And on that happy note, we finally broke our diving hiatus with a morning dive. It was great to be back in the water, I had no idea I would miss it so much. Instead of using air in our cylinder as we usually do (21% oxygen), we used Nitrox, which is basically a gas mixture consisting of less nitrogen and more oxygen (32% oxygen in our case). Completing that dive means we're officially Nitrox Divers!
Bernie and I post-diving
And now for the part that's actually relevant to Valentine's Day. At the beginning of this week, Andrea made these adorable envelopes for each person in our crew and hung them up so we could all make Valentines for each other:
By this morning, the all the Valentine envelopes were stuffed (yay!):
Being on an island with limited access to crafty resources, here's my version of Valentines that I ended up making for everyone
After dinner, we all gathered around the envelopes like kids waiting to open Christmas presents. Since Amanda had taken the initiative in making Valentine Hats for everyone, selfies were going on all around:
Needless to say, it was a pretty successful celebration all around. There were some incredibly creative/incredibly sweet/incredibly funny goodies in my envelope, which goes for everyone else as well.
Breaking into the first Valentines
Sending my love out to everyone else back on the mainland and all across the country/world who has been part of my life. Miss you all, and Happy Valentines Day!!
Class is really starting to get going- we've had three long lectures so far, and our first midterm is coming up on Tuesday. On a happier note, it seems like we'll be taking a class field trip to Avalon in the near future (Catalina Island's biggest city and main tourist destination), so stay posted for updates.
After hearing about my kayak trip to Bird Rock/Blue Caverns with Bernie a few days ago, several people wanted to check it out for themselves, so I hit the kayaks once again. The waves was incredibly smooth today, with none of the rough winds that plagued the water just a few days ago. As a result, we made the trip with about half the time and effort that I had expended when I first went with Bernie.
Hunter about to enter the caverns
Navigating out of the cavern's shallows
Just as we emerged from the caverns, we were surprised by a seal basking on a rock right outside of the tunnel. Seal's are a lot more unusual to spot around here than sea lions, and we fussed over this one for a while before going on our way.
On our way back, we found several more cavern-like structures cut into the rock face. Unlike Blue Caverns, none of them seemed to tunnel straight through the cliffs; however, there were several with narrow chamber openings that seemed to lead deeper into the rocks. Without a flashlight and water shoes, exploration seemed a little questionable, but I'll definitely be returning in the near future.
One of the cavern structures we discovered
We don't have class tomorrow, so I spent the rest of the day watching Star Wars and brainstorming Valentine ideas for everyone. I know some people are planning pretty cute ideas, so I'm hoping I have a creative epiphany sometime soon..
You know life is good when elementary school traditions begin to re-surface.
Today, in short, was a rather productive day that included class, meals, time spent working on my research project/internship, a run, and weights. By the time I had finished my workout, I was definitely feeling like I could use some relaxation, so I hiked a short ways up a trail to string up my hammock.
The hammock life is the only life for me
I had a pretty cozy set-up going, and would have stayed for longer if it wasn't for dinner. I can't remember the last time I enjoyed such a relaxing read- I'm still congratulating myself on such a worthwhile investment. Really, I'm beginning to think beds are overrated.
As promised, I set out after class today to finish the hike that I had started yesterday. This time, I brought some friends along, one of which informed me that the trail I found was definitely not a new discovery. So much for that.
Lucky us, we happened to set out right when a thick cloud bank rolled in from the ocean. Swirling around the mountains, the fog made for some of the most breathtaking landscapes I've seen since I've got here.
Fog closing in early on in the hike
We stopped for many photos along the way, and this shot of my friend Savannah taking a panoramic gives you an idea of just how thick and dense the cloud bank was. The usual blue expanse of ocean that the trail overlooks was replaced by an impenetrable layer of misty white.
When I last went back to the mainland, someone asked me if I had gotten used to how beautiful the island is, or if it still takes my breath away. If that same person were here to see how the same landscapes vary in appearance from day to day, I don't think they would have had to ask.
The sun breaking through the fog
In general cacti grow all over Catalina Island, but they happened to be particularly dense along this hiking trail. Despite my caution, I still managed to stub my foot on a baby cacti that slipped my notice. I sincerely hope this doesn't become a trend throughout the rest of the semester.
Cacti covered hill
When we finally reached the top, we had broken above the cloud bank for a pretty spectacular view:
The clouds moving across the hills toward the town of Two Harbors
We couldn't have timed the hike better- by the time we were descending, the fog had lifted, and all was clear blue sky once again. Oh, how I appreciate the whims of Mother Nature.
Well it's back to real classes and 9:30am lectures. I miss diving a lot already, but we're conducting research projects that include diving as part of this class, so hopefully I'll be back in the water soon.
The research project is largely open ended as far as what we want to study. We were paired up into teams of two, and my partner Elliott and I messed around with some ideas we were interested in pursuing. These included invasive species, applications of citizen science, and managing stakeholder interests.
After lecture, lunch, and a nap, I was feeling a little antsy so I went on a little solo exploration. I started out at the junkyard, which is located just behind our main campus.
