Okie dokie, sorry this blog has been dead for so long. I keep forgetting that I have this thing and the moment I do remember is the moment I am no where near my computer. Aside from that, I’m going to try to relay the last couple months for the amusement of anyone still reading this. Ok, right, Orpheus Island. For the Australia version of uni spring break certain classes can gobble up this time for fieldwork and trips so instead of a week you have 3-4 days…if you only have one class with a field trip. So for Coral Reef Ecology we all had to do field work on Orpheus Island. Sounds interesting, right?... You’d be completely wrong, it was fantastic! Basically Orpheus Island is a remote island accessible only by boat and the only thing on it besides forest is a small research station and an exclusive resort. It was gorgeous! It was basically untouched reef, it was so colorful, and we were allowed to touch it! Everyday we would get up and spend hours in the ocean snorkeling our like crazy gathering data for various student made projects. Not only that., but we were also allowed to interact with it! Our professor told us that was the only way we could fully learn, so he said we could handle the coral! That never happens! Granted we had to make sure there was no sun block on our hands so we wouldn’t harm the coral. A lot of vigorous scrubbing of hands occurred before every survey. Coral wasn’t the only thing in the water. We saw lots of colorful fish! They were swimming all around us; angelfish darted in front of our faces, butterfly fish and snails everywhere and, as a special surprise Christmas tree worms! There’s a pic of them down below. They are a small worm that attaches to hard substrate, like rock or dead coral and filter feed. When predator (or your hand) causes a change in the water movement, they withdraw themselves into the rock. Fun fact they were the inspiration for the retractable plant in one of the early sequences in Avatar! Biology, its awesome! On a less positive note afternoon work was a bit of a pain (literally) because at low tide and with a current we were accidently bumping into coral constantly. You could I.D. coral from the mucus imprints on our butts basically. Everyone ended up with coral scraps and cuts on their hands. Luckily no one got infected. It wasn’t all work though; we also got to do a fun snorkel very early in the morning in the mangroves. Looking for baby sharks! We didn’t find any unfortunately, but swimming the mangroves was the best maze I’ve ever been in. We did see one from the shore one day though. That day before dinner everyone was just hanging around napping and recouping, when some one shouted “Shark!” In a flash every student, whether lazing about, working, or sleeping, jumped up and ran towards the beach. Nearly everyone was there looking and chattering excitedly about where it had gone ( we probably scared it away, as some had run into the water)… yeah we’re weird like that, marine biologist are the only one who will run towards the water when someone yells shark. Self preservation, what’s that? We are scientists!
After half a week was up we packed up and headed back to JCU, only to get on a bus the next morning and head down to Arlie Beach. Nine of us went, we took up a while room at the hostel we stayed at. We spent the rest of our week swimming, lazing around on the beach and catamaraning. No, we didn’t sail it, we took a tour on one around the islands, I’m not coordinated enough to crew a ship. We had such a short time that we thought we’d get a nice summary sailing around the islands. It was very relaxing. During our tour we took a break on White Haven beach, home to the palest, finest sand I’ve ever seen. Fine ground, natural silica sand feels absolutely heavenly between your toes, it felt like the dust I used to fill my chinchilla’s dust bath. All of us decided to roll around in it and imitate sugar cookies (because silica sand is a good exfoliate!). Several f the locals said hi as well, three lace moniter lizards and a massive green turtle. We also spent some time snorkeling as well. It wasn’t as impressive as Orpheus, but then again there is a lot more human traffic in the area, so it wasn’t surprising, it was still nice though. So that was my “Spring Break”. I’ve much more to chat about, my advanced dive course, the rainforest, diving in the Coral Sea, but I’ve got to be rested for tomorrows cage dive, with great whites! Here’s hoping I see a few! Got any question or just want to rant about my lack of keeping up with the blog? Leave a comment below!
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