Friday Fantasy: Iceland Investigation Part 1

Originally posted March 16, 2007

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Back at the Foundation in Bethesda, Sue Fairview and the young explorer were called into a meeting for their next adventure to be assigned and discussed. They were going to Iceland to investigate and conduct a survey the current state of flora and insect life in areas threatened by planned industrial damning of river valleys around the town of Sölatvirkjun. They would be teaming up with Russian vulcanologists studying geothermal changes in the same area when they arrived in Reykjavik. They left the glassed in conference room and went for cappuccino.

On their way to the kiosk, they ran into the analytic organic chemist, Dr. Gutekunde that was working on the melon goop submitted from the Amazon. He joined them at their table with his tea.

“I can give you some preliminary results on that concoction, er, sample you guys brought in. Let’s see. It had a weensy bit of psilocybin, from the mushroom cap I suppose, a very itsy bitsy bit of cocaine, probably from the cocoa leaves, and I found a common known anti-biotic or two, plus an unknown compound that the anti-viral lab tells me has broad spectrum activity. (Of course he gave the amounts in micrograms per milliliters, but it has been translated from the metric to the literal for you non-science folks.) Get this; it is most active against the human immunodeficiency virus. How’s that for news? Could be a new drug active against HIV!”

We both looked at him and said in unison, “What!!!”

“Keep in on the QT for now kids; we wouldn’t want to start a press feeding frenzy. But you guys did a really great job down there bringing this stuff back. We are going to fast track analysis and testing, find the structure, try to synthesize it, and if we can’t we will have to go back and find the natural source. But going back to find the natural source would be antithetical to our purpose here at the foundation, now wouldn’t it? You know, disturbing nature and all that. But the compound seems pretty simple, so we should be able to synthesize it. Then we have to scale it up to produce larger amounts and begin safety testing and then test for efficacy. You know how it goes with drug development. I am sure that FDA with work with us on this one. But congratulations you guys. Great job!” Then he slapped the young explorer on the back, stood and left.

Sue and the explorer just stared at each other open mouthed in disbelief.

Sue said, “What just happened?”

Mr. Butterfly answered, “Um, I think we heard some really great news and I think it is going to be okay that I had bareback sex in the Amazon after all.”

A warm smile came to Sue’s face and she tilted her head laughed a hearty laugh, and Mr. Butterfly joined her. They finished their coffees and returned to their cubicles to work out the details of the Iceland trip.

They were pretty psyched. The plan was they would fly there, and stay in Reykjavik for a couple of days to gather supplies, meet the Russians, then travel by bus to the Sölatvirkjun area on the Könetikut River and camp with two Russian volcanologists who were there to study associated geothermal changes around nearby hot springs and volcanoes. Sölatvirkjun is a town on a river that is to be flooded at some point in the future. They would stay there for a week and travel with the Russians by horseback to areas of interest to both parties.

Mr. Butterfly was excited to go to Iceland because of the Gay nightlife he had heard about there. He mentioned it to Sue and she was into checking it out too. They couldn’t wait to go. Tickets were purchased from Expedia departing from Baltimore to Reykjavik for only $530 round trip and the flight would only take about 5 – 6 hours each way. Bags and backpacks were packed with excitement. Tents, research and camping equipment were shipped in advance. Everything was ready for their excursion to the little northern island of Iceland. The month was July and everything was perfect.

What little adventures would our explorers get into this time?