This morning I was awake at 6 with the sun. I went back to sleep until 6:30, then I decided to go for a run. I put on my shoes and headed for an adventure. I ran down towards the marina where sunset beach is located. It was a beautiful run and when I got to the beach, I did some sit-ups in the sand then went for a swim. I threw back on my shoes and ran back to the dorm. It was a great way to start my day.
Breakfast was at 8:15 like every day… They had French toast, yogurt, fresh squeezed orange juice, and sliced mangos. Right after breakfast we skyped with Edd Brooks, who is in charge of all the shark research here. I met him while I was visiting in December; he is very knowledgeable about sharks. We are kind of running around with our heads cut off because the kid Niels, who is in charge of the Nurse Shark project doesn’t have his project finalized. So, the past two days we have been running around doing nothing. It is starting to make me a bit frustrated, so I have been trying to do everything to start the project.
After our skype call with Edd, we rode our bikes to Paige Creek to see if we could observe any sharks. We walked the shoreline and saw 2 nurse sharks and 3 juvenile lemon sharks. I started to get excited to actually go out and observe and take measurements because I could see the sharks well in the water before anyone else did. After we walked the shoreline we headed back and rode our bikes back to the lab. We were supposed to start getting the gear ready for tomorrow, however the students are doing interviews everywhere so there was no place for us to work. So, once again we are wondering around doing nothing… looking lost.
Lunchtime is always fun. Today we had a baked potato and salad. It was delicious. The Maxeys surprised me and were at lunch, so it was good to see them! They were happy to see me here. We have made plans to have dinner Tuesday night, so that will be nice! Today I ate lunch on the rooftop which has an amazing view of the water. I can’t describe how incredible it is. I will take a picture and try to attach it. I ate with a kid Luke who I met today, he works with the bonefish team. I was talking to him and told him I wanted to go out with them one day and see what they do. He was super nice and laid back. I branched out today at lunch and sat with people I didn’t know, so it was nice to talk and get to know more people.
We have this paper we have to get signed by different people around campus. There are different areas like, medical interview, kitchen rules, risk management, etc. So me and the two other new interns went to the kitchen and one of the ladies remembered me from last time I was visiting in December. It made me feel good! She was so sweet, so now I have an in with the kitchen ladies! Life is so simple, but perfect here. Everybody does their thing and stays busy. This weekend is Deep Creek’s (a settlement, or town, down the road) “homecoming” called the Conch fest. We are apparently going Saturday night, from what I have gathered it is a bunch of drunken people who come in town to celebrate where they came from. All the interns go and drink once the students leave! We have a little down time right not, about 30 minutes, before we take off in the van. You can’t drive the vans unless you are 25, which no one on the Nurse Shark team is, so we had to find someone to drive us. We are going to the different creeks and walking the shoreline like we did at Paige Creek. We will observe what we see and write it down.
So the farthest creek is about a 15 minute car ride, however when we are actually doing the research we have to ride bikes. So, I am definitely going to have jacked legs by the end of the month and a half!!! This one creek called Plum Creek was breathtaking; I can’t wait to do observations there. It was something you see out of a magazine or screensaver, no one was one the beach, no houses, there wasn’t anything. It was incredible! We were able to walk up to 2 nurse sharks, it was so cool. I never knew they would let you just walk up to them. I touched their tails! Apparently the females go into shallow water to get away from males that are trying to mate with them. The males bite them and clench on to them creating scars. We returned for dinner which we had chicken, rice, corn, and vegetables. After dinner we met at the wet lab to gather all the gear and get everything ready for tomorrow’s actual research at Paige Creek.
Once we finished everything, we were told people were going down to the conch fest for an interns birthday. We rode are bikes there at night with headlamps, it was so fun. We parked our bikes at an interns house who lives right down the street from the festival. It was so cool, they had booths set up in a field with food, prizes/games, a big bar, and music. There were talent competitions, dance offs, and all kinds of stuff. It was so fun. Everyone was enjoying themselves and drinking so everyone was very social and friendly. I met a few more people last night. These are definitely my kind of people! Around 11:15 we decided we should start riding our bikes back since it was a 20 minute bike ride. The stars were beautiful like every night, so clear and so many. We made it home and hit the bed because we had a meeting at 7 in the morning to finalize our gear checklist and project methods.
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