Author: Mike Pole

From New Zealand. Traveling the weyward path trying to figure out how the world works. I study fossil plants, past climates, travel, walk, hike, read, take photos, struggle with computer graphics and plant trees.

Cheap Eats Nanjing 2 – Biangbiang Noodles

I had to warm a little to this place – its signature dish, ‘Biangbiang Noodles’, means you are trying to eat (with chopsticks) something that is like an enormously elongated and slippery chink of lasagna. At first I found it impossible to haul the stuff up more than about an inch out of the bowl.… Continue reading Cheap Eats Nanjing 2 – Biangbiang Noodles

West Timor – Mine of Women and the Palm Wine Bomb

West Timor – Mine of Women, and the Palm-Wine Bomb I never thought to see a mine run by women. By why not? And why? Timor is an island north of Australia, and owes its existence to the geological collision between Australia and Indonesian archipelago to the north. The east side of Timor is now… Continue reading West Timor – Mine of Women and the Palm Wine Bomb

Australian Grasstrees – ancient registrars of fire

In Australia there are trees that look like inside-out chimneys. Strong but sensitive – a fungal attack can leave them as a pile of mush within days, and, often as not, they won’t survive being transplanted from the wild. But, you can burn them to a crisp – and they will re-sprout, again, and again,… Continue reading Australian Grasstrees – ancient registrars of fire

Five Degrees of Global Warming – The Leaf Fossils of Kakahu, New Zealand

Fossil leaf from Early Eocene New Zealand

Sometime in the 1980s my Prof, ‘JDC’ (Doug Campbell of the Otago University), showed me a box of spectacular leaf fossils that had been collected from Kakahu by Graeme Mason while “out rabbiting”. Kakahu is a farming district in the hills, a few kilometres out of Geraldine, in New Zealand. Leaf fossils had been known… Continue reading Five Degrees of Global Warming – The Leaf Fossils of Kakahu, New Zealand

Would you like a beer? – Guests of the Kalimantan Police

Roni is a Batak. This is a christian tribe that lives in the Lake Toba area of the otherwise Muslim Sumatra. The Bataks are famous for their relaxed, easy-going, easy to get along with anyone nature. Roni is just the kind of guy a geologist wants as a partner, minder, and Mr Fix-it. There was a… Continue reading Would you like a beer? – Guests of the Kalimantan Police

Chromite and Pine Forests – the closest I’ll ever get to the Old Syria

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On March 21, 2011  I was sent to do a job in the far south-east of Turkey.  Me and Erol, my indispensable helper, met the local contact, dined, and were then driven far into the hills. I only had the fuzziest of notions where I was going – as no-one spoke a word of English… Continue reading Chromite and Pine Forests – the closest I’ll ever get to the Old Syria

The Giant ‘Lake Manuherikia’ – an extinct lake from the New Zealand Miocene

Bannockburn Formation of the Miocene Manuherikia Group, exposed at Galloway, New Zealand

Alexandra lies at the junction of the Clutha and Manuherikia Rivers. The usual translation of the Maori word ‘Manuherikia’ is that it means something like “cry of a tied bird” and records a scout tying a weka (a bird) to a stake to mark the crossing point of that river (Reed Dictionary of NZ Maori Place… Continue reading The Giant ‘Lake Manuherikia’ – an extinct lake from the New Zealand Miocene

(Both) Battles of Breitenfeld – a day’s walk near Leipzig

It is a macabre thought that in these days of GIS and databases, someone could probably come up with a map of Europe – colour-coded by the amount of human lives lost in battles over the past score of centuries or so. I wonder what it might tell us. Leipzig is one of those German… Continue reading (Both) Battles of Breitenfeld – a day’s walk near Leipzig

Where was the Murihiku in the Jurassic?

A few years ago I used to teach American classes that came to the University of Queensland. One evening my Stanford class had just arrived and I wandered over to their college accommodation to say Hello. I came across an odd sight – a knot of students surrounding what turned out to be a young… Continue reading Where was the Murihiku in the Jurassic?