Above is a Navcam image of Curiosity's location after a successful drive on Sol 1869. The shadows show the Robotic Arm (RA) and turret on the left, and the Remote Sensing Mast (RSM) to the lower right. I can't help but think that Curiosity is giving us a "high-five" for another stellar drive!

Today we planned a jam-packed 2 sols of remote and contact science as we continue our journey along the Vera Rubin Ridge (VRR). On the first sol, Sol 1870, we'll do a ChemCam observation on the bedrock target "Waboomberg," followed by some Mastcam imaging of nearby VRR features, including exposed rock layers and light-colored bedrock. We'll then use the DRT to brush the surface on target "Platberg," which is followed by MAHLI imaging and an APXS analysis. We'll do additional APXS and MAHLI observations on Waboomberg.

On the second sol, Sol 1871, we'll continue our science observations by using ChemCam and Mastcam multispectral to target Platberg. It's quite common that we use multiple instruments on a single target - this is to corroborate datasets and give us a more complete, thorough analysis. We'll take an additional Mastcam image of "St. Lucia" to look at some interesting bedrock features by Curiosity's wheel. Finally, we've planned a nice suite of ENV activities, which will include DAN, REMS, a Mastcam tau, and a Mastcam line-of-sight extinction image. To wrap up the plan, we'll drive to our next VRR stop, take some standard post-drive images, and set ourselves up for an exciting weekend of science on Mars!

It was a good weekend on Mars. Curiosity spent the weekend exploring a beautiful outcrop of sedimentary rocks (shown in the above image) as part of our continued investigation of the middle and upper parts of Vera Rubin Ridge. Images like these will help us figure out the environment in which these rocks were deposited.

Today's two-sol plan is focused on additional imaging of a different part of this outcrop to better constrain the sedimentary structures and the transport directions that they record. We planned a large Mastcam stereo mosaic of the outcrop seen in this Navcam image, as well as a ChemCam RMI mosaic to get even higher resolution imaging of a small portion of the section. The plan also includes MAHLI and APXS observations of the target "Volksrust" to characterize typical bedrock in this location, as well as a number of environmental monitoring observations to investigate the spectral characteristics and dust content of the atmosphere. On the second sol, Curiosity will drive toward our next outcrop and prepare for more contact science and imaging. Can't wait to see what the next stop will hold!

On Sol 1864, Curiosity successfully got a move on from her inadvertent layover stop, which presented the science team with a new workspace, and a new view of the structures exposed in the "Vera Rubin Ridge." The team grabbed as many observations of this new piece of real estate as they could fit in the plan, not only because they were happy with the change of scenery, but because the plan is to drive once again this weekend!

Both MAHLI and APXS will look at the targets "Barberton" and "Campbellrand" using somewhat unusual techniques. MAHLI will image both Barberton (a patch of bedrock with a rough, nodular texture) and Campbellrand, a smooth patch of Vera Rubin Ridge bedrock at night using her white light LEDs to illuminate the target. The choice of night imaging was driven by the poor workspace illumination expected at the more-typical daytime imaging times. When Curiosity is parked facing eastern headings, as she was today, the rover arm and body cast shadows on the workspace in front of the rover. Shadows across MAHLI images make it more challenging to see the color and texture of the targets. MAHLI's white light LEDs are not quite bright enough to use during the day to fill in these shadows, but in the dark of night, they illuminate targets brightly, giving the team an unfettered look at their rocks of interest.

APXS will analyze Barberton using their raster technique. In a raster, APXS is placed at multiple spots, each slightly offset from one another, over a target that is hypothesized to have at least two different chemical components. In the case of Barberton, these two different components are the background bedrock and the material producing the nodular texture. The slightly different spots measured by APXS yield slightly different chemistries. By using the MAHLI images that accompany each APXS analysis to determine how much of each component is within each spot, the chemistry of the components can be separated from one another. Barberton chemistry will also be probed by ChemCam before MAHLI and APXS look at it.

