Sunny Seward

Lowell point beach

fishermans warf

It’s a sunny day in Seward with blue skies. This is rare, as most of the time it is cloudy or overcast. Unfortunately it is only 36 degrees with a nasty windchill, So I only spent three hours outside walking thus far today. I wandered down to the fishing warf and looked at all the boats and then I happened upon a nice little hike with water falls around two lakes. When the wind became too cold to bare, I walked back to my apartment. Only to start feeling guilty about missing the gorgeous day, so I went BACK outside with my book to try and read on the beach. This was a short lived endeavor as it was much colder sitting in one spot than moving around. 

Blue skies! (view from my bedroom window)

Yesterday I accidentally went on an absurdly long hike. I knew there was a state recreation area down the shoreline a little ways with some good hikes. It was slightly cloudy and windy but it was the first day it hadn’t been raining so I felt like I had to take advantage of it (are we seeing a trend here?). As most smart humans know, things on a map are much farther away than they seem, although I hadn’t taken this into consideration. When I finally got to the park it was miles down the road and I was already very tired. But since I was there I carried on. I went on some nice woods hikes then went down to a very pretty beach.  The way back was slightly torturous as I was walking against the freezing wind and I was exhausted. All in all it was an amazing hike, I hope to do more out there when I either get a ride or the wind isn’t trying to blow me into the ocean.  

slightly askew self \timer pic

Work has been good but fairly slow. Basically just caring for the otter (and she seems to need constant attention) and getting ready for the flood of seals that are supposed to come in. They said that they are surprised that we haven’t gotten one in yet. Maybe because it is a late spring. My night shifts are from 4pm- midnight.  I make sea otter formula (basically blended squid, clam, vitamins, milk, and some other ingredients) It looks kind like a milky brown substance and I always get a craving for a milkshake after I make it. When I walk home at midnight its not even fully dark, the sun has just finished setting and there is a blue glow around the mountains. 

look after each otter.

Today... was not real life.
I'll start from where I left off. Last night Katie picked me and Maggie up and we headed down the Seward highway to Seward. This is rated one of the most scenic drives in North America and that is not an exaggeration. We saw a flock of eagles, and drove through huge snow capped mountains on either side. it was a cloudless night so we were able to see everything clearly.

this picture does not do it justice at all.

We have a nice two bedroom apartment with three of us right now. All the windows show awesome views of mountains and trees.
Today was the first day of orientation! we got a tour through the sealife center and went through all the safety mumbo jumbo. We then met up with our supervisor for the actually marine mammal stranding position. Every morning before entering the facility we have to change out of our shoes into the xtra tuff waterproof boots. Not only because it gets super messy, but also to keep contaminants out. Same goes for if we leave the facility and have to enter the building we have to completely shower and wash our hair before entering the building.
As we entered the rehab room we saw the facilities only patient, a one month old sea otte. completely adorable. by the end ofb the day i had held it and even bottle fed it. it was such an amazing thing and it was so soft. its not so busy at the center now but in summer we will have lots of animals to take care of. we learned how to mix formulas and soon we will learn how to tube feed and draw blood. its getting late here and i have no internet so im on my phone. until next time.

Once in a blue moose

Yesterday I feel like I finally had the Alaskan experience, I saw two moose! They were both when I was on my 35 mile bike ride (ahhh). The first one I saw was a bull and it came charging through the woods next to the bike path. Moments later it was followed by this tiny little yipping dog, which was somewhat comical. The next one made me slam on the brakes because it was in the middle of the path. I hadn't notice it at first because I was too absorbed with the scenery. This one was a female and It didn't seem bothered by me, basically ignored my existence completely and I cautiously rode by it. At one point I was at most five feet from it. SO AWESOME. 

Other places I went in my bike ride: the salmon fish hatchery, where I learned how the fish are raise from eggs and then released into the streams for game fishing and food. I also learned how to gut a salmon with a clever computer simulation. 

