Day 5 - Sharks?

Max was the day's leader - he wrote the following for the day's blog...

Today was a long day without a dull moment. As usual the day started with a workout at 6:45. Today we were lucky, since the camp founder/principal, Chris Maxi, led us on a run swim. This workout consisted of short swims followed by various activities ranging from pushups to lifting rocks and then a mild run to the next swim. The two highlights of this run swim were climbing over a seawall and jumping off triangle cut. The sea wall was about five feet high, but the bottom foot was still underwater. Since it was underwater most of the wall was covered in a slippery moss plant. This made the wall very difficult to climb over.  To make it even harder before attempting the climb, Chris had us pass a rock back and forth while doing wall sits. Zack was the first one over the wall. He set the standard high getting over the wall perfectly. Surprisingly to all of us, everybody made it over the wall without a problem. Only a few people suffered cuts from the rough edge. After a short run we arrived at triangle cut and we got to jump off the cliff. Same as yesterday it was a fun jump. The highlight was being able to see Wes and Jenny jump off the eight-foot cliff. Then run swim concluded in everybody touching the flagpole in the middle of camp. By the end everybody was exhausted and looking forward to breakfast.

            The rest of the day consisted of shark fishing. Everybody had been looking forward to seeing sharks in the wild for the first time. The group was split into two groups. I was on the smaller boat with Wes, Zack, Bella, Alix, Serena and Vanessa. Every else went on a larger boat with Jenny. The smaller boat went drum lining while the larger boat went long lining. Unfortunately nether boats were able to catch any sharks. Most frustrating for my boat was that multiple times the bait had been taken off the hook by a shark. It seems like the other boat had a similar encounter, with a shark swimming under one of their hooks while they were approaching it. Even though my boat did not see any sharks we still had a great time on the water. We leant a lot from Ian, the shark researcher who we were helping with his PhD work. Also between setting the hooks and checking them we were able to snorkel on a patch reef. It was very interesting being able to see just one section of reef sounded by white sand. It is amazing to see how something so small could support so much life. During this swim we got to see our first jellyfish. The jellyfish seemed to be glowing a purplish hue; it was cool to look at. At the same time the other boat was also snorkeling at a different reef. From what Ben has showed us in his videos, it looked like a fun time. There seemed to be tons of fish located there. Their supervisor Brendan is a very good free diver. He was able to swim down about 60 feet to the bottom of the reef and stay down there for about a minuet. He took Ben’s GoPro down to the bottom with him and got some amazing video, showing all the different kinds of fish. At the end of their swim, Brian saw a shark swim around the edge of the reef. They identified the shark as a Reef Shark and that was between six and seven feet. Upon retuning to the Island School, the big boat went for another swim by the harbor. They were able to pick up a sea sponge and dissect it on the docks. When I returned this is what they were doing. It was amazing the about of small animals that were living inside of the sponge. The coolest thing to me was the sea cucumber. After unloading to boats and cleaning off the dock we had free time until dinner.

            After spending almost seven hours out on the water we were all hungry and tired. We all journeyed over to the marina store to refuel on food. The store was full of tempting choices, but the main choices were chocolate cookies, ice cream, and candy bars. It was the best pre-dinner snack ever. Brian was the stand out having his own carton of ice cream with two candy bars and a Gatorade. Brian’s “snack” consisted of over 1,000 calories.  On the walk back to the island school Zack, Brian and myself were able to knock down two coconuts from a tree. Brian proved useful in cracking them open on the road then ripping them open. If you have never tasted fresh coconut before you are missing out. It was great. Mostly everybody tried it, Anna, Rachel, Liz, Alix and all of they guys indulged in the coconuts. Upon returning to the school we headed of to dinner and then a movie presentation.

            The next leader will be Bella.