Mastcam had many new features and structures to look at even just 25 m away from our last stop. South and east of Curiosity were two prime mosaic targets: bedrock exposures identified from orbit, which proved even more interesting on the ground. Stereo imaging of both these areas will allow the team to measure the bedding orientations in this part of the Vera Rubin Ridge, perhaps gaining more clues to its origin. Mastcam will also turn her filters on one of these bedrock areas to probe its iron mineralogy. Smaller, closer targets of interest for Mastcam were also available including "Belingwe" (a vertical exposure of nodular bedrock) and "Bergersdorp" (a resistant bedrock layer).

The environment-minded members of the science team planned a suite of observations - movies looking for clouds and dust devils, and images assessing the dust load in the atmosphere - at three different times of day throughout the weekend. Taking measurements at multiple times of day helps the team understand how the Martian atmosphere behaves throughout the course of a sol in Gale.

After the successful completion of all these activities, Curiosity will drive ~22 m further up the ridge toward another bedrock exposure of interest. Here's hoping the new vistas keep coming!

Curiosity will finally be back on the move. The rover made an unexpected stop of nearly two weeks in the current location due to several things ranging from failed uplinks to insufficient arm heating and a camera glitch. It reminds us that everything must work just right to successfully operate a robot on Mars. In addition to thorough remote and contact analyses of this stop, Curiosity had several other notable accomplishments, including placing the drill down on the ground for a test, and dropping off a sample of "Ogunquit Beach" dune soil to SAM for evolved gas analysis.

The rover team is planning two sols of operation. Curiosity has a ~25 meter drive planned for Thursday, hoping to stop between the two sandy areas shown to the left and right in the image. Before the drive it is doing ChemCam observations on "Gravelotte," "Sibasa," and "Brooklands." APXS will have an observation of "Sibasa" and an overnight integration on "Gamka," both after DRT brushing. MAHLI will make observations of these two as well as of the REMS UV sensor. Mastcam will follow up on all of the Mars surface targets. On the second night ChemCam will take two passive observations to test its detector noise levels at two different temperatures. Observations also include REMS and RAD Get_Data, DAN passive integrations, and post-drive imaging to set up for the weekend operations.

We are starting to suspect that Vera Rubin Ridge might be cursed. After the challenges we faced last week, we were hoping for a successful weekend plan but alas, it was not to be. Over the weekend Curiosity's arm didn't heat up as much as it was supposed to, so the arm activity failed and most of the weekend plan was lost. So today the name of the game is to try again!

The main activity in the 1861-1862 plan is another attempt at dropping off the "Ogunquit Beach" sample in the SAM instrument, followed by SAM Evolved Gas Analysis (EGA) of the sample. In other words, SAM will heat the sample and measure what gases are produced. On sol 1862 there will be a science block where we will try to recover some of the remote sensing that was planned for the weekend. This will begin with a Mastcam mosaic that builds upon some previous Mastcam images of "Region 7", followed by ChemCam and Mastcam observations of the bedrock targets "Schmidtsdrif" and "Estecourt" as well as the soil target "Lisbon". The science block will end the way it began, with another Mastcam mosaic building upon a different previous mosaic of an area currently called "Region 6". Navcam will also watch for clouds overhead and Mastcam will do a routine observation of the rocks and soil near the rover to check for any changes.

Hopefully we have seen the worst of Vera Rubin Ridge's "curse", and we'll be able to finish this SAM analysis and start driving again shortly!

Following a series of setbacks this week, Curiosity is on track to have a productive, albeit stationary, weekend. Monday's communication issue and Wednesday's possible difficulties in delivering the "Ogunquit Beach" sample to the Sample Analysis at Mars (SAM) instrument have given the science team a series of headaches as we try to make progress along Vera Rubin Ridge. Even yesterday, the team discovered an error with the left Mastcam data transfer that has marked the instrument temporarily SICK and is preventing us from acquiring new data from it until sometime after this weekend's plan. Nonetheless, the team is optimistic moving into the weekend, and has planned a really nice suite of observations.

Curiosity will try one more time to deliver Ogunquit Beach sample to the SAM instrument, and SAM will hopefully perform an evolved gas analysis (EGA) on the sample overnight on the first evening of this weekend's plan. Curiosity will spend the majority of the following day (Saturday) sleeping and recharging, as the EGA analyses require significant power to perform. Towards the end of that day, Curiosity will image and brush a patch of flat bedrock in front of the rover named "Sibasa" and will analyze this patch of bedrock with the Alpha Particle X-Ray Spectrometer (APXS) instrument to accurately characterize the chemistry of this region. This will be an overnight measurement.

