And a close-up of activities at York.

Phil

Click to view attachment

Update to sol 4431 at the rock Bashful II which has rolled down off Hinners Point.

Phil

Click to view attachment

Sol 4437 - we are now sitting between Pvt. Reubin Field (sol 4084) and Pvt. George Gibson (sol 4139).

Phil

Click to view attachment

Another drive on sol 4441. We are descending the valley again, near the old path down this side of the valley.

Phil

Click to view attachment

Another good drive in Marathon Valley, sol 4443.

Phil

Another drive - winter is well and truly over now if we can be on this slope.

Phil

Click to view attachment

Sol 4453 - a short drive to reach the rocks at Gibraltar II.

Phil

Click to view attachment

Opportunity drove again on sol 4456, so time for a map update. My new feature names might need to be moved a bit.

Phil

Click to view attachment

This update to sol 4459 includes a correction to the recent path and name positions. I usually base initial drive paths on the maps tweeted by Mike Seibert (https://twitter.com/mikeseibert) but these are not corrected for wheel slip or other issues. Later I can fix a location using the local panorama or from mapping at the MER website by Tim Parker of JPL. The drive on sol 4453 must have had a lot of slip on this steep slope, so its end location needed a substantial correction.

Phil

(PS thanks Mike for those maps and your comments on Twitter, they are very useful)

Click to view attachment

... and another update, to sol 4461.

Phil

Click to view attachment

Sol 4468 - a small move to the north.

Phil

Click to view attachment

A little move south on sol 4475 (while Curiosity stubbed its toe and stayed put). I am preparing a close-up map of this area.

Phil

Click to view attachment

To repurpose a good old Canadian saying, this looks like 'the beginning of the long dash' to the south. A 45 m or so drive across the valley floor towards the exit point on the ridge. Time for a new base map. (EDIT - I have replaced my guessed path with one from Mike Seibert's tweet, but modified a bit to fit my estimated position)

Phil

Click to view attachment

Time for a new map base as we set out on a new adventure. And looking at the route ahead in HiRISE images, this is indeed going to be an adventure.

I should say the recent positions are only estimates, and there may be changes later.

Phil

Click to view attachment

I don't have time for a proper update today, but this is roughly where we are.

Phil

Click to view attachment

Update to sol 4485, and we are down in the new valley.

Phil

Click to view attachment

Down into the valley a bit more on sol 4487.

Phil

Click to view attachment

We had a move on sol 4491. I'm a bit lost without Midnight Planets updating at the moment but JPL has images and Mike Seibert tweeted a map.

Phil

Click to view attachment

Another drive on sol 4493. I have to figure out what a new base map needs to look like now. We could use a road map!

Phil

Click to view attachment

Still trying to choose a new base map, so here is a temporary version of the new map, with a 40+ m drive on sol 4495. This summary map shows that we spent just about 400 sols in Marathon Valley, and the total area covered by the long looping path is not much bigger than a 100 m square on the map. For comparison, Spirit spent its last 1200 or so sols in an area around Home Plate which was about the same size as this work area in Marathon Valley.

Phil

Click to view attachment

We drove overnight - well, somebody drove, we are just looking out of the windows. Update to sol 4497.

Phil

Click to view attachment

"drove overnight" wow, is that unprecedented? i guess its not really a power issue since all they need to do is essentially let off the brakes here, though that's probably not an accurate statement, but I've never heard of a MER night drive that before.

speaking of power issues, i have to wonder what the battery's charge capacity is like these days, er years? like the rover, it has to have started going south years ago, i remember 10 years ago it was discussed somewhere on this board that it would be the final limiting factor a few years down the road if all else went well, and well, all else has gone so very very well, but the battery... <insert energizer bunny reference here>

No - over my night in Ontario. In other words, I get up in the morning and find new images showing that a drive has occurred. It is quite impossible for Opportunity to drive at night on Mars.

Phil

Unless Opportunity is a super all terrain vehicle and can get over major terrain elevation texture changes, she may have to head North-East to find a smooth transition route to the lower crater wall. Surely due East is not an option...

The rover drivers have a wealth of experience with interpreting satellite images and identifying transits within Opportunities capability that also meet science objectives. I don't think they will have any problems getting down to the apron for the trek south.

