Month: June 2022

We recovered from the covid, thankfully. On our last day in Potenza, Sergio and his students hosted a party for me and Charlie where we received a couple of small gifts including a full size color geologic map of Italy! In the evening we strolled around the streets of Potenza with Sergio and his wonderful wife Marta and their 3 daughters, Gaia, Aurora and Alice.  We had a light dinner with snacks and beer where Alice (5 yrs old?) performed an elaborate chemistry experiment that involved moving water between many cups on the table, and we ended with a selfie in the Piazza Mario Pagano right outside our apartment. Today we moved out and our host gave us a ride to the Potenza bus station, and we are now in Naples ready to fly back to the U.S. tomorrow. We already miss Potenza and the many wonderful people who we met. I am especially grateful to Sergio and his family and colleagues who made it such a special visit for us. Sergio and I will continue collaborating on stratigraphy and tectonics of southern Italy, and we look forward to returning for more adventures!

Charlie and I thought we might skate through the pandemic without getting infected, but no such luck.  We got sick and tested positive a week ago in Bari, on the coast of the Adriatic Sea, where we attended the 2-day GeoSed conference. Whoops! We stayed an extra 2 nights at a hotel in Bari, and then got a very expensive taxi ride back to Potenza (big tip to the driver who agreed to take us). We have been isolating in our apartment since then, feeling pretty sick and out of it.  Our friends Sergio and Gianpaolo have been heroes, delivering food and supplies and even a direct phone consultation with a doctor early-on. Today I tested negative though still feel like I have a head cold, and Charlie is still testing positive but feeling better every day. We did find out that all the published guidelines will allow us to travel to Naples a week from today (Day 14) and fly back to the U.S. the next day July 1 … thus marking an unexpected twist to our last 2 weeks in Italy.  PS – COVID19 really sucks, best to avoid catching it if possible!

Above: COVID-19 survival kit, Potenza Italy.

On June 13 we attended a one-day field trip with a group of Italian sedimentologists going by the name “GeoSed”, to view Cretaceous and Miocene sedimentary rocks exposed near the crest of the southern Apennine orogenic belt. It was a gorgeous sunny day, I learned a lot and the company was great! Charlie and Sergio struck some memorable poses (see below).  We saw a thick section of Cretaceous marine deposits that were overturned by strong back-thrusting and folding near the crest of the Apennine orogen, and wound up with overturned bedding dips of 30-40° to the NE. We ended the day on a walk through the quaint town of Pietrapertosa, just another gorgeous Italian hilltop ancient stone city.  Photos below.

Above: Charlie and Sergio enjoying the day.

Above: field trip leaders doing what field trip leaders do.

Hey sedimentologists, these turbidites are up-side-down!

Above: Miocene Gorgoglioni Flysch, amalgamated sandy channel-fill turbidite complex.

The boys looking good!

Above: Nice exposures in the hill top town of Pietrapertosa.

Above: Roadside cafe built into channel sandstone with rip-up clasts!

We are finding that the Italian people really love their history and holidays. Recently Potenza hosted a 3-day festival in honor of San Gerardo, the revered patron saint of Potenza. This festival celebrates an event in the year 1111 when San Gerardo is said to have used a magical force of light to repel an attack on Potenza by intruders commonly described as “Turks”. Some myths say that the attackers were actually Saracens from the Syrian or Arabian desert, and other accounts assert that the fighting took place in Germany and the story was translated to southern Italy for religious or political reasons. Regardless of such details, the people of Potenza go all-in on this celebration which included days of singing and partying in the streets, and culminated with the very popular Parade of the Turks. Photos below provide a sample of the energy and color of this event.