One situation to describe how well family week went…I’m currently writing this blog update during a home made game of family feud using otter and gray whale trivia. Its genius, and some of the ridiculous guess answers are devastatingly gut-busting:
“What is the gestation period of gray whales?”
“2 YEARS 1 MONTH!!”
“2 years 1 month gestation period for a 900 pound infant?! I hope not!”
And this was only the end of the week. I can’t say I worked very hard today as it was one of my last full work days and I haven’t slept much in the last few days, but at the same time I don’t feel too regretful based on our level of success the days prior. Two days ago we saw a bear, multiple eagles, a seal, and an entire family of four river otters who put a show on for my kayakers and myself not once but twice during the transect. It was probably the best field day of the trip, and I doubt I’ll have a chance (and I don’t know if I want one) to have a better field day with the three days I have left in Ahousaht. And after seeing all that, we spent the afternoon dunking the kids with the kayak and having a big day on the water, jumping off the top of Stardust (which at high tide was higher from the water than the pier) and swimming across the inlet. The water was cold, but the heat from the past few days made it worth it.
My group wasn’t quite as lucky yesterday (or today for that matter) but all of our luck apparently got transferred to Drifter (our whale-watching boat) who ran into a fishing boat that had just finished a catch of over 70 Coho salmon and were generous enough to give two to us (granted Tyler knew the fishermen). So that night the boys (including myself) built up a cedar fire, burned it down to coals, threw on some wet alder wood and slow cooked the heck out of both of those fish. Everyone loved it and the best part was I didn’t have to do dishes post-perfectly-cooked-salmon-dinner.
And the highlight of highlights (drum roll please)…we saw a bear within 50 feet today. Around five pm, one of the Moms was getting a little antsy from being cooped up inside on a beautiful day, and wanted to go on a hike. So Jeff (the super cool Earthwatch director) and I rallied together and got a couple others to come with us. We hiked up to the reservoir up in the hills behind the house, and once we got into the trail we started finding bear scat that was relatively fresh. We had seen bear scat on the trail before, but never that fresh, so needless to say (me being the only staff member) I was on my toes. But we made it to the reservoir just fine, and I was relaxing on a log about 2 minutes before we heard crashing across the water and a Jeff saying good and loud, “BEAR.”
It never got to a point where it was a threat, because the bear was a cub and there was like I said about fifty feet of water between us and it. Nevertheless I knew that seeing a cub is the worst type of bear because it means Mom isn’t far away. We had a good time talking loud to it, taking photos and videos and watching it pick berries. But after about twenty minutes of that, we finally saw Mama, and she was heading down to our end of the reservoir, and at that point I decided it was time to head back. It was a super exciting last night of the trip, and it made Jeff’s whole trip because he’d never seen a bear before. I think he got quite first taste of one tonight. And me…I just can’t get over the fact that I’ve seen three in the last two weeks, not to mention probably having one within staring contest distance while checking a camera.
Tonight has of course been a slightly bittersweet last night for the volunteers, because it’s my last group of volunteers before I leave on Friday. I’m excited to go home, and the first week of being back in civilization will still be awesome, being part of my best friend’s wedding. But then it’s back to REAL real life, and even though I’ve been working here and getting paid to do it, I’d gladly pay it all back to spend another six weeks up here in this great place with all these great people. I know that all good things come to an end (or at least take a break before the next good thing), I’m thankful for what I’ve learned and seen and been a part of here; I’m ready for yet another phase of life to end and another begin, but one thing’s for sure: I’m going out with a BANG.
Smooth sailing, happy trails, always throw your hooks out because you never know what you’ll catch, and don’t be afraid to jump because more often than not, the water’s just fine. Oh and don’t forget to double-foil wrap when you fire-cook salmon, because losing those delicious juices when the foil tears is an EPIC party foul.
