Today was the final fiull day of the class. It was a good day. I woke up to go for a walk but it was raining so I decided that I would rather not get soaked and cold this morning so I went back to sleep. I got up for brekky and after that, we had a group snorkel session as our last one. We went out and swam pretty far into the lagoon and saw some cool things. I saw some more moon wrasses, one of my favorites, some of them were pretty big. I saw a GIANT green sea turtle, he was so big I thought he was a loggerhead at first. I saw a giant clam that was also humongous and colorful. I think the best part of the snorkel was seeing an octopus hiding in the coral. We don't get many octopus here at Heron Island so this was a treat. He seemed pretty big but it was hard to tell because only his eyes were sticking out and the rest of his body was hidden inside the coral.
After the snorkel, we had lunch and then some free time to prepare for presenting our research. We presented all of our projects and it was pretty neat. Lots of cool stuff was shared. My project was on rays and we found that rays like to hang out in lagoons at high tide because the waves get softened up by the coral and don't mess with the rays as they rest. Throughout the class, we have had a challenge to either collect the most pieces of plastic or the heaviest plastic and the winners of each category would recieve a sweet Heron Island Thermos. After presenting, it was revealed who the winners were. I had the heaviest piece of plastic so I ended up with one of the prizes! I like the thermos alot, it will be a great, useful souviner. Edd and Trisha also handed out some awards for certain categories, such as sleeping beauty and aquaman (bet you can't guess how you earned those awards). I got the Bartholomew Marion Quint award (captain from Jaws) for always being the one staring at the ocean with a far away stare. Spot on as I usually stared out at the ocean and went for long walks by myself to the ocean. We tried to watch the sunset as a group one last time but the storm clouds blocked any possible sunset from happening. That's fine, we had absolutely amazing sunsets when we arrived. Dinner was amazing. We had steak and potatoes as our final dinner on the island. The meals this trip have been outstanding and I will miss having every meal made for me that I could go to town on. The night passed quietly for me as I just enjoyed being here and reading, relaxing and remembering my time. I won't ever forget this trip and I am glad I went.
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Today was pretty relaxed. Woke up at 6 for a different reason today, the low tide happened at 530 so Cat and I went for an observation period early instead of late so we could work on our report for our project. After our observation period, we walked towards the resort and I found another sea star that was drying up on a rock. I picked it up and gently threw it into the ocean since I caught flak for tossing the last one I found. A little down the beach, there were a ton of young seagulls gathered together (refer to picture). They were standing there, silent and menacing. It was weird so we just walked past. We went back to the station and relaxed until our next observation period at high tide. After that and lunch, Cat and I finished up our report and got our presentation all ready to go. We had a lot of time until dinner so I went for a walk because why not. On my walk I saw a baby black tip reef shark really close to the shore. It was really young, less than 2 months old. He was swimming super close to the shore line and he kept rolling with the waves as they crashed onto the shore. It was pretty fun watching him go. Before dinner, everybody gathered together for photos. We took a lot of photos, I have selected just a few of them below. The sunset was a bust since it has been super cloudy all day. Dinner was rice and curry and I decided now was the time to eat to gain real weight. I had three plates and ate until my stomach hurt, then I had desert. The desert was amazing so I kept shoving it down. I powered through the best kind of pain until the food was all gone. I haven't hurt this way in a long time but I don't regret any of it. I went for my morning walk and holy crap, the wind was absolutely howling. All day and night today, the wind was going crazy. After breakfast, Cat and I went for our high tide field observation and we didn't even swim because it was all white caps and 2 meter high waves. We just observed from the shore and we actually saw 21 shovel nose rays. Not a bad observation period but the wind was crazy. For those of you who don't know, wet suits are super tight so they are hard to get on and off. Today when I was getting out of my wet suit, one of those thoughts that shouldn't be said out loud but gets out happened. I said as I finally got my suit off, "Ah! My nuts are free!" Cat was laughing pretty hard. Lunch happened some time later and I didn't do much after. I took a nap on a couch in the library and then Cat and I went for our low tide observation. We didn't see anything. Today was pretty relaxed. I am totally fine with just chilling on a remote tropical island off the coast of Australia. Sweet gig. Cat and I wrote some stuff for our research paper, prepared a PowerPoint for presenting our research on Saturday, and chilled. I forgot to mention some small details from the past few days so I will do that here since the post would be super short. Yesterday, I found a blue sea star out of the water because the tide had gone so low. I said out loud, "wake up!" and threw it back in the ocean. I'm a real marine biologist now. When we saw the tiger shark on Tuesday, I was fine getting back in the water after it left and said, "I don't care, I'm going back out there, I will make love to that shark if I have to." Sometimes I just say things without thinking. Usually it makes people laugh which is bad positive reinforcement but I sound very silly. At dinner today, Trisha and Edd were worried because, "where are we going to find another lunatic like Sam?" Good to know I am loved. Today was a nice relaxed day. I went for my usual morning walk at sunrise and no death events occurred so I counted it as a good walk. I had breakfast and then went for my first observation snorkel for my project. I swam for 30 min looking for rays and didn't see any. This was probably due to the wind blowing like crazy and trying to swim in the strong current made me flail a lot and make a lot of noise which scared any local rays away. On a positive note, I walked the beach and recorded the rays I saw, which was a few so my project isn't a bust. Lunch happened and then me and my partner wrote some stuff for our report on our project. We went out for a low tide observation of rays and didn't find any at all. There is a lagoon that surrounds Heron