Well, here it is, the home stretch. I'm currently back in Cusco after finishing up at CICRA and, sadly, retiring our old, trusty DAO. She had been through a lot and the foam at the rear of the fuselage was getting quite weak, which allowed the tail to move vertically quite a bit. I attribute it mainly to 3 weeks of daily rough landings, a 100m plunge into a stand of bamboo due to an in-air motor failure, and a failed takeoff which sent it tumbling over a cliff. So, all in all, it is pretty miraculous that she lasted as long as she did.
But anyway, it is time for the final chapter. On Monday I'll be heading back to Tres Cruces armed only with the hexacopter, my wits, and 2 compañeros from one of the universities here in Cusco. We will set of down the trail which is home to 8 of our tree plots, and we'll set up camp halfway down. We will use that as a base of operations to make daily trips out with the copter to image the plots and, potentially, some of the area surrounding the plots. When we're done the trail will spit us out at the other end, we'll catch a ride down the road a bit to San Pedro, and stay there for a night. The next day we'll head up to 2 more tree plots, image them, and hopefully head back to Cusco the same day.
That is if all goes well...
Needless to say I won't have internet on the trail, so check back in a week or so to see how it all went down.
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