Catching up...(Sunday, May 31, 2009)

Wow a lot has happened since I wrote last time, and it’s just been so ridiculously busy that I just haven’t had a chance to sit down and write about it! It also has a little bit to do with my computer and how stupid & slow it is…it won’t hold a charge, && it takes 20 minutes to load when I turn it on, so the battery dies before it gets started up. Fabulous. Anyways…

Thursday we went dugong searching. A dugong is similar to a manatee, except instead of a paddle-shaped tails, they have dolphin-like tails. They feed on sparse regions of seagrass and are often spotted in the Moreton Banks near Moreton Island. So a group of 9 of us got into a little inflatable dingy and sped away from Straddie toward the open ocean. SCARY!! This dingy—I kid you not— was metal on the bottom, but other than that, it pretty much looked like a glorified Life Saving ring. At first I thought my professor, Glenn, was just going to putter out into the channel and we’d go slowly in search for these sea cows. Oooh was I wrong. He hit the gas and we FLEW through the ocean toward Moreton Island, every ocean “bump” leaving our stomachs thinking we were on a roller coaster! Now, those of you who know me know I HATE roller coasters, but this journey was sooo much fun! Of course I did my normal Ashley scream & cackle, and I may have shouted “We’re gonna die!” a couple of times, but all in all it was a blast! We ended up spotting 2 dugongs: a mommy & her calf! They were beautiful. I’m hoping I successfully took a good picture of them coming up to take a breath, but i won’t know til I get back to the states. Also on our journey, we spotted several stingrays; some were HUGE! We also spotted a loggerhead turtle, and my professor told us to jump in and get on the turtle’s back. We thought he was kidding. Nope. Wrong again. He was dead serious, and for the other group, he literally jumped in onto the turtle’s back & held him up for everyone to see. Jumped right into the open ocean! He said they call it the “Turtle Rodeo,” and I’m fairly certain it’s illegal haha. The guy is nuts I swear!

Friday was the day we presented the research we’d been doing all week to the class and to the professors. In the morning we went to Cylinder Beach for some good ‘ole R & R. The beach was soo beautiful (pics up on facebook). It was nice to get out of the research center and just have some real downtime. In the afternoon, we presented. I think everything went alright with my project, and everyone else’s was very interesting to listen to as well. Then after dinner we went down to the Little Ship’s Club (one of two bars in Dunwich, lol). The whole group came, and we proceeded to take shots of tequila with our professor! Ahhh, good times. Glenn (our prof) also tried to pimp me out to the hot bartender! He must’ve had a little too much Jose, lol.

Saturday we went up to the north tip of Straddie & checked out a place called Point Lookout (also pics on facebook). It was sooo beautiful. We took a hike all around the rocky headlands. I am scared half to death of heights, but I faced my fears and climbed with everyone else. I even posed on a couple rocks for some good pics! Our group shot was awesome too. It’s so unreal how places this gorgeous can even exist. My pictures definitely don’t do it justice. After our hike we pretty much just relaxed on the beach again until it was time to say goodbye to Straddie & head back to Brisbane. Once we were back into the city, we went out to a super nice place for dinner called JoJo’s before doing a little bit of souvenir shopping. One of the girl’s was friends with a guy who goes to school not far from the city, so later on he came into town and we hung out with him & his friends at a small bar. It was a blast! I went to bed super early, though, because these long days are so exhausting.

Today we went to Underwater World! OMG it was soo awesome (notice I’m running out of adjectives to describe all of my adventures. I apologize. You have to be here to understand!) We took a guided tour of all the aquariums. As neat as it was, I’m just really looking forward to seeing it all in person when we snorkel on the reef this coming week. The BEST part of Underwater World was for sure my seal swim! I got into the tank and swam with the awesome seals. One of them even gave me a kiss :-) They were so much fun. They’re favorite game is tug-o-war, and man are they strong! Pulled me right off the rock I was seated on. They are literally the most fabulous creatures—they’re so intelligent & relatively easy to train, too. They do the coolest tricks, and most of the time they’re very friendly! I just had sooo much fun in general. Well, we’re going to be spending the next couple of days traveling, and then we’ll be on Heron Island. I don’t really think there’s a lot of internet access there, if any, so this may be my last post for at least another week. Well at least I got you caught up!

Sun, Research, & Soldier Crabs (May 27, 2009)

So in case anyone was wondering, we didn’t catch any sting rays in our net :-( That’s probably a good thing since all 16 of us girls probably would have shrieked in fear if we did, lol. Well, it was a fun adventure nonetheless.

Yesterday we dove head first into our project work, and for the past 36 hours that has been my main focus. We set up two experiments with our Soldier crabs: one with varied water salinity and another with varied water temperature. Both have produced interesting results, and now we really just have to crunch some numbers in preparation for our presentation on Friday. FUN!

Today has been ridiculously beautiful! We were up before 6am to catch the low tide, and as the sun came up, we knew it was going to be glorious. After a couple hours of grueling research, I decided to take some “me time” and head to the beach to lay out under the Australia sun (no worries, I applied 30 spf beforehand). It was so serene—I just soaked it up and read a bit of Breaking Dawn (the 4th book in the Twilight series!) Ahhh, this is seriously the life.

I got some really cool pictures today too. For whatever reason my computer won’t upload them to facebook, so I’ll probably have to wait until I get back to the states. But I took some pictures doing field work so everyone can see my pretty little soldier crabs, and I also got a picture of a rainbow! This rainbow was HUGE…you could literally see from one side to the other. I’m surprised no one went in search for a pot of gold :-) Honestly, I think just being here in this country and on this island and with these awesome people is the best "pot o' gold" anyone would want to find.