On Sunday, Curiosity will spend two hours investigating her surroundings with Mastcam images as well as ChemCam laser-induced breakdown spectroscopy (LIBS) measurements. ChemCam will analyze four separate targets: "Schmidtsdrif," "Sibasa," "Lisbon," and "Estecourt." Schmidtsdrif is a potentially hematite-rich target that is similar to iron-rich targets identified earlier this week. Sibasa is the brushed and imaged target that was also analyzed using the APXS instrument. Lisbon is a patch of dark soil near the rover. Estecourt is a raised block of material that is also similar to a previous sol's target, and these analyses will hopefully allow for comparisons between targets.

Mastcam imaging will not only document these ChemCam targets, but will also be used to acquire additional images further away from the rover to inspect the nature of the Vera Rubin Ridge from this location, and to help us plan for future traverses. As the left Mastcam instrument is currently unavailable, all imaging will be done with Mastcam's right "eye."

With all of the headaches that arose this week, the science team and rover planners have managed to again arrange for some wonderful science to be done with the resources that are currently available. On Monday, we will hopefully have accomplished a successful EGA analysis on Ogunquit Beach, will have used the APXS instrument to characterize Sibasa, and will have a plethora of new Mastcam and ChemCam observations to understand this section of the Vera Rubin Ridge. Hopefully all of your weekends will be more relaxing than Curiosity's!

After Monday's communications hiccup (detailed here) that prevented us from uplinking our two-sol plan, today we're hoping to redo most of what we had in Monday's plan. This primarily includes a remote science block, during which we'll shoot a few ChemCam targets named "Hartley," "Hooggenoeg," and "Beaufort" to study nearby pebbles and bedrock. We'll also look behind us to take some Mastcam mosaics of Aeolis Palus, the Gale crater plains to the north of Mount Sharp. We'll take some additional Mastcam images to document local bedrock features as well as the Vera Rubin Ridge terrain just in front of the rover.

We originally planned to do a SAM analysis of our stored "Ogunquit Beach" sand sample, but we came across a late breaking issue that caused us to remove the activity from the plan. It turns out that Mastcam images showed that the sample may not have made it into the SAM instrument. As a precautionary measure, we decided to forego the analysis for today since there is a chance that the SAM sample cup is empty. Better luck on Friday!

Our exploration of space, and Gale Crater specifically, is enabled by incredible technology and amazing engineers and scientists. But, circumstances constantly remind us that space is hard. It's a hostile environment to both people and technology and we have to strive constantly to keep things working so we can continue to explore Gale Crater. Since last December, that has involved Curiosity's team of engineers and scientists working to diagnose and then work-around a problem with the drill. That effort has made excellent progress and we hope to be able to drill Mars rocks again in the not-too-distant future! Associated with that is designing new methods to deliver samples of those rocks to Curiosity's laboratories: CheMin and SAM. Mastcam imaged the inlets for SAM on the rover deck yestersol.

We prepared a packed science plan for Curiosity today, including a SAM analysis of a "doggy-bagged" sample of martian sand from a location called "Ogunquit Beach" that the rover visited months ago and a sure-to-be spectacular Mastcam panorama of the Gale Crater floor ("Aeolis Palus" in scientific jargon). However, space is hard, and some technical issues with NASA's Deep Space Network of satellite dishes around the world prevented us from sending Curiosity its marching orders. But, those activities will hopefully be retried in the next few days.

MSL drove over 20 meters on Sol 1850, to an area with lots of bedrock exposed. We had several nice targets to choose from, but were limited in what we could plan because we want to prepare for a SAM evolved gas analysis (EGA) of sand from "Ogunquit Beach," which requires significant power. We are planning only 2 sols today, to get synced back up with "Mars time" on Monday, so will not be driving this weekend.