I also got hopelessly lost trying to follow some seemingly strange directions. But I did end up biking 35 miles and did not think I was going to make it back I was so exhausted. 

For dinner I met up with someone that I met hiking the day before and we went to the glacier brewing company and then took a quick trip to REI. On the way back we had some struggles with the bus schedules and routes again, but overall it was a marvelous day. 

Today I check out of my hostel and Katie comes to pick up at four and then we travel to Seward to start the internship!!

small airport

me and a mountain on the costal trail

My hostel

halfway through the bike ride. Trying to get a pic of me and the distant mountain... didn't work

Arctic Adventures

Alaska adventure. Day one. 

This has been a long day, it started out at 6am in chicago, getting up to go to the airport. After some untimely accidents and stand still traffic I made it to the terminal with minutes to spare. 

Upon arrival to Anchorage, I had a short cab ride with a very friendly driver to my hostel. Which is positioned on a backdrop of snowcapped mountains. 

I basically ran in to check in, threw my stuff in my room and emerged into the sunny city of Anchorage. After practically skipping a few blocks I realized I hadn't a clue where I was or where I planned on going. I sought direction from some nice looking natives and promptly turned the other direction when they started throwing booze bottles at each other and yelling. 

I was hesitant to approach anyone afterward, so I just hopped on a bus and hoped for the best. I got off at the transfer station and started wandering around downtown following a not-so-informative map. I finally got my bearings and perused through some gift shops and people watched a little. Next I took a four mile hike down the coast with stunning mountain views. (pictures to come.) 

Its amazing how much clocks and sunlight can influence you. I started getting really tired on my hike down the coast (it feeling like 10 at night already to me), but when I looked at my phone to check the time and saw that it was only six I perked right up and felt a surge of energy. 

After my hike I stopped at a bar called Darwin's Theory and sat down by myself to have a beer. Somehow moments later I was deep in conversation with some elderly native Alaskans, learning about their lives and the history of Alaska. Its amazing who you strike up conversation with when you are traveling alone. 

That's another thing, I never really thought I would be good at traveling alone until I just went ahead and did it. Sure, it was a little shakey figuring out the bus system and maps but honestly it makes me feel really accomplished to have gotten downtown, taken a good hike, had a nice beer while charming natives, and made back home to my hostel without much problem. Kind of makes me feel like I could do anything! Traveling by yourself, you don't have to answer to anyone but yourself and you can do whatever you feel like whenever. Grocery shopping today I realized that I could just make all the decisions and buy whatever food I wanted. So, naturally, I took like three times longer deciding what to eat for the next three days. 

And on that note, I am thoroughly exhausted and my tiny stiff dorm bed is calling my name. I still feel slightly guilty going to sleep because it looks like the middle of the day, it wont get dark tonight until after 11. 

Its been a great first day. 

Helen and Elisas adventure through the woods

Hello all! It has been ages since I updated, and I could think of no better time to do so then after I returned from a marvelous backpacking trip to the Porcupine Mountains.
Last Wednesday morning me and Alyssa got up bright and early to drive up to the Porcupine Mountains in the upper peninsula. we were armed with our toasted everything bagels, iced capps from tim hortons, and a sense of adventure. We were also aware that the weather forcast for the week was 40% chance of thunderstorms or higher for everday we were going to be there. but we still made the 10 and a half hour drive up to the porkies.

