The Explorers' Club

I've been wondering what other people my age have done with this time on earth (while we can still run, skip, jump...) It started to obsess me. I know my little world and my small industry, I know some fun exciting events, people, dinners, symposia and can identify much useless information in the course of my day. I can impress paralegals and attorneys when I use the phrase "xls", can scare people by running "scripts" and nod my head knowledgeably when someone speaks of "spoilation."

So what....

Last night, I stumbled across an old institution here in NYC that hosts interesting lectures once a month on adventures and exploration.

Here's what I read that made me grab my coat, run out of my office and head uptown:

The club's mission is to encourage scientific exploration of land, sea, air and space, emphasizing the physical and biological sciences. Its headquarters is the Lowell Thomas Building on East 70th Street in New York City.

Over the years, membership has included polar explorers Roald Amundsen, Robert Peary, Matthew Henson, Ernest Shackleton, Vilhjalmur Stefansson, Sir George Hubert Wilkins, and Frederick Cook; aviators Jimmy Doolittle, Charles Lindbergh, Richard Archbold and Chuck Yeager; underwater explorers Sylvia Earle, Jacques Piccard, Don Walsh and Robert Ballard; astronauts John Glenn, Buzz Aldrin, Neil Armstrong, Sally Ride, Kathryn Sullivan, and cosmonaut Viktor Savinykh; anthropologists Louis Leakey, Richard Leakey and Jane Goodall; mountaineers Sir Edmund Hillary and Tenzing Norgay; former U.S. Presidents Theodore Roosevelt, Franklin D. Roosevelt and Herbert Hoover; and thousands of other notables including journalist Lowell Thomas, newspaper cartoonist Mel Cummin and pioneer explorer Thor Heyerdahl.

Anyway, they throw lectures once a month. The building is a converted old mansion on the Upper East side, with flowery wrought iron terraces, solid old libraries, fireplaces, exotic rugs, pictures of astronauts on the walls, a stuffed polar bear, a sled that has crossed the North Pole, giant ivory tusks, and books about land, sea, air and space expeditions. I bought my ticket, entered the main library and had wine and cheese with scholars, historians, and explorers.

The lecture started when a vibrant guy about my age stood up at the podium and was introduced to the audience. He was a combination of Tom Cruise and Indiana Jones. His video and slides were about his exploration and plotting and conservationist efforts for the caves in the Yucatan Penninsula - Mexico. His name was Sam Meacham, and he is a part of Cindaq, an organization dedicated to conservation and exploration of fresh water resources and underwater geography underneath the Yucatan.

A cenote is an opening in the jungle terrain filled with fresh water and is a passageway into the limestone cave-system underneath Tulum, Cancun and all of the surrounding tourists areas of the Yucatan.

He and his team walk or fly through the jungle, locate the Cenote, put on diving gear and bring 400 lbs of underwater lighting equipment, and dive downwards, following the underground rivers. Past dinosaur bones, ancient sacrificed skeletons, pottery sherds, ancient sloth, and underwater architecture of the Maya, dodging stalagmites and stactites before the caves were overrun from the rising oceans. He spoke about walking down carved Mayan stairs, past an underground stone alter, and down into the dark pool of freshwater under the jungles.

He and his team experienced previously undiscovered plant life, fish, crustacean, and even mammal remains.

Footage and scientific measurements were sent to National Geographic and various scientific institutions for examination of flora, fauna and water chemistry, especially as it is affected by the tourism of the Yucatan and explosive population growth.

Anyway, we were all ooh'ing, ah'ing, and I felt inadequate.

This is what people do with their time?

Update:

Just read a curious little post about the Explorers' Club Annual Dinner at the Waldorf Astoria this year (attended by an old roomate of mine, one of the first groups of women invited to join the society.)

Anyway, on the menu:

Earthworm Stir-Fry
Roasted Goat, Pork Chitterlings, Eyeballs, etc.
Maggot- and Bug-Covered Strawberries
Scorpions on Toast
Duck Tongues on Belgian Endives
Lotus Stalks
Sweet & Sour Bovine Penis


"You foolin' me?? For real?"
"Ain' no lie."

Full article on Epicurious.com's blog.