Caverns and Mountains:

Hiram Students Follow in the Footsteps of Alexander von Humboldt



Erin Sams, Erin Carver, Matt Wilson, and Daniel Factor

As they traveled deeper into the cave, Alexander von Humboldt and Aimé Bonpland were entering places within the natural world that had never been scientifically documented.  Few had ever traveled as far as they, although their guides, who were local monks, tried to stop their journey.  The guides feared the darkness, for they believed man belonged in the light, that light was righteousness.  But von Humboldt, in his unrestrained brilliance, saw instead opportunity.  When the monks refused to travel any further, von Humboldt shouted in frustration to them, “Light?…Light was Knowledge!" (Kehlmann, Measuring the World)  In his eyes, light would come to humans with new discoveries.  Darkness would only exist as long as one was not willing to learn about, or bring light to, the unknown.


Light illuminates the entrance to a cavern in Khao Sok National Park, Thailand.  
Photo: Erin Carver

As we begin our travels around the world, we too are entering the unknown and by comparing our experiences with those of von Humboldt, we are more able to draw meaning from them.  As naïve world travelers, we face novelty all around us and often have difficulty distinguishing important ones from the everyday.  While we may not be penetrating the darkest wilderness of the Orinoco, the expedition we have embarked on is unique, and comes at a time when the long established patterns identified by the natural history observations of scientists like von Humboldt are changing at an unprecedented rate. 

On a later journey, long after his excursion to South America, von Humboldt met with a lama to discuss his research and the knowledge that Humboldt had gained.  The lama mentioned that if Humboldt's journey had taken place without heart it would be worthless and he would have learned nothing, for you get out of an experience no more than you put into it.  Humboldt put his entire heart and life into his work and benefited greatly, as did the world of science.  On our trip we are "re-enacting" a short period in Humboldt's life.  Like him we are putting our heart into what we are learning in order to get the most out of it.  We are keeping detailed journals of the biomes and places we visit to compare them to those of Humboldt.  We have learned from Humboldt and the lama that having heart in a journey, especially a journey of discovery, is the most important part.  As the trip continues we will find out if we have the heart we need to undertake such an important journey. 


The peaks of Haleakalā volcano on the island of Maui. 
Photo: Erin Carver. 

Our experience of traversing the volcano Haleakalā on Maui gave us an opportunity to directly compare our observations to those described by von Humboldt. We witnessed extreme ecological shifts as we ascended the mountain, and then again as we hiked to the center of the ancient crater that once poured lava onto the surrounding landscape. As we hiked we observed variations in flora and fauna that von Humboldt would have struggled to explain, and as we examined the altitudinal gradients and the effect of geomorphology on local weather patterns, we did our best to connect the two.

Von Humboldt set out to measure the world. That is, his exploration was a way of gaining greater understanding of the planet. Two hundred years later as we write this -having passed through six time zones in a single day - the times have certainly changed, but the objective remains ever constant. We have set out to understand the world, not just to look at photos from a textbook in a classroom. There is no better way to do this than to experience the world, especially in times when the future of the environment is uncertain as a result of global warming.  We have invested ourselves entirely in this expedition of sorts.  With our dedication we will learn a lot from this planet, and hopefully be able to follow von Humboldt's example of sharing his view with the rest of the world. But one thing is certain - there will always be much more to learn.

Last Modified 27 Feb 2008
Daniel Factor
dcfactor at gmail.com