So I am probably the world’s worst study abroad blogger, but since I am going to be on an isolated island for the next month and a half, I figured I better let you all know what I have been up to.
I just got back from a 10 day trip in the Rainforest. It was a very interesting and educational experience overall. We had an assignment to get a 5-10 minute presentation on a certain flora and fauna in the places we visited. Mine were mistletoe and the musky-rat kangaroo. Basically the trip consisted of three parts: coastal rain forests, highland rain forests, and sclerophyll (basically dry rainforest that has lots of eucalyptus). In the coastal rainforest, we finally got to see a cassowary in the wild (we were in Mission Beach that has the highest population of cassowaries). The cassowary actually had his chick with him (that’s right, the male cassowary incubates the egg and cares for it’s young, take notes boys). Even though cassowaries have been known to attack people, they are very important to the rainforest ecosystem and a definitely pretty awesome to see. They look like a giant prehistoric bird that should be extinct.
When we were in Mission Beach, we stayed at a hostel that was kinda like Parrotfish lodge (that we stayed at in orientation) but a lot less sketchy. They had a pool with a log on the middle of it that all of us jumped off of. We attempted at trying to dive through a very small hula hoop from the log, but no one quite mastered that talent (I actually straight up belly-flopped at my try). We played chicken fights and tried to reinstall our diving dingo synchro team, unfortunately only two of us showed up to practice. I learned a new move called the clam but i have yet to fully master the dolphin move (video to [most definitely] not come). I was able to run along the beach with my friends Natalie (goes to UCSD and has a lot of friends in normal) and Rebecca (who lives in Colorado but goes to school in Minnesota for some unfortunate reason; Fun fact: Minnesotans say o’s weird). After our run, we decided to do gymnastics on the sand. I was at an unfair disadvantage because Natalie has literally done every sport/dance/fitness class imaginable and Rebecca does jump roping, but It was still fun. In terms of actually learning on the trip…well we did lots of analysis of forest structure and plant ID (super fun).
After Mission Beach, we headed up to the Tablelands again. We stopped at a Rainforest canopy walk and we got to see the whole rainforest canopy below us (see fb pics which will be posted probably in 2 months). Then we got to go to a waterfall and swim in it. The only downside to that was we had to first go to a place that was infested with marsh flies (huge flies that when they bite you, you can actually feel them). They were all over people and in our bus, but luckily I drowned myself in bug spray and they didnt come near me (haha suckas).
Moved to Lake Eacham: Our new cabins for housing was a big step up from our old accommodations (we had a tv in our room yeee). Also, we were 1km away from Lake Eacham that is a crater lake that I finally got to swim so intense…maybe 50 strokes in (sorry team, I am going to be out of swim shape hardcore). I did however run a lot around the Lake and even got to see my fauna (THE MUSKY-RAT KANGAROO!!11!!1). Not a lot of people got to see the musky-rat kangaroo but here’s a description. It’s the size of a large guinea pig and has a long scaly tail and 5 mya it used to be the size of a modern kangaroo (that’s one giant rat-like thing). Oh on another note I was finally able to do a handstand while against a wall and almost can do a headstand. Okay back to the actually learning thing, we did a lot of lecturing during day trips to places like Lake Barrine and some random old people’s property (our instructors literally just called the place Don and Jill’s). We got pretty used to sleeping in until 7/7:30 until disaster stuck. One night we went spotlighting in the rainforest, we saw a tree kangaroo, green ringtail possums, and a bandicoot, which were all adorable. Then after spotlighting our instructors said, “Oh btws mist netting tomorrow at 6 am…” Mist netting is basically where you put some nest up in the rainforest and wait for birds to have their major heartattack of the day and get stuck in the net. Then you tag the bird and poke at it to get measurements that don’t really matter because you are the only one doing bird tagging in Northern Queensland. As you can tell I wasn’t a fan of this mist netting or whatever, or maybe it was because we had to get up at 5:30 in the morning. Then the next day we had to get up at 5 am to do our platypus data collection for a group paper. Even though it was at 5:30 in the morning, the platypus were pretty darn cute (except the first day Rebecca and I struggled hardcore and almost feel in the creek; the second day was better).
We switched housing to yet another upgrade (free wifi in rooms and bigger tv!). My friend Taylor and I (not as much Leanne, but she still watched the videos with us) became not obsessed but pretty close to it with watching certain music videos. We probably watched this one video at least 20 times in the past week. We were able to get a good look at some of the deadliest snakes in Aus along with a python. We got to see some sugar gliders and padimelons at night near the housing as well as some Huntsman spiders again (supposedly they are harmless but I would argue that their pure size can induce girlish screams and mini heart attacks).
On our second to last day, we did something that will be in infamy in my mind for the rest of my life (am I even making sense anymore?). We bush whacked our way up a mountain without any direction and with just a compass and a map. It was a 2.2 km straight path but of course there’s freaking lantanas everywhere and you cant walk through those things so we ended up having to find our way to the ridge to get to the bluff of the mountain. It took us 2 hours to get up and 2.5 to get down because we got lost a lot trying to find our way back. also, our instructors starting laughing at us and left us to find our way back when we decided to walk back up the creek to the bus (we found it just fine without them ha). At least they bought us ice cream afterwards.
Also, the whole trip we had two words of the day. Some were a little more appropiate than others but I feel like I am going to be using wicked and ptl (praise the lord) much more often. Oh and hella too but that was already used a lot in my vocab (hellah norcal lingo).
The one downside to this trip was our “ecology goggles.” Whenever we were on the bus, Jack (our nonaussie from ireland instructor) reminds us to put our ecology goggles and use 10% of our brain to survey the landscape as we pass by. Unfortunately the moment we get in the bus all I do is sleep so I think my participation grade is gonna be pretty gnarly.
Now I am currently back at the Northern Greenhouse contemplating why I decided to go to a isolated island with probably a max 200 people on it for the next month and a half. I hope snorkeling translates to swimming because there def ain’t no pool where I am going and supposedly the resort on the island is only for celebs and I can’t even go within 50 meters of it (there goes my gym membership idea). But I am super excited to do research there. the research station is world renowned and I am going to study something that I am very interested in. I am studying the effects of ocean acidification on brittle stars, jumping snails and cone shells. and they aren’t barnacles :D Oh so basically I have a 10 day trip there with my whole group where we do a marine field study. Then everyone leaves me to go hangout and have halloween back in Cairns, while I work on my research (for my independent study project), marine field study paper, and my focus question essay oh and my final. I am definitely going to be a bit stressed but it’s all good especially because of the fact that I am going to be on an island that is at the doorstep of the Great Barrier Reef. My friend leanne and I are for sure researching there, which should be awesome. The one issue is we have to order all our food ahead of time. I’m pretty sure I didn’t order enough so if I message you for food, just send food (preferably a pizookie) to 111 Middle of Great Barrier, Near some lizards island. Anyways, sorry for another super long post…I know you love me
Jenn Girl (okay this is what sleep deprivation does to people. Do not be me)