Island and the low tide made the entire lagoon have about 2 feet of water for a long ways out. This probably means all the rays go away because the water is so low, or at least it makes me feel better believing that when we don't see any rays. Most of the rest of the day was spent enjoying the island since we are given all of the day to work on our projects. My group will be continuing to observe tomorrow and Friday (one day ahead from the states over here) so the next few days should be some observing and relaxing on this beautiful island. Yesterday there was seagull chilling in the water dunking his head and it was pretty funny. I forgot about to write about it yesterday but remembered because I took a video of it. The sunset was pretty sweet this night. Since the tide was so low, there was a bunch of pools and the sunset reflected off of them. It was amazing. Dinner happened and the rest of the night was spent relaxing on a cool little island off the coast of Australia. Bonus: Pat, our incredible cook, is the guy smiling at the sunset I wake up at 6 pretty naturally now. Today was quite the day. I went on a walk right as the sun rose over the island. It was super windy and I could barely look ahead so it was quite a surprise when I saw something moving in the sand. I got close and noticed it was a baby turtle making its way from where it hatched to the ocean. The birds were circling above and waiting for their chance to swoop down and eat the baby. I stuck around until the turtle made it to the ocean. I had hoped that would be enough to prevent a premature death, but the seagulls were persistent and grabbed the little guy while he was out swimming. Sad start to the day. I found some what I thought were deflated ping pong balls along the shore but apparently they were actually old turtle eggs. We had breakfast and then we had a lab where we observe coral to see if they are dying or being bleached. We went out and along the way, there was a baby bird with broken legs stuck in a hole. We are not allowed to interfere with the animal life so we had to let him be. Another dead animal for the day. We got to the beach where we were going to be observing coral and right as people started snorkeling out, a tiger shark showed up. Tiger sharks are very aggressive so we all freaked out and got out of the water. In case you care, if you see a tiger shark you should calmly move as fast as possible to get out of the water. The appearance of the tiger shark made our professors quite concerned for our safety so we decided not to do the lab today. We went to lunch and then went to the outer reef. It was amazing out there. The water was clear and warm and we snorkeled for about 2 hours. We saw lots of fish, like tons of fish. We saw a bunch of turtles, a black tip reef shark, and a bunch of spotted eagle rays. While on the boat back to the island, we saw a spotted eagle ray do a giant leap out of the water. It got like 3 feet of air. It was so cool. For some reason it was unnaturally cold today even though there was no clouds and the sun was shining. Just one of those days the sun decides to not do anything. After the snorkel, I showered and got bundled up in clothes and then I got with my partner to propose our project for the next few days. It got approved! Our project is to observe rays out in Shark Bay on the East side of the island and see what they are doing over the next three days. Should be a fun project especially since we both love rays and we want to know more about them. The sunset was very nice tonight since there was no clouds. The stars were also amazing. Heron is quite something and I am very grateful and happy to be here. Again, thank you mom and dad for getting me on this trip. I woke up at 6 today. Getting better at sleeping in. I went for a walk around the island and found a brick in the sand. I don't know any myths about finding bricks in the sand but I should look them up because I may have just set something in motion without knowing it. On my walk I also saw an eagle ray jump in the air! They look hilarious flapping in the air as they jump. We had breakfast and then an ID test for fish, corals, etc. I had a 50.5/51 because I said Sea Cucumber instead of Giant Sea Cucumber. Not bad considering my bad memory. We had lunch and then we went to the outer reef for some snorkel sessions. The outer reef was very cool. Lots of fish and turtles and I even saw a white tip reef shark go right past a turtle. I can't seem to post videos but I did happen to catch that moment with the turtle and white tip. Ask me to see it when you see me next! I think my wet suit is one size too small because it keeps exchanging water and not holding onto it so I get cold quick. I don't think a smaller wet suit would be tall enough for me anyways so I am just screwed, yay tall and skinny! Today the rain and clouds stopped and it was clear with lots of sunshine. It really helped my cold get better with the sunshine and brought my spirits up. The stars last night were amazing and I saw 2 shooting stars and a satellite. I am sure they will be even better tonight with the clouds all gone. The date tag is actually United States time, it is the 2nd of June as I write this, not the 1st. Anyways, I am slowly dying from this cold. I am so congested. I found out two other guys also have colds so we have been quarantined from everybody else. We call ourselves the leper squad due to being segregated for our horrible diseases. We all joke that we will get everybody else sick and cough at people. Making fun of a dire situation. I woke up at 6 today, woo! Getting that extra sleep. We had breakfast at 7 today rather than our normal 730 because we had a lab today where we go out during high tide then low tide, high tide occurred around 8 today. Our lab was looking at fish abundances, so we go out and set out a measuring tape and then record all the fish we see along that tape. We analyze the video of the fish and mark what fish we see. Luckily, we only had to swim during the high tide and we could walk the area during low tide so I didn't completely freeze and feel like crap from my cold. I went to the harbor to watch the sunset (refer to the pics) and there was a giant ship that contained a ScUber. Apparently, it is a ship that has a submarine the people can uber with (get a ride in) from around the reef. It cost like $3,000. I wish I had crazy money to just ride a submarine to my next destination, forget the ferry. |
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About MeI am the guy whose name is on the top there. I am a student who graduated with a BA from USU this year and finally gave in to Dr. Atwood's pestering to go on her Heron Island Class for coral reefs. People often call me really sassy and unhappy. What they don't know is that my resting face is angry, but I am usually pretty happy. ArchivesCategories |