Yesterday was the first day of drilling at Magadi. We had everyone on site (day and night shift for a single 12 hr day shift. Drilling went fine. We went through alternating trona and black sapropelic muds (looks and feels like pipe grease!) plus a few gravel lenses. The changing lithologies were a bit of a challenge for the drilling. We started off with the hydraulic piston corer which went ok until we would hit some trona beds or stiffer clays. Tried switching to extended nose and then eventually to the rotating "Alien" tool, which is what we finished the day with. This seems to be working well at the moment. At the end of the single Sunday shift we were down to 20.76m, which includes about .8m of drill pad so about 20m of lake sediment. Everyone is very happy about that! Today we will probably hit the thick chert layers which will for sure slow us down. We will attempt to core this chert and see how it goes. Magadi is hot during the day amd the sun is intense reflected off the dry salt crust, but it cools off nicely so (for the day shift folks anyway) we will enjoy a nice G&T hour at the end of the shift! Pics to be posted shortly.