Despite the power constraints, we were able to plan a lot of activities today. Sol 1852 will start with Navcam searches for clouds and dust devils, followed by Mastcam mosaics of the expected path ahead (southward). Then ChemCam and Right Mastcam will observe bedrock target "Balfour" and a block named "Ripon." Late that afternoon, MAHLI will acquire a full suite of images of Balfour before APXS is placed on it for an overnight integration. We considered brushing Balfour before examining it with MAHLI and APXS, but to save time/power we decided not to. The ChemCam laser often cleans dust off of the surface of rock targets, so we're hoping that will suffice on Balfour.

On Sol 1853, the long-awaited drop-off of Ogunquit Beach sample to SAM is planned! This activity was delayed by the drill anomaly and the testing that followed, so we are excited to be planning it today. If all goes well, the SAM EGA will be planned on Monday.

Since the start of our investigation of the Vera Rubin Ridge (VRR, a narrow and winding ridge that exhibits signs of oxidized iron phases from orbit), we've been primarily driving around on fractured bedrock material with a general lack of sand. This is unlike the landscape in the Murray formation at the base of the ridge, which was dominated by a combination of bedrock exposures and wind-mobilized sands. However, following Curiosity's drive two days ago, the team found a local landscape dominated by small cobbles and pebbles with an abundance of fine soil surrounding these fragments. We had planned to investigate this location based on both ground- and satellite-based observations due to its different appearance relative to the rest of VRR, but this was our first up-close glimpse of this different landscape.

The science team had a few decisions to make during today's planning session. There was time available to use the MAHLI (high-resolution imaging) and APXS (bulk chemistry) instruments located on Curiosity's arm to investigate the surroundings, and the team was able to choose to perform either a quick "touch and go" analysis (where we are able to drive away the same day as making the measurements) or a more detailed contact science investigation, where APXS would be used overnight and we would stay in the same location for a few days. Each option has pros and cons (including the number of targets that could be analyzed, the amount of driving that we can do in the near future, etc.), so the team started the day with this detailed discussion of these options and the geologic targets in front of us.

With such a heterogeneous landscape in front of us, there was a concern that APXS measurements (which have a large footprint relative to the pebbles in the workspace) would be difficult to interpret (i.e., determining which pebble(s) or soil are contributing to the chemical signatures), so the team decided to forgo any APXS measurements and instead use the finer-scale ChemCam chemistry measurements to characterize the observed heterogeneity. Curiosity will also analyze the landscape using multispectral Mastcam observations, which can provide additional information about the observed compositional diversity. This will allow the rover to drive off later that same day without the need to stick around. Once this decision was made, the science team then took to selecting targets of interest to analyze.

ChemCam will analyze two locations near the rover to determine the compositional variability. The first target, "Blinkberg," is a pebble-rich region near the rover, and ChemCam will be used to measure several pebbles and soil patches surrounding this target. Investigation of the second target, "Wolkberg," will consist of measuring a larger clast and the surrounding soils. These observations will hopefully inform the team about any compositional variability observed in the pebbles that are strewn about the region.

Mastcam will then take over to acquire high-resolution imaging and multispectral observations. Mastcam will first turn to imaging the horizon just south of the rover, towards a region of interest for studying the nature and structure of the VRR. Next, Mastcam will image the "Blinkberg" ChemCam target and the surrounding area using all of its multispectral filters, which will help to characterize any observed compositional variations. Then, Mastcam will perform a similar observation of the "Wolkberg" ChemCam target and the surrounding region known as "Zeederberg." Curiosity's arm will then be unfurled, and she will use the MAHLI high-resolution imager to investigate the "Blinkberg" target, hopefully helping to constrain the grain size of the pebbles and sediments in the acquired scenes.

After this region has been extensively studied, Curiosity will continue her drive towards the south. Following this drive, Curiosity will document her surroundings using her navigation cameras, Mastcam will image the surroundings to characterize the nearby soils and rock clasts as well as imaging the rover deck, and ChemCam will make an automated chemistry observation of nearby bedrock and will calibrate its imaging system.

Today's science planning was a great example of how "nimble" the science team can be. The team started its discussion with several options on the table and was able to quickly assess the rover's surroundings and make the best decision possible to analyze these surroundings, keeping the broader scientific objectives and goals in mind. It's often said that getting scientists to agree with each other is comparable to "herding cats," but today was certainly not one of those days!