Any comfort you once took in the familiarity will be ripped to shreds as you learn to stand on your own, to delve into who you truly are and re-invent yourself into who you want to be. - Erin Stephany
Monday, August 16, 2010
Monday, August 9, 2010
Into The Wild
This week was Teen Week, and if there was ever a time when I’d consider myself slightly grown-up (impossible, I know), it’d be this week. I’m usually a mildly disoriented character as it is, forgetting things, becoming lost for words, losing my train of thought….but being in the charge of these kids took me from my usual disoriented character and blew me into a plummeting airplane of whacked out. I don’t know how it happened, but I’ll venture that it could have been a combination of or a strategic single placement of the following teen behaviors: constant chatter, loud screaming, blasting the worst rap songs ever created while meetings are taking place, dancing to said worst rap songs, disintegration of any food particles lying around in the kitchen, disregard and lack of respect for anyone of authority, complete lack of manners, or complete lack of common sense. I remember being a teen once (hell I still have the appetite of one) but I want to believe that I wasn’t quite as insane as this.
All of that venting aside, it was a pretty good week by the books. My team saw otters four days straight, which I find extremely abnormal, and I constantly reminded them how lucky and spoiled the were for getting to see so many. One lucky teen and I (if I could be so bold, the most normal teen in the group) saw a black bear (probably one of the best moments of this trip). To top it ALL off, while checking some video footage from one of my IR cameras in the field, we discovered that a cougar had been prowling by my camera not a day after I was there changing the battery (another awesome moment). Safe to say I am now a strong believer in all the dangers and excitement that this little island paradise, and the next time I feel stupid for talking to myself in a very loud and high-pitched Elmo voice while rifling through otter scat in the bush, I will think about that cougar and that bear.
And this segues into the not so great but definitely exciting aspects of this week. Out of the two big ones that I’ll mention, we’ll start with the least exciting. Today, Krystal and I were setting up a video camera at a new latrine site. It was a pretty tough camera to place because the location we chose for it is on a rock that’s partially submerged half the day by rising tides, not to mention we had to lie on our stomachs in order to fasten it to a branch. But, superstars that we are, placed it just fine, but as soon as we stood up to go, we heard a crack in the brush. Then we heard loud crashing in the bush that seemed to get louder and closer. Krystal promptly HISSED as loud as she could and made for the kayak, while I yelled “LOUD NOISES!” and had my bear mace out faster than a gunslinger in a quick draw. The crashing stopped, and both of us got into the kayaks quickly and headed out to the middle of the bay. Nothing came out to the rocks where we had been standing, but it was a scare all the same.
The more suspenseful moment of my week and likely the most suspenseful day for every staff member here was three days ago, when a girl in my group fell off of a downed tree about three feet, landing laterally on her hip and head on the tidal rocks below. I don’t want to make it more dramatic than it was, but it was pretty dramatic for me while it was happening, particularly because 1) this girl was my responsibility and 2) the girl can’t weigh more than 100 pounds, she’s a twig. And I was expecting that twig to be unconscious when I got to her. She wasn’t, but it’s definitely an experience I’ll never forget, having a tiny girl smashed on the rocks screaming and crying for me to help her. I made the cardinal mistake that would put my lifeguard training to shame, pulling her out of the rocks before checking for a head injury, but it went as smoothly as a situation like that could have gone. We managed to get her back in the kayak, paddled her to the house, she had a first responder there within the hour and in three she was on a ferry to the hospital. Amazingly, she was back at the house by dinner time, albeit with a cracked hip. I know not to feel responsible, and I don’t. It was an accident and everything turned out okay. Still, (following what seems to be the fabulous theme of this trip) it was another brand new experience for me that I’ll likely carry with me to my grave.
And if I never hear the words “Teen Week” back-to-back in the same sentence ever again, I’ll be okay with that.
Smooth sailing, good hunting, watch where you step, and always remember protection ;-)
All of that venting aside, it was a pretty good week by the books. My team saw otters four days straight, which I find extremely abnormal, and I constantly reminded them how lucky and spoiled the were for getting to see so many. One lucky teen and I (if I could be so bold, the most normal teen in the group) saw a black bear (probably one of the best moments of this trip). To top it ALL off, while checking some video footage from one of my IR cameras in the field, we discovered that a cougar had been prowling by my camera not a day after I was there changing the battery (another awesome moment). Safe to say I am now a strong believer in all the dangers and excitement that this little island paradise, and the next time I feel stupid for talking to myself in a very loud and high-pitched Elmo voice while rifling through otter scat in the bush, I will think about that cougar and that bear.
