This morning we had our first morning snorkel. Once we all met up, "suited and booted" at the touch pool, we headed out into the water at the boat dock. We immediately saw tons of stingrays, turtles, and a giant grouper around the dock. Zach and I headed out around the ship wreck first and where we saw a white tipped reef shark followed by three black tip. I don't even know how many sea turtles I've seen at this point. Same thing with stingrays, they were everywhere this morning. Honestly being able to snorkel while the sun rose and come back to rinse off and tuck in to an amazing breakfast was amazing. I'm not normally a morning person but when I trained my body to be on Australian time I woke up really early for Aussie time so now I'm totally fine waking up and going to bed early. It's kind of great honestly, especially since I didn't really experience any jet lag thanks to dads top notch travel sleep planning. After breakfast we had our first lecture on coral and reef morphology. Brynn and I were in Trisha's oceanography class this last semester so we both had already had the same lecture before but it was a good refresher. Plus coral's just super cool so it's always fun to learn about. Before lunch I spent some time looking over our fish we need to know for our ID test. There's a lot to memorize and I kind of shut my brain off at the end of the semester so it's weird to try and study again. After lunch we had our first lab! Yay for doing science! Sean and I were a bomb team for the benthic cover lab. We used a transect line (basically a giant tape measure) and a quadrat grid to measure the difference in benthic covers (algae, rock, sediment, and coral) the farther you walk into the lagoon. Back in the lab we did data analysis and a quick write up on our hypothesis and results. If I really keep up this whole science thing I'm gonna have to learn more about excel and hopefully despise it less. For free time Nora, Sean, Russ, Zach, and I all walked out to shark beach where we saw TONS of rays and guitar fish! We walked along the water pointing them out to each other as we made our way back to the dock for sunset. Tonights sunset was even better than last nights! Before dinner Katie, Cat, and I all tried to come up with funky mnemonics to help us remember the scientific names for all the fish. We came up with some pretty solid ones that made us laugh. I'm just excited to be able to identify all of the cool beasties I see while snorkeling. I guess there's some more science nerd that will be coming home with me, you're welcome everyone.
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Well here we are...I made it to my final destination, Heron Island Research Station. This morning we took the troopy out to the marina. The boat ride took two hours but it was amazing. We had smooth seas the entire way and the weather was perfect. The wind was cold but the sun was just enough to keep us comfortable. We watched as we sailed away from shore how the water turned turquoise. When we turned back we could also see the smog hanging over the coast which was kind of unsettling. As we got close to the island Edd pointed out our first sea turtle. There were rays in the water around the jetty as we docked. We were all super excited and I think it didn't real hit us until we docked and walked off the boat that we were really on The Great Barrier Reef. We were given a little tour and shown to our rooms. There are three girls in my room and 4 bunk beds so we each get to dump our stuff on one bed and sleep on another which is nice because living out of a suitcase honestly sucks. There's a touch pool, library, labs, kitchen, and housing at the research station. The resort is on the other side of the island. Lunch was awesome! Our chefs name is Pat and he's amazing. After settling in for a bit we got our safety talk and then we had a bunch of time until dinner. So we had our first snorkel! The reef is so full of life. I felt like I was there with David Attenborough as he told me about the parrotfish munching away at the coral. Kenen and I saw a green sea turtle on our way back in from the snorkel. After rinsing out our wet suits and gear we all watched the sunset at the jetty. I'll never get over sunsets over the ocean. Again, Pat shook us all with personal lasagnas and a yummy dessert. Now all thats left is to take a look at the stars. I hear they're great tonight. It still doesn't quite feel real...I'm on another continent, across the globe, in the other hemisphere, on the other side of the largest ocean. Right now it's Tuesday, but back home it's still Monday... A bed is a wonderful thing. I'm too tired to even do the math and figure out how long it's been since I was in my bed. It feels like it was ages ago. I've been in a car, a 737, a tram, an A380 (dad's really jealous), a bus, another 737, another bus, a Dash 8 (should've come dad), and what Edd called a troopy (basically an outback landcruiser-it was dope). The Gladstone Backpackers is a hostel basically in the middle of a neighborhood in a small mining town called Gladstone. I love it! It's definitely nothing I've ever experienced before but it's a really cool place. It's basically a home that's been renovated into this hostel. Edd told us that some houses in Queensland are built on stilts and it kind of seems like this house used to be. Now the lower floor that you get to through the backyard is where all the rooms and showers are. Upstairs is the kitchen, a living area, and the office. The backyard is where everything actually happens. There's a fire pit, tons of leather couches, a pool, ping pong table, bar, and a stone pizza oven. It's kind of what you'd imagine a really well put together frat house would be. We dropped all our things in our rooms and hung out in the backyard talking and eating when we arrived, after surviving the troopy. They made us pizza in their huge pizza oven and it was delicious. They piled the pizza with tons of veggies, things I'd never think to put on pizza (carrots, sweet potatoes, cucumbers, etc) and tons of the usual stuff as well (onions, meat, peppers, etc). It was an eclectic mix but it was SO good. My tummy is happy. Honestly, eclectic is a great word so far for my Australian experience. This is what I came for. |