(Our favorite little silly goofy guy)

By Akira, Athena, and Uma

We slept in today, set off at around 9:30, and made our way to Mount Grant to pick weeds. We were greeted by our favorite goofball, Jacob from the San Juan County Conservation Land Bank as his expert volunteers, Bob and Barry. In today’s hot sun, we went after our greatest enemies, and the island’s greatest threat, Thistle and Tansy Ragwort. They have made it on our wanted list because of their prickly personality and invasive nature. Also, there were some cool bugs like… LADYBUGS 🙂 After a short battle, we stopped for lunch, but in the process…ran…out…of…WATER (oh no) !!!!!!!! After our short break, we ventured out to continue the saga. In the end, we “harvested” two bags of #weeds. The rest of the day was filled with working on our projects, cleaning, playing, and having a reunion with Tom. Here’s some pictures. Bye.

PS: weeds suck

By: Athena, Uma, and Akira

After a long night of playing games together, we woke up bright and early to see SOME OYSTERS!!!! We spent about an hour learning about their operations and sustainable farming methods at the Westcott Bay Shellfish Company.

After checking out the farm, we took a hike to English Camp and walked the Bell Point Loop (barefoot gang stroke again). Along this scenic route, we stopped at Bell Point and learned about ocean acidification, kelp, and the importance of the food web. We also saw a view of the oyster farm from earlier.

After lunch, we went to the Whale Museum with Big Alex who was able to provide us with some extra insight into all the information we were seeing. Here is some of the sights we saw included below.

During our free time, there was an offer from Courtney (dorm mom) to GO SWIMMING!!!! Four brave soldiers (Athena, Uma, Carter, and Dylan) decided to venture out to Eagle Cove for a chilly afternoon swim. Some of our female soldiers took the water with an iron fist while certain others didn’t (especially not our native Florida man).

GOODNIGHT!!!

By Athena Burk Bravo, Uma Garcia, Akira Wittkamper

Our first full day on the island started off by getting familiar with the local wildlife found in the tide pools of Deadman Bay. During our first hour, we spent time exploring the tidepools, at a high level and beginning to identify the species we were seeing.

We were lucky to have our guide Alex with us able to answer the questions regarding the ecosystem we were seeing. When we first got to the beach, we noticed the abundance of barnacles. As we began to explore further, we saw sea cucumbers, sea anemones, crabs, chitons, sea stars and even a bald eagle! We were able to identify the types of species more specifically with the help of our group and Alex.

Included below are some of the sights we saw this afternoon.