is greener on the other side - Very true for the island figuratively speaking...an aerial view(awesome view from the 7 seater small plane that I took to get to the island!!) speaks a thousand words :) half of the island is absolutely barren and devoid of green as compared to the other half ... this thanks to some 100000 sheep and some 5000 pigs who decided to have a "all you can eat buffet party" some years ago ... the sheep ultimately had to be exterminated to prevent the island greenery from becoming "thread bare".... they just have a couple of cows, two horses left on the island as part of the ranch...no more sheep....

Enough of facts ....there are no roads ... only trails... so to get across the island from one end to other .. you have to offroad ... and it was a very wonderful dusty, albeit roller coast-ish experience ... :) and ofcourse the flight back and to was very smooth ... despite all the propeller ringing I still have :) we flew our lunch in ... and camped out poolside for our meetings ....

It was one heck of a trip in short ... :) Business trip that I enjoyed to no end ..... and for more information ... here's a pretty concise link that tells you the how, what , where.

And here's the background information on Santa Cruz:
http://www.nature.org/wherewework/northamerica/states/california/preserves/art6335.html

I love my work ....few days I get to say it ...Off roading... yeah...