Map update to sol 4500, approaching The Hill With No Name, as fine a ski jump as i have seen on Mars.

I don't expect our plucky rover to go down onto the lower slope, I think it will turn south after looking at the hill and move along the slope from one outcrop to another, eventually moving back uphill again.

Phil

Click to view attachment

As great a name that The Hill With No Name is, it does now have a proper name: Spirit Mound.

They did that deliberately! Waited for me to make a fool of myself after checking countless times - refresh, refresh, refresh. Then they post it.

Phil

OK, map update complete with mound name. It may be a nod to Spirit the rover, but it really takes its name from a place in South Dakota, visited by the Lewis and Clark expedition. Arrow Rock (Missouri) was another place visited along the way. So in Marathon Valley we had feature names taken from people on the expedition, here we have names taken from places along the route.

Phil

Click to view attachment

A little move forwards to a science target, sol 4505.

Phil

Click to view attachment

A close-up map of Spirit Mound. This is not based on a high quality DEM so don't treat it as a very accurate orthophoto of the site. It's just an approximation intended to help locate targets relative to the rover.

Phil

PS this new valley has a name now, Bitterroot Valley, taking its name from a place in Montana.


Click to view attachment

A tiny move to the north on sol 4516, probably for more multispectral imaging of Gasconade, or perhaps to reposition the IDD.

Phil

Click to view attachment

OK, the last small move was to reposition the IDD. Today (sol 4520) a 1 m move to image the Gasconade area.

Phil

Click to view attachment

a map of recent activities on Spirit Mound.

Phil

Click to view attachment

A little move on sol 4527. Mike Seibert tweeted that this will improve communications over the next week - suggesting to me a lot of imaging, maybe a big panorama.

Phil

Click to view attachment

We must be nearing the end of activities at Spirit Mound. Here's an updated map.

Phil

Click to view attachment

And we're off! Heading out on the next great adventure (AKA serious science).

Phil

Click to view attachment

Click to view attachment

Another very small move on sol 4548.

Phil

Click to view attachment

Update to sol 4550, climbing uphill a bit around the base of the rocky hill.

Phil

Click to view attachment

Im confused. I thought Jpl planning to drive up to features that resemble Gullies.

Is this still in plans?

Hey Decepticon,

Back of the envelope...
The gully in question is about a half mile away ( call it 2600 feet -- as a Mars crow flies )
Opportunity has traversed 27 miles in 4550 sols ( an average of 31.3 feet per sol -- which is about half the distance down a bowling alley)
So, OPPY can fly there in roughly 83 days -- about three months (mid Feb 2017)

BUT... the actual distance OPPY will maneuver around 'mars stuff' will be 1.5X? (3,900 feet) - its kind of fractal-ly
And there will be things JPL will want stop and investigate along the way.

So the absolute average fastest time to get there will be 125 days ( 4 months -- mid March 2017)
My best guess for the earliest arrival at the gully is 182 days (a full half year) Roughly May 15, 2017 -- and that is optimistic! (Dust storms, seasons, malfunctions, discoveries, you name it)

It's still in the plans, it just takes awhile... Has JPL published any kind of dates for this adventure?

(BTW: you and I could hike over there in less than an hour)

Wow Thanks for those details.

I'd like to make a request for the full Oppy traverse map from day one to today. Thanks ahead of time.

What you are asking for does not really exist. The closest you can get to a very detailed map of the whole route is (purely coincidentally) my book! Atlas of Mars Exploration, vol. 2 - alas, rather expensive. However, I might be able to make something that works for this. Let me think about it.

Phil

I guess this was what I was looking for just for a frame of reference. Would be nice to get one of these every so often just to gauge full progress:

OK, I see what you mean. I thought you meant a much more detailed map.

Phil

In case you havent tried it, its worth mentioning that someone out there is still keeping the Oppy traverse path up to date:
Launch Google Earth and go to View > Explore > Mars, open the 'Layers" panel on left and open Mars Gallery > Rovers and Landers and double-click on "MER Opportunity Rover (USA)"

More detail would be great but would have to be limited to inset blowups.

Thanks for the google earth tip!

Map update to sol 4552, a small move near Pompy's Tower, probably to find a better path through the block field here.

Phil

Click to view attachment