And this segues into the not so great but definitely exciting aspects of this week. Out of the two big ones that I’ll mention, we’ll start with the least exciting. Today, Krystal and I were setting up a video camera at a new latrine site. It was a pretty tough camera to place because the location we chose for it is on a rock that’s partially submerged half the day by rising tides, not to mention we had to lie on our stomachs in order to fasten it to a branch. But, superstars that we are, placed it just fine, but as soon as we stood up to go, we heard a crack in the brush. Then we heard loud crashing in the bush that seemed to get louder and closer. Krystal promptly HISSED as loud as she could and made for the kayak, while I yelled “LOUD NOISES!” and had my bear mace out faster than a gunslinger in a quick draw. The crashing stopped, and both of us got into the kayaks quickly and headed out to the middle of the bay. Nothing came out to the rocks where we had been standing, but it was a scare all the same.
The more suspenseful moment of my week and likely the most suspenseful day for every staff member here was three days ago, when a girl in my group fell off of a downed tree about three feet, landing laterally on her hip and head on the tidal rocks below. I don’t want to make it more dramatic than it was, but it was pretty dramatic for me while it was happening, particularly because 1) this girl was my responsibility and 2) the girl can’t weigh more than 100 pounds, she’s a twig. And I was expecting that twig to be unconscious when I got to her. She wasn’t, but it’s definitely an experience I’ll never forget, having a tiny girl smashed on the rocks screaming and crying for me to help her. I made the cardinal mistake that would put my lifeguard training to shame, pulling her out of the rocks before checking for a head injury, but it went as smoothly as a situation like that could have gone. We managed to get her back in the kayak, paddled her to the house, she had a first responder there within the hour and in three she was on a ferry to the hospital. Amazingly, she was back at the house by dinner time, albeit with a cracked hip. I know not to feel responsible, and I don’t. It was an accident and everything turned out okay. Still, (following what seems to be the fabulous theme of this trip) it was another brand new experience for me that I’ll likely carry with me to my grave.
And if I never hear the words “Teen Week” back-to-back in the same sentence ever again, I’ll be okay with that.
Smooth sailing, good hunting, watch where you step, and always remember protection ;-)
Sunday, August 1, 2010
Man Day - Canuck Chronicles Day 17
7.31.10
I don’t know why I bother trying to think ahead or bother planning for anything specific around here if it isn’t research related. It gives a false sense of security. And the funny thing is, I’m not saying that in frustration. I’ve come to grips with it and on most occasions I actually enjoy the rush of it because I’m already abysmal at planning ahead for anything.
This morning was not exactly one of those moments. Here I was taking the words “four days off” after the volunteers leaving as nice slow time to catch up on my research data entry, organize my thoughts, and catch up on sleep. How naïve I was back then. Last night William (head researcher) asked if I’d come out to Tofino with him and our mechanical engineer on staff to help him try to fix up his truck. What time would we be leaving? Five in the morning. To be fair, I agreed to the whole thing, wanting to take every opportunity to go into town for free. I didn’t feel that way when five a.m. rolled around, however, but I woke up soon enough once we had the wind in our face flying the boat down the channel at 20 nauts.
We had to drop off another two members of our little family in town as they were headed north to do a whale transect for William, after which Will, Taylor (mech. Engineer) and I went out for a quick and early breakfast before setting out to fix the truck that William had parked in town. The problem (putting it lightly) was with the front left suspension. Now I don’t know much about cars at all, so I was trying to soak up as much as I could while acting as errand boy for the two who actually knew what they were doing. I won’t lie, I didn’t feel very useful, but I did what I could. We knew it should only be a two hour job replacing the parts we had to, but we estimated ahead knowing our own skills and planned for a five hour job. But with these kinds of things, as I said at the beginning of this entry, planning much of anything around here is a futile effort. We started work on the truck at 8ish and didn’t finish until about 5. The most impressive of our trials and tribulations was that once we finally worked around all the rusted screws, nuts and other crap just to get to the shock, we spent about two hours trying to make the new one fit before someone had the bright realization that we had the wrong shock entirely. The fact that we had successfully replaced other parts of that side suspension was the welcome reminder that the day wasn’t a total loss. We did some shopping (mostly for alcohol) and made it home by a well-earned 6:30 pm.
