Lake Kutubu

From various points around this area and when you are flying in you get good views of Lake Kutubu. Here is some information on it.

Lake Kutubu is the second largest lake in the country. It is at an elevation of 808 meters with an area of 4,924 ha and was Until recently one of the most inaccessible areas in the country, with access only by light aircraft or on foot. The lake was formed when ash and debris from a volcanic eruption blocked of a valley. It has a maximum depth of approximately seventy meters. The lake depth can vary up to 2 m between the maximum height of a wet period and the end of a dry period. Annual average temperature is 23°C and rainfall is 4,500 mm.

The lake is fringed by reed-dominated swamp, especially at the northern and southern ends and The site includes seasonally inundated flatland swamp forest. During a scuba survey, several submerged cave systems were found.

Southern Highlands Province was the last area to be penetrated by the Australian colonial administration. The administration's first outpost was established in 1939. Indigenous land use has changed little in the intervening 60 years, in this one of the most sparsely populated regions in the country. The Fasu people are spread widely to the west and southwest of the lake and own the land in which oil fields are located. Residents of the villages around the lake rely principally on the sago palm that provides 75% of their food volume (starch), as well as supplying building material. There is subsistence gardening, and hunting and fishing encampments. There have been several attempts to introduce cash crops, such as cocoa and coffee, but with little success thus far because of limited transportation. The development of oil and gas in the region has however, increased access through the development of road links and establishment of regular airplane flights.

(Most of this info comes from a website on wetlands preservation www.wetlands.org

Nothing much happening

Today it looked for a while as if the weather was improving and it actually stopped raining for a few hours. I grabbed my camera and dashed off to take a few photos of the camp. Good thing that I did it straight away because now at three in the afternoon we are once again enveloped in cloud and a steady drizzle has set in. Work wise there is nothing to report really, just steady as she goes while we await the go ahead from the community affairs group to start construction, hopefully in the next week or so.

Welcome to the jungle.

Three of us went out for a trip along the road yesterday to have a look
through the Agogo processing facility and up to the drill pad where the
bush run of the line meets the road.
I think I have written about this before but just to reiterate, the
project is the construction of a set of pipelines from a wellhead in the
jungle to a processing facility at Agogo. The first seven kilometres,
the bush run, are through some very inhospitable jungle and everything
on that section needs to be flown in, men, equipment and materials. Then
from the end of the bush run to Agogo the lines follow the edge of a
dirt road, the road run, and finally there is the tie-ins and some
refurbishment of a separator vessel and the fabrication of a slug
catcher at the Agogo plant itself.

As I hadn't been out in the field yet I jumped on the opportunity to go
out and have a look. So we left the rain surrounding Ridge camp for the
mere drizzle of Agogo about half an hours drive away. On entering the
plant and checking in at the control room we got a quickie safety
briefing and were then left to our own devices. The plant is small by
most standards and the area where we have to bring in the line is mostly
clear although we will have to excavate a rocky outcrop to get enough
space for the slug catcher.

By the time we left the plant a small miracle had occurred, it stopped
raining! Now we went up the road looking for possible laydown areas for
the pipe and to check on the road crossings we will have to put in. The
road steadily goes up and it wasn't all that long before we were back in
the clouds but apart from the odd spot of rain it stayed pleasant enough
and after another hours drive we reached the end of the road and the
start for the bush run. There is a small camp up here for the drillers
and exploration crews that come by from time to time. It consists of
five or so portacoms a bush kitchen and a longhouse. The portacoms have
four or five rooms each, the longhouse sleeps about twenty and is
completely made out of bush material and plastic sheeting and looks like
something you'll normally expect to see in the slums of Bombay although
it's actually quite serviceable. The bush kitchen is a similar structure
as the longhouse but split in a kitchen and dining area and the kitchen
has all the stainless steel benches and appliances you would expect to
find in similar facilities around the world. As we are thinking about
possibly using this camp for some of our personnel we had a look around
to see what we might need to upgrade and change, mainly the toilet and
shower block, before we can move our people in.

When the cloud cover parts you can see the wellhead we have to start our
line from but in the hour or so we were up here it only cleared once for
two or three minutes. The scenery here is magnificent though with huge
trees and very dense foliage, from the camp you look into a gorge that's
at least five hundred meters deep and which we will have to go down in
before crossing two rivers and heading back up a ridge to the well head.
With the rain making everything slippery and the clouds making
helicopter support hazardous it will be one hardcore construction
project.

On the way back we also called in to the area where we want to put our
main camp. Again this is located on a ridge and on a good day you look
down over Lake Kutubu of course there were clouds when we arrived but it
looks like an excellent spot with plenty of room all the same.

So that was that a Sunday well spend.

Rain

I have been here for almost a week now and it hasn't stopped raining
yet. Sometimes it drizzles, sometimes it buckets down but it always
rains. The longest dry spell has definitely been no more then five
minutes. As a result everything is damp, including the clothing you put
on in the morning and the bed you climb into at night. If you suffer
from rheumatism this is not a good place to go.

Live on the Ridge.

Only three days and a number of things are already starting to become
routine. I get up at five and have a shower and shave before walking to
the mess hall for breakfast, eat my muesli and off to the office. As we
haven't established our project office yet we tend to grab what ever
desk space and computers we can. I have a lap top with me as well but
it's old and a pain to use as it can't interface with the network here.
We work from six in the morning to about six thirty or seven in the
evening, have dinner, watch some television and go to sleep. Rinse and
repeat for nineteen days and then have a weeks break.

The camp here is old, about twelve to fifteen years and the rooms show
that but it also has a comfortable lived in feel to it. Common areas
have plants and picnic tables, there is a covered basketball court and a
gym, the food in the mess hall is pleasant with a good choice but
because of our long work hours there is not much time I actually spend
using these facilities.

If you were wondering why the funny disclaimer appears on the bottom of
these messages, it's because internet access is seriously restricted
here and I post via the Email system. I will clean these up when I have
unrestricted access to the net again, probably on my breaks.


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