A junkyard boat that's outlived its days on the water
After poking around for a bit, I discovered a trail that didn't look familiar, so I naturally started following it. I ended up meandering my way up Mt. Wrigley (the slope that we hiked in my earlier posts), picking my way through loose rock and attempting not to impale myself on the cacti.
On my way up, I ran into several foxes, one of which jumped on the trail and started trotting directly toward me. He eventually skirted around me at the last minute, but it's just one more example of how comfortable the animals here are around humans. Even the fish in the water have no qualms about inquisitive divers- my hands will often be barely a couple of inches away from them before they'll swim away.
The inquisitive fox
Before I got all the way to the top of the slope, it began getting pretty dark, and I realized I was in danger of missing dinner. With the threat of an empty stomach looming ahead of me, I made good time back down the slope, resolving to come back and finish my hike tomorrow.
From a distance, the junkyard where I started my hike looks miniscule
Well not really at all, but it's probably the closest I'll ever get to having a cool animal attack encounter where I lived to tell the tale. A little ways off of the shore of our campus is a huge rock that forms something like a mini island; we call it "Bird Rock". In celebration of the beautiful weather, I decided to kayak out there with Bernie and go look for Sea Lions since you can always hear them calling from the rock.
The waves were pretty rough so we had a bit of a shoulder workout getting out there, but here's a panoramic of our kayak as we approach Bird rock. The photo makes it seem a bit smaller than it actually is.
Before we even got close to the island, the tell-tale stench of animal manure told us that we were on the right track. Sure enough, we as we approached the island, we saw huge groups of seals piled on the shore of Bird Rock. There must have been at least a hundred, and one of them was absolutely massive. I don't know if sea lion colonies have something similar to a Queen Bee, but he definitely looked the part
We started pulling the kayak in closer, and all of a sudden, King Sea Lion gives a huge sort of half yawn half bark and plunges into the sea towards us. Before you know it, twenty-some other seals have followed suit and are swimming straight for us. At this point, our kayak was only about 10-15 feet away from shore, and it was probably the most terrifying and most amazing experience all at the same time. Bernie was half convinced they were going to capsize us, but I think they just wanted to defend their territory. A few curious sea lions even followed behind us for a little bit.
Our kayak headed straight into a group of sea lions up ahead
This episode of sea lions jumping in the water toward us was repeated several times as we made our way around Bird Rock, and we made many hasty kayak getaways.
Some other cool photos that I snapped of the sea lions on Bird Rock:
The lighting at this angle of Bird Rock made for a pretty good silhouette shot
By the time we had circled to the opposite side of the island, the surge was really strong, and we put in some serious shoulder work keeping the kayak from drifting too close to the sea lions. When we finally got our fill of photos, we continued on to Blue Caverns.
Blue Caverns is basically a tunnel like structure through a rock cliff that's wide enough to kayak through. The photos and video I'm about to post do it absolutely no justice; it's beautiful.
Entrance to the cavern
We took a video of our entire trip to through cavern. I was attempting to help paddle while taking the video, so apologies for the shaky quality. The sound cuts out for a little bit towards the end before cutting back in, so you may want to turn your volume up a little during that section (basically, the part that you miss includes us running into shallow tide, so I temporarily cut out of the video to help Bernie paddle out).
Our view exiting the cavern
Roundtrip, our entire kayak excursion took a little less than two hours. Bernie and I had stupidly decided that lifting weights was a good idea before we kayaked, so our shoulders were pretty much shot by the time we paddled back into the Wrigley harbor...which just made the experience that much better.
Thoroughly soaked by the ocean spray; a selfie to document our successful return
To top off a fantastic day, Trevor finally taught me how to tie a proper knot, and Savannah and I successfully hung our hammocks up today! Unfortunately, I didn't have my camera with me to document the momentous event, but I'm sure there'll be plenty of hammock photo ops in the future.
Class starts again tomorrow, even though I'd gladly take a few more days off. Still, a great end to a great long weekend.
I've been frequenting the trail to Two Harbors pretty often this weekend, adding another trip to town this morning. This one was rather unplanned, as I was rudely awakened by Hannah telling me I should get up and go hiking with them.
My quads were pretty sore from all the uphill hiking and running I've been doing, so getting up the normally not-that-bad Deer Valley trail was a lot more painful than I expected.
I snapped a shot of the Wrigley campus as I was coming back down the hill so you guys can get a sense of where's where. The light blue building closest to the harbor is the dive locker where we store all the diving gear. The larger beige building to the right of it is the Hyperbaric Chamber, where they treat dive accidents.
Going uphill from the waterfront, the largest three tiered building is where our lecture hall, lab rooms, and library are located. Directly across from that is the brown administration building (it's almost blended in with the hill) where we can send/receive mail or sign up for boats leaving the island. The arena-looking circle in front of the administration building is an amphitheater that we never use, and between the amphitheater and the admin building is a volleyball court.
Farthest back is the group of buildings that consist of the dining hall (the building with the white columns to the very right) and the dorms. We're in the dorm building directly connected to the dining hall, but some of the other buildings to the left are actually cabin-styled cottages.
Due to the soreness of my calves, I wasn't feeling very excited about more physical activity, so I spent a lot of the rest of the day watching the Olympics. Looking at all the hubbub in Sochi makes me feel like we're watching a world completely removed from our little island- which, in most senses, we are.