But of course that wasn’t the end of the day. Tyler and I have been planning a session with his semi-automatic shotgun for some time, and I was not going to let a long day under a busted truck stop me from seeing that plan through. Sure enough our timing was perfect since we were able to eat real quick and hit the trail up to the canyon by seven, gun, ammo and clays in tow. We made it a big staff event and there was plenty of daylight until seven pm so we had a blast (literally). I’d never shot anything else besides a boy scout b.b. gun or an airsoft gun, so I was a little anxious as to how it would go. Can I even shoot it? Can I shoot it accurately? Is the recoil going to break my nose? But surprisingly it came pretty easy. I followed Tyler’s safety lesson and stance as best as I knew how, and in the end I did pretty well. The recoil was pretty weak as the semi-automatic takes most of the energy from the recoil to load another round, and after only six rounds, I was already hitting flying targets. It was some of the most focused and serious fun I’ve ever had, and once again (as has been the norm since I arrived) was an experience that will no doubt have a deep impression for the rest of my days.
So all in all, today I rode in a boat, helped fix a truck, bought booze and meat, and had a damn good first shotgun session. I think I see a couple more hairs on my chest.
Smooth sailing, straight shooting, and always make sure you have the right parts for the job.
I don’t know why I bother trying to think ahead or bother planning for anything specific around here if it isn’t research related. It gives a false sense of security. And the funny thing is, I’m not saying that in frustration. I’ve come to grips with it and on most occasions I actually enjoy the rush of it because I’m already abysmal at planning ahead for anything.
This morning was not exactly one of those moments. Here I was taking the words “four days off” after the volunteers leaving as nice slow time to catch up on my research data entry, organize my thoughts, and catch up on sleep. How naïve I was back then. Last night William (head researcher) asked if I’d come out to Tofino with him and our mechanical engineer on staff to help him try to fix up his truck. What time would we be leaving? Five in the morning. To be fair, I agreed to the whole thing, wanting to take every opportunity to go into town for free. I didn’t feel that way when five a.m. rolled around, however, but I woke up soon enough once we had the wind in our face flying the boat down the channel at 20 nauts.
We had to drop off another two members of our little family in town as they were headed north to do a whale transect for William, after which Will, Taylor (mech. Engineer) and I went out for a quick and early breakfast before setting out to fix the truck that William had parked in town. The problem (putting it lightly) was with the front left suspension. Now I don’t know much about cars at all, so I was trying to soak up as much as I could while acting as errand boy for the two who actually knew what they were doing. I won’t lie, I didn’t feel very useful, but I did what I could. We knew it should only be a two hour job replacing the parts we had to, but we estimated ahead knowing our own skills and planned for a five hour job. But with these kinds of things, as I said at the beginning of this entry, planning much of anything around here is a futile effort. We started work on the truck at 8ish and didn’t finish until about 5. The most impressive of our trials and tribulations was that once we finally worked around all the rusted screws, nuts and other crap just to get to the shock, we spent about two hours trying to make the new one fit before someone had the bright realization that we had the wrong shock entirely. The fact that we had successfully replaced other parts of that side suspension was the welcome reminder that the day wasn’t a total loss. We did some shopping (mostly for alcohol) and made it home by a well-earned 6:30 pm.
But of course that wasn’t the end of the day. Tyler and I have been planning a session with his semi-automatic shotgun for some time, and I was not going to let a long day under a busted truck stop me from seeing that plan through. Sure enough our timing was perfect since we were able to eat real quick and hit the trail up to the canyon by seven, gun, ammo and clays in tow. We made it a big staff event and there was plenty of daylight until seven pm so we had a blast (literally). I’d never shot anything else besides a boy scout b.b. gun or an airsoft gun, so I was a little anxious as to how it would go. Can I even shoot it? Can I shoot it accurately? Is the recoil going to break my nose? But surprisingly it came pretty easy. I followed Tyler’s safety lesson and stance as best as I knew how, and in the end I did pretty well. The recoil was pretty weak as the semi-automatic takes most of the energy from the recoil to load another round, and after only six rounds, I was already hitting flying targets. It was some of the most focused and serious fun I’ve ever had, and once again (as has been the norm since I arrived) was an experience that will no doubt have a deep impression for the rest of my days.