When we arrived at the park, we chose a campsite near the woods and were instantly swarmed with bugs as we exited the car. we set up the small two person tent and after 10 minutes of deliberation decided we had put it in a low area of the campsite and had to move for fear of being flooded in there.
We crawled into our sleeping bags and prepared for sleep. which for me, didn't come until 4 am when I individually put on every single layer of clothing I brought with me trying to warm up. Yes, it was a chilly night.
Despite the chilly and damp night prior, we prepared for our 30ish mile hike through the back country of the park. Packed our bags and headed off starting at lake of the clouds lookout point. The first day we did ten miles, rugged terrain, hills, roots, lookout points, rivers. It was a great day. We spent a lot of the miles singing because you're supposed to make a lot of noise to make sure you dont surprise a mother bear and her cubs. There was one river crossing that we had to do where we had to wade across the river. the water was SO COLD that my feet were in pain for minutes after exiting the water. At our lunch spot we got to watch salmon struggling to swim upstream to their breeding grounds.
Our first campsite was on lake superior next to a tent with three college age looking boys. We busied ourselves by pitching the tent, making tea and filtering water. Then we collected our packs to hang them on the bear pole. (you have to hang up all your food or else hungry bears will come ripping through your tent and whatnot). The problem was that the pole used  to hoist up your bag of food was heavier than our bag. Together we struggled to lift our bags on the pole high over our heads to hook it on the small hook about 10 ft high. each time we tried we were unsuccessful and therefore ended up dropping our packs from a high height to the ground. Luckily the guys next to us took pity on us and let us put our food in with theirs.  we spent the rest of the evening hanging out with them around their fire swapping stories.
This night was no better than the last temperature wise, in fact Im pretty sure it was a lot colder. I was shaking so much i felt like the entire tent around me was vibrating and didn't start to doze off until dawn. It didn't help that the waves from the ocean sounded like a bear breathing outside of our tent.
The next morning we awoke and saw a bald eagle land in a nearby tree. everyone rushed over and watched it as it perched there surveying the scene. It was so awesome to see it out in the wild as opposed to captivity. after a few minutes and us trying to inch closer it took off and circled the area a few times before disappearing into the woods. AWESOME.
The hike was much colder on this day and what seemed like infinitely longer. The first half of the hike was pleasent with nice scenery. but then we entered into the swamp/bland woods area that seemed to stretch for miles and miles but was only about 5. We had to maneuver our way around swamps and mud and fallen trees and walk through the blisters we had gotten the day before. moral was low. We were still singing but this time it was pain by three days grace as opposed to zip a dee doo da that we had been singing the day before.We went a little over 11.5 miles on this day.
At camp the only bear pole was directly in the middle of a deep swamp. We cursed our bad luck and went to work trying to stretch over the distance of the swamp to hang up our food. Everytime, we were dangerously close to it falling into the water and nowhere near close to hanging it on the pole. So for fear of our food getting soaked, we abandoned this effort and walked back the 1/4 mile to the rustic cabins hoping someone would take mercy on us and take in our food for the night.
The next day was our shortest only about 5 miles long. We hiked through the (much prettier) trail and arrived back at around 2 o clock. We counted 23 obstructions on the path in this short day and we both fell a couple of times in the steep downward slopes. But it was all very rewarding when we arrived at the top and to our car.

We headed up to the nature center to buy patches and brag to anyone that we could find that we had just hiked more than 30 miles. We realized that no one really cared and hopped in the car to head over to pictured rocks!
we didnt get there until late and we knew we had to find someplace to sleep for the night. we went to a couple of campsites but they were horrendously overpriced for being a patch of grass and a picnic table. so we decided it was a good idea to sleep in our car. we went to three different parking lots trying to find out which would be the least shady/get us in the least trouble if we were caught sleeping there. we finally decided on a parking area where you can drop your boat off. We got cozy in our sleeping bags, reclined our seats and tried to go to sleep. We were rudely awoken by a light shining in our car and a police officer tapping on our window. we tried to come up with a quick story in our groggy just-sleeping-nearly-upright state. But he provided it for us. "just taking a nap?" he said "staying here all night?' when we said yes to both of these things, he said alright just checking and left. I said not a single word in this whole exchange. And this whole time we thought we were committing some crime and being very sneaky when we were really only just sleeping in our car.
The next day we did some short hikes at the pictured rocks and saw several beautiful waterfalls. We didn't stay too long but headed home at around 2 pm. We saw most of the famous sites though and did a couple miles of the trail.
At a gas station on the way home a lady came out of the building as I was washing the windows, looked at me and exclaimed "oh hi Helen!" I looked at her perplexedly but she just kept walking closer and smiling. When it was clear that she still didn't understand that I wasn't Helen I gave her an awkward little hello. When she was right next to me she said "oh your not Helen. I'll have to call Helen and tell her I met her twin!" And with that she dropped her can of pepsi, which sprayed everywhere, and walked away.  ah the encounters you have at gas stations...

 catch yall later with my next adventure!

