Month: April 2022

Tharsis Canyon Journalist Report
Crew 227 Journalist Report 2 April 2022
Sol: 6
Name of the person filing the report: Sirga Drouet
Good evening everyone and welcome to a new adventure of the Tharsis Crew!

Yesterday night after freeze-dried vegetable spaghetti, a discussion about a fun nickname: TCC, Tharsis Cool Crew (an abbreviation that reminds me of the earth), a belote game between girls and the boys at the dishes (a very 2022 situation), Julien hypnotized us!

He placed himself in the community while we were all snuggled up in our bed. Then he started his declamation which put us in a state of drowsiness. His voice was more and more distant and Ignacio was snoring more and more loudly, an indication that Julien had done his session well. I promise I didn’t push Ignacio from the room 😉

Today was a very exciting day! Cheyenne, me, Ignacio, Julien, and Audrey had the quest to find the big canyon I told you about on Sol 2. The one we want to call Tharsis canyon. This time all the elements are in our favor. We drink a big glass of water, put on our space suits, and went into the airlock of decompression.

This moment is always long… Especially on the return when we are hungry! In short, we are in the airlock we go out, we put on our rovers and zouuu we left towards the big exploration!

We had a little difficulty finding the entrance of the canyon but after a catch of height to have a better vision of the zone we quickly located the furrows that the river dug through the thousands of years.

Wow, it is there I said to myself! We left with a decided step towards the cut rocks, with the adventure companions, we left towards the horizon! After a good hour of walk, we were still at the end of a full with some rocks on the edges of the dry bed of the river but still no trace of the big walls of the canyon which we had seen in the distance… However, we walked fast and determined steps!

We thus took the decision to go up and to skirt the crest and further, to jump over the small cracks, to skirt again, and then PAF the moment so much awaited we were all at the top of the canyon. In front of us was an audience of rocks that jostled for a place in the precipice. We were there, very small to look at this spectacle which seemed to us petrified and yet very alive.

Then suddenly Julien (the timekeeper) said to us: guys it remains 60min to return to the rovers whereas we took 1h20 to arrive until here! Alalalala the return was sporting!

We were like in a movie to run to throw the bags, to encourage everybody, to cut the path of the outward journey to optimize the return, a movie I tell you! Finally, we arrived in time to be able to return to the Hab without overheating the rovers and remain careful on the return.

On our way back, like explorers, we explained our adventure to those who stayed in the Hab, we pointed out on the map the path we had taken and how far we had gone in the canyon. Except that after the debate we realized that well, in fact not so far as that! We made 1/3 of the canyon, it is already a feat for tracking! The EVA of tomorrow is planned to be military to beat the score of today, we shall also make a 3D mapping with the drone for the experience of Cyril (we cross the fingers so that it works).

At 4 pm we allowed ourselves a little Saturday madness to celebrate the birthday of Jean (a little late). We ate a brownie, everybody was in the angels, a real delight!
The fact of not having access to the outside world brings us very close, we spend hours talking and laughing without seeing the time pass.

I forgot to specify that yesterday evening Ignacio took us with the telescope a superb picture, between the fails, the nebula Cat eye. Julien and Ignacio planted some plants which point to the end of their nose, we hope to be able to eat them to feel again the taste of the fresh.

This evening in the program delights I foresee us a gratin with insects mmmh!

We think hard to the earth, Spotify did not follow us on Mars it did not follow the crew and I find myself to be the DJ of the orphans of the music.

We are living an incredible experience and we are at half of our life on Mars. We still have a lot to learn but I’m sure we’ll come back grown-up, with a head full of achievements.