Mission San Antonio de Padua
Field School
As part of my major in Archaeology I needed to go to field school. The first thing I noticed is how expensive they are! I ended up choosing this one for a few reasons. First of all it's a good deal money wise (which you will find out when you start looking around). There are less expensive ones, but they tend to be only a few weeks in length, which leads to the number two reason. This one is 6 weeks long! And reason number three? Well, I live in NJ, and this field school was the farthest I could get from home while staying in the country!
The school is hosted by California Polytechnic (CalPoly) summer session. For 6 weeks you stay at the Mission San Antonio de Padua in Jolon California. The mission is in the middle of a reserve on (part of?) Fort Hunter Ligget army base. Because of this, it is very isolated. We had some visitors we gave tours to, but for the most part you are on your own. Just you, the friars and the field school.
It is beautiful and peaceful and almost like a retreat. I grew to love the sound of coyotes at night.
This is one of the cloistered walks at the mission. This is the front of the building, but there is also an entire cloistered garden with a fountain. Like I said, beautiful.
The reserve is all around you, and more than beautiful. We went on field trips with the school, and then on some weekends a few of us drove around looking for rocks to climb up on. It's not the serious, guideline type of rockclimbing, but there are all sorts of opportunites to climb up and just meditate. Boy am I feeling "homesick" right now.
But of course we're there to work! The strangest thing (to me) was how dry it was. In NJ, even on a hot, dry day, you dig less than a foot and you get moisture. In 6 weeks, digging 2 or 3 meters, I never hit wet soil. Though it did rain once! It sprinkled for about 5 minutes one day. Oh and one more thing. When they say it's not the heat, but the humidity? I hate to admit it, but they're right. When it was over a hundred (more than a few times) all you had to do was step into the shade of a tree and you felt fine. Too bad my pit was in the sun all day long!
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