The Earth is a Spaceship

This post is coming a little late, I have been busy with school.
Over spring break I went to Vieques Puerto Rico for an Alternative spring break! Our main focus of work was environmental- mainly cleaning up beaches, planting trees, working in the greenhouse etc. We had a great group of people that got along really well and it was probably one of the greatest weeks of my life.
The bus from campus to take us to the airport came at 3 am on friday night, so naturally, I didn't sleep at all. Traveling consisted of a bus ride, two plane rides, and a cab ride to the hotel after we arrived in San Juan. A whole day of travel. In the morning I was stopped at security because I forgot to take our my swiss army knife from my carry on bag. They had to search my bag and me then took it away from me. When I boarded the plane I also realized that i had left my pillow by the security gate as well. haha. Other things I lost this week: my bathing suit bottoms (no idea where those went, i searched the entire house before leaving), my toothbrush, and a ring. At least I left little bits of myself all over Puerto Rico!

 This the was the front entrance of our little home, I couldn't get all of it in one picture. 

This is the view from the roof of our house
 

When we landed in San Juan we hailed a cab and told them the name of our hotel. He looked at us and started laughing. With the language barrier, it was hard to understand what was going on but I managed to hear the words "really? staying there? change your reservations." We were all stumped because we couldn't really change reservations this last minute and we didn't really know why he thought it was necessary. We later found out that the reservations had been booked in a hospital. It was four floors, the first three with hospital beds, patients.. the whole nine yards. But the 4th row was a hallway of hotel rooms to rent out. So that was where we stayed on our first night. It was a little shady and very strange but not bad since we had to leave so early in the morning anyway. That night we went out on the town to dinner, ice cream and to see the sites.

Me and Carolyn enjoying Mofongo: a tasty Puerto Rican Cuisine. 


The next morning we took our 9 am ferry to the island! We stayed in a beautiful rented house with all necessary accommodations (not to mention wifi and cable!). We spent this whole day at a nearby beach, snorkeling, swimming, tanning and generally enjoying the warmth and sunshine that we were so lacking back in Michigan. To top off the day, we made spaghetti dinner and ate it on the roof during the sunset.

The next day, our work still didn't start until 5:30 when we had a meeting with the fish and wildlife office to find out what we would be doing for the week. So to fill our time we went to an even more gorgeous beach, La Playa Caracas, which means Red Beach. There were palm trees every few feet, completely clear water, and little lizards that we could catch running around!

Beach!

Caracas

My New Best friend

 At the meeting we got our itinerary and some background information on the island. Then to end the night we played poker and bet with m&ms :) We also participated in my new favorite sport, tarantula hunting! What it is, is basically you go outside and find a taranchula hole (there were plenty all over the yard) and poke a stick around in there and see if you can piss it off enough to run out so you can get a glimpse of it. This sounds potentially dangerous and stupid but it was very exciting and kept us entertained for at least an hour.
Tuesday was our first day of real work and everyone packed up and we were picked up at 8 am and driven to the greenhouse. We spent the first half of the day weeding around the greenhouse, pulling up unwanted shrubs and trees and watering the plants in the greenhouse. We found several forms of interesting wildlife like a coci (native frog), a cool walking stick, a ginormous spider, and some cool little lizards. At the end of the work day, they took us down to Caracas after work for a quick swim.