So all in all, today I rode in a boat, helped fix a truck, bought booze and meat, and had a damn good first shotgun session. I think I see a couple more hairs on my chest.
Smooth sailing, straight shooting, and always make sure you have the right parts for the job.
The Life Aquatic - Canuck Chronicles Day 16
7/30
First day without volunteers at the University of Victory Whale Lab in….two weeks exactly. It’s a surreal kind of feeling having the house so empty after it was practically alive for so long (seriously, the house moves…sways more like it). It was sad seeing them leave, since we had one group of five people who were here for the first two weeks and got pretty close with the staff. There’s one in particular that I’ll especially miss, but that’s the way it is. Tyler said it from the beginning: you learn a lot about a person when you live with them for a week, but as quickly as they grow on you, they leave again. It’s just the way things work in the eco-tourism business I suppose.
That said it was a pretty colossal last day for our campers, and a great morning for the staff and especially me. As soon as I walked out squinting into the foggy sunshine, I saw the whole group of volunteers heading down the peer, whispering frantically and waving me over, saying they had seen a river otter in the middle of the inlet. Just as a reminder, my research project down here is a study of river otter behavior, and in two weeks I have seen little more than two otters, so it’s easy to believe me when I say I was a little excited. Not only was this particular otter not so cleverly evasive as the others I’ve stumbled upon, but it put on a straight-up show for our volunteers. It dove down and came up a few seconds later with a fish and then swam with it right at us, under the pier and across to the other side, where it feasted on its breakfast under a floating wharf on the shore-side of the pier. It started playing peek-a-boo with us for a while from under that wharf, poking its head out of various cracks and gaps until we realized that unless the otter could move at lightning fast speed and pop its head out of two different places at once, there was actually MORE than one otter under that wharf. They didn’t play with us for very long and soon swam out to the central dock where they didn’t come out from under until they were out of range of us. I found it very interesting timing that I’ve been searching for river otters tirelessly for the last two weeks, and the day that our second batch of volunteers gears to leave, Two decide to pop out right from under my nose. I’m pretty sure they’re toying with me, but there’s no way of proving it.
The staff decided that our little furry entertainer shouldn’t be the only one who had a big breakfast, and we made ourselves a rancher-size breakfast (after the last of the volunteers were gone). I have to say we’ve been living a pretty impressive vegetarian lifestyle on account of it tends to be cheaper when buying in bulk for an average of 22 people, not to mention that half of our first week of volunteers were vegetarian. So needless to say, meat’s become something of a delicacy in the old house. But this morning we threw that little conservation rule right out the window when our head-researcher William pulled out his five POUND secret stash of bacon as well as leftover bratwurst. He cooked up all the meat and a giant brick of hash browns, after which I contributed some of my famous omelets (which I DID perfect in Scotland), and with a side of smoked salmon on top of all that, we ate until we couldn’t eat any more (which in my case took a loooong time).
We spent a good amount of time discussing plans for next week after we were all content with our food intake, which was very necessary as next week is Teen Week, and anybody who’s ever been a teenager at camp can imagine what kind of storm we have ahead of us. But the staff is doing a great job of taking advantage of the four-day calm before it. We worked the rest of the day on cleaning up the house, doing bulk laundry and taking inventory of all the food we have left in the house. I had some batteries that needed charging and data that needed organizing, so it became a simple but productive afternoon. And when that even started to slow down, I realized I had a camera in the field that I had to check, so I begged a couple of the staff to hit the 5pm mosquito-ridden water with me in the kayaks. And I’m glad they did, because I retrieved my first video feed that actually had an otter visible on it, albeit a thirty second video of its rear and tail before it disappeared. It was still more than I expected to see and was another nice reminder that maybe I could be possible almost close to doing something correct out here. Don’t worry, I won’t let it go to my head.
We had leftovers for dinner and had a lovely evening of sharing an unclaimed bottle of Jack Daniels and watching The Life Aquatic. I’d only ever seen the beginning of it when it first came out and I didn’t really get the humor at the time. But now after getting the full dose of it after spending nearly three weeks in an aquatic environment, I think I can safely say that it’s become one of my favorite movies (though that could slightly be the booze talking).
