Marine Biology: Part 1

I finally have all I need to blog about Leah's trip to San Diego. She is here to help with stories, I have her log book from the trip and pictures from the school plus the ones she took.  It will be all jumbled and pictures are not in order.  We got up at 4:30 in the morning.  It had snowed that night.  Cora thought it quite funny that it snowed the day Leah was leaving to go to the beach.  She traveled up with some of our friends that were going also.  I would have loved to have seen all the looks in the airports that they  got walking in this big sea of highlighter yellow hoodies. 

I found a site that let us track her flight.  We checked it many times to see where she was and to know she had arrived safely.  One of the teacher was giving us nightly updates by text.  I would stay awake every night until they came through.

It was beautiful sunny weather.  Most of them were in T-shirts during the trip.  Leah said it was fun to play 'Spot the Canadian'.  Their group was in shorts and the Seacamp leaders and others were in sweaters and long pants. 

(From the airplane)

When they arrived they got to go for a walk on the beach and look for kelp, sea grass, and living organisms.  They went to the aquarium and saw lots of marine life.  Tide pooling was something Leah enjoyed.

Most nights they did some lab work.  They got to feel many different sea animals and bisected a squid.

One the second day they went kayaking.  She really thought that was fun.  I guess the boys were trying to tip over their kayak and ended falling in.  Leah thought that hilarious.  They had races across the lake and played some version of water soccer.

(Where they bunked)

(This is where they ate)

Leah said it was all really good food.  But every day for lunch they had sandwiches since they were out doing activities.  By the third day they were getting tired of sandwiches.

(Learning to kayak)

All those circles above are jellyfish.  Anywhere they walked on the beach they had to shuffle their feet to scare the jellyfish away.

Third day they went to the Zoo.  After walking around for a while they went on a private behind the scenes bus tour.

She loved the baby giraffe.

One of her friends' dad was along on the trip.  By the third day they were getting a little hungry from their small sandwiches and one piece of fruit.  Especially this dad and the boys.  (Leah said breakfast and dinner were awesome, just lunch was a little small)  So he bought himself something to eat and all the girls an ice cream.

Leah said this panda did a very good job of ignore them.

She saw a polar bear and they got to pet an armadillo.  Then back for dinner and more labs.  Leah played basketball with the boys almost every night.  Both my girls would way rather play ball with boys then girls.  Not as violent.  They had campfires and lots of fun evening activities.