Oh just Walkin stick and me

Our second day of work was a little more fulfilling, and we got to plant trees on the beach! Our lunch break was interesting to say the least. We were all eating our lunch quietly when one of the guys we were working with called us over because he had caught an iguana! we all excitedly ran over and started petting it and taking pictures with it. At some point in the mayhem, the iguana got its front portion of body loose from his grip and started twisting around while its tail was still being held on to. This resulted in the tail ripping off and the iguana charging straight for us in its attempt to escape. The dynamic of the moment changed completely as people screamed and jumped on chairs and as Mike threw the (still twitching and bleeding) tail onto the table where we had just finished lunch. whew.

Iguana + Tail

Ahhhh

This was the night of our biolluminescent bay tour! We shopped around and ate dinner until dark then took a cab to the beginning of the tour. Let me explain, there are these awesome microorganisms living in a certain bay in Vieques that have some sort of chemical process that make them glow when they are touched! That was a horrible explanation but I don't really know the science behind it. We took kayaks into the middle of the lake (as you dip your paddle in the water the water glows around it for a few seconds AWESOME). Me and Maureen had some slight trouble with our kayak and got a little over zealous trying to race someone. We flipped it. Within the first five minutes. We had to get help from the guide to flip over the kayak and get back in. After that it was filling with water and we were falling behind and had no way of communicating to the guide. Our tour guide did not speak any English and rambled on at us for a few minutes in spanish. We were flailing our arms trying to get his attention and tell him that we were sinking. When he finally noticed our predicament, he uttered the only English words I had heard form him. "Shit. The Titanic."  After this we had to catch a ride with someone else back to shore, but not after we got to swim in the water with the dinoflagellates! It was honestly the most awesome thing I can think of. As you moved your arms in the water it created a pathway of glowing water. And when you lifted your arm out of the water you could see little sparkles sprinkling down your arm.
Thursday was our last day of work. We spent it on the beach cleaning up trash. There was SO much. We had filled all the garbage bags shortly after lunch time. We got to spend a lot of time exploring the beach and looking at seashells also. We found a ginormous star fish as well.

Me and the Starfish

Friday was our day off and we headed onto the main island to go to El Yunque the rainforest! We spent a glorious day with an awesome tour guide, hiking to picturesque locations, swimming in waterfalls and taking lots of pictures of exotic plants.

Swimming in the waterfall!

Now I'm sort of shortening this post as it is getting incredibly long and I have probably lost everyone who is reading it, if anyone is.
But, needless to say, it was a very awesome trip and we were all sad to leave. But what I took away from it was a great new group of friends, a sense of accomplishment, and a lot of seashells. :)

I LOVE VIEQUES!!

Opossums

You know the expression its raining cats and dogs? Well actually its raining opossums. At least it is at the nature center. I checked out three opossums when I was there on Tuesday. Most had varying degrees of frost bite on their ears and tails and were just generally thin. It was interesting to notice that each one had very different personalities.the first one I pried out of the carrier barred his teeth and hissed at me during the whole examination. The second one fought savagely to get out of my grasp and the third was calm and peaceful. Its like the seven dwarfs, so far we have sneezy, grumpy, and bashful. and we also have sleepy who lives in the cage next to the overly friendly cottontail who I have never seen awake. I wonder when happy, dopey and doc will join us.
Tuesday was also another day of bagging frozen mice! although luckily this time there were no headless ones. We spent our time choosing the cutest ones and setting them aside for our favorite animals. I think we freaked out the new volunteer, Megan. I wonder if she'll ever be back.
To everyone's delight, Max found a couple of parasites in the fecal sample of a screech owl. We spent the next 15 minutes taking turns crowding around the microscope and learning about the different parasites animals can have and how to treat them. yay! Also did you know that you can take a picture with a digital camera through a microscope? It actually turns out pretty well.
Alright I guess we'll see what sort of adventures I'll have when I go in tomorrow!

Also here are a couple pictures for your enjoyment of our lovely little red screech owl, oh and me.