Smooth sailing, good hunting, and always get your boots wet.
First day without volunteers at the University of Victory Whale Lab in….two weeks exactly. It’s a surreal kind of feeling having the house so empty after it was practically alive for so long (seriously, the house moves…sways more like it). It was sad seeing them leave, since we had one group of five people who were here for the first two weeks and got pretty close with the staff. There’s one in particular that I’ll especially miss, but that’s the way it is. Tyler said it from the beginning: you learn a lot about a person when you live with them for a week, but as quickly as they grow on you, they leave again. It’s just the way things work in the eco-tourism business I suppose.
That said it was a pretty colossal last day for our campers, and a great morning for the staff and especially me. As soon as I walked out squinting into the foggy sunshine, I saw the whole group of volunteers heading down the peer, whispering frantically and waving me over, saying they had seen a river otter in the middle of the inlet. Just as a reminder, my research project down here is a study of river otter behavior, and in two weeks I have seen little more than two otters, so it’s easy to believe me when I say I was a little excited. Not only was this particular otter not so cleverly evasive as the others I’ve stumbled upon, but it put on a straight-up show for our volunteers. It dove down and came up a few seconds later with a fish and then swam with it right at us, under the pier and across to the other side, where it feasted on its breakfast under a floating wharf on the shore-side of the pier. It started playing peek-a-boo with us for a while from under that wharf, poking its head out of various cracks and gaps until we realized that unless the otter could move at lightning fast speed and pop its head out of two different places at once, there was actually MORE than one otter under that wharf. They didn’t play with us for very long and soon swam out to the central dock where they didn’t come out from under until they were out of range of us. I found it very interesting timing that I’ve been searching for river otters tirelessly for the last two weeks, and the day that our second batch of volunteers gears to leave, Two decide to pop out right from under my nose. I’m pretty sure they’re toying with me, but there’s no way of proving it.
The staff decided that our little furry entertainer shouldn’t be the only one who had a big breakfast, and we made ourselves a rancher-size breakfast (after the last of the volunteers were gone). I have to say we’ve been living a pretty impressive vegetarian lifestyle on account of it tends to be cheaper when buying in bulk for an average of 22 people, not to mention that half of our first week of volunteers were vegetarian. So needless to say, meat’s become something of a delicacy in the old house. But this morning we threw that little conservation rule right out the window when our head-researcher William pulled out his five POUND secret stash of bacon as well as leftover bratwurst. He cooked up all the meat and a giant brick of hash browns, after which I contributed some of my famous omelets (which I DID perfect in Scotland), and with a side of smoked salmon on top of all that, we ate until we couldn’t eat any more (which in my case took a loooong time).
We spent a good amount of time discussing plans for next week after we were all content with our food intake, which was very necessary as next week is Teen Week, and anybody who’s ever been a teenager at camp can imagine what kind of storm we have ahead of us. But the staff is doing a great job of taking advantage of the four-day calm before it. We worked the rest of the day on cleaning up the house, doing bulk laundry and taking inventory of all the food we have left in the house. I had some batteries that needed charging and data that needed organizing, so it became a simple but productive afternoon. And when that even started to slow down, I realized I had a camera in the field that I had to check, so I begged a couple of the staff to hit the 5pm mosquito-ridden water with me in the kayaks. And I’m glad they did, because I retrieved my first video feed that actually had an otter visible on it, albeit a thirty second video of its rear and tail before it disappeared. It was still more than I expected to see and was another nice reminder that maybe I could be possible almost close to doing something correct out here. Don’t worry, I won’t let it go to my head.
We had leftovers for dinner and had a lovely evening of sharing an unclaimed bottle of Jack Daniels and watching The Life Aquatic. I’d only ever seen the beginning of it when it first came out and I didn’t really get the humor at the time. But now after getting the full dose of it after spending nearly three weeks in an aquatic environment, I think I can safely say that it’s become one of my favorite movies (though that could slightly be the booze talking).
Smooth sailing, good hunting, and always get your boots wet.
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