STRADBROKE ISLAND (May 25, 2009)

So we’ve been here on Stradbroke Island for about two days now. It’s gorgeous! Seriously, like a scene right out of a movie! The water isn’t as clear as it usually is for this time of year because of all the rain they’ve been getting, but today was absolutely beautiful. Yesterday we began a little bit of fieldwork, heading out to the mudflats during low tide & exploring the area’s biology. I saw some things I’ve never seen before, including a blue-ringed octopus! These octopi are only inches big, however a single bite will kill you. I was only inches away…Scary! We spent most of our time just becoming familiar with the Moreton Bay Research Station, which is supposedly one of the nicest facilities we’ll use on this trip. The rooms are kind of cramped, but other than that, the food is great and the researchers are all really nice.

Today we went out into the mudflats for more fieldwork. We pulled a huge net into the ocean and did some fish sampling. Found a few cool ones, including some puffers and some with poisonous fins (one of them spiked my friend! ouch!). We decided that tonight we’re going to go out and try to catch some stingrays in our nets—btw, stingrays are what stabbed Steve Irwin through the heart, killing him. Yes, it’s semi-dangerous work we’re doing out here, but as my hilarious instructor Glenn said, “Biologists must put themselves @ risk sometimes for their work.” Guess I really am a true biologist, eh?! I’m not too worried, though. Stingrays get scared if anyone comes near them and they run away as long as they haven’t been threatened. Trust me, I don’t plan on irritating a stingray anytime soon!

Tomorrow I begin research with my group on our own project: studying the response of soldier crabs to different types & levels of stress. The soldier crabs are the coolest things I’ve seen here on Straddie (that’s what the locals call the Island!). They are small, light-blue crabs that burry in a corkscrew-like fashion into the mud upon approach. Sometimes they burry clockwise, sometimes counter-clockwise. I’m interested in discovering how & why they decide to burry the way they do. They’re so cool! And you can just pick them up right into your hand. They try to pinch you, but instead it only tickles! Oh, and the reason they’re called soldier crabs is because they form huge “armies” of crabs and all walk along the mudflats together. Today, the mudflats were literally covered with soldier crabs in some parts! Crazy!
Ok enough biology. I’m sure I’m the only one who is truly crazy about this crap anyways, lol. Welp, I’m gonna go squeeze into my wetsuit and see what kind of stingrays we can catch in that net! Wish me luck!

Have a go, Mate! (May 23, 2009)

I’M FINALLY HERE! And this place is awesome! It has rained on and off both yesterday & today, but it is still ridiculously pleasant, especially for winter (where it reaches lows of 52 degrees F, oh boy!) lol. So the flight was crap. I broke down in tears @ security in Detroit when I had to say bye to my mom, not knowing whether I would actually make it to the other side of the world. BUT I’m fine. lol. The international flight from LA to Sydney was really actually nice. Except for when we “ran out of fuel” and had to land in some ridiculous island called Nomeae (or something) in the middle of the ocean. Later, we found out that our flight may have actually got a bird caught in it somewhere in its propeller, causing us to have an emergency landing. Anyways, so then we missed our flight from Sydney to Brisbane and had to wait for a later one, not knowing if anyone would be at the airport to pick us up. PHEW! It was an exhausting 34 hours of traveling.

Brisbane has been really nice. We had a little orientation, and everything sounds like it will be beautiful and educational, but most of all FUN! Today we visited the Lone Pine Koala Sanctuary, where I got to hold a koala and literally play with kangaroos! There was even a teeny tiny baby koala in its mommy’s pouch. Sooo cute! Visiting the Sanctuary was literally the best experience I have had in my life so far. I wish I could describe in words how fabulous it was, but honestly you just have to see for yourself.

The title of this blog is one of the many “attitudes” I am working on developing while I’m in this country. Trying new things is important in Australian culture, and while I am here I am attempting to take advantage of every opportunity. Those of you who know me know I am the pickiest eater on the face of the planet, and though I’ve only been here 3 days, I’ve already tried shrimp (yes, I’ve never had shrimp lol) and this stuff called vegemite (it’s basically solidified soy sauce, sooo salty!) Another attitude is “No worries,” and so I’m trying to be as laid back as is allowed!

Well, tomorrow we head off to Stradbroke Island, and honestly I’m just hoping that the weather holds out so we can have a great island experience. Trust me, I’ll letcha know…J

STILL in the US...

Welp, today is the day!! Those of you who know me know that I have been waiting almost 7 months for this day to finally come. It's so strange. I remember back in October, sitting on my bed w/ my roommate, Jenni, when I just randomly decided I was going abroad. There were so many criteria the program had to meet. First of all, it had to be somewhere that spoke English. Secondly, it couldn't be more than a month long--at least if I wanted to keep my awesome Pharmacy Tech job @ U of M Hospital. And thirdly, it couldn't completely drain my bank account. On top of my own criteria, I still had to apply & have them choose me!! It seemed like too many things could go wrong, and I truly doubted myself at first.

But here I am, 6am on May 20, 2009...only hours away from my flight to Australia. This will be my first time off the continent of North America, and holy crap am I going big. The program is a Tropical Marine Ecology course through AustraLearn, and today marks the first day of my journey up Australia's East coast. I'll be doing research in the Great Barrier Reef, making my way from Brisbane to Cairns and visiting Stradbroke Island, Heron Island, and Orpheus Island along the way! I'M SO EXCITED!! I will try to keep this blog up as often as possible, though I am not sure how often I'll be able to post. I'll be keeping a journal on my laptop, so I may have to post multiple entries in one sitting, since I don't know how often I will have internet access.

My emotions are soo screwy right now. I've been having trouble sleeping lately (obviously...why else would I be awake @ 6am!?!) This is the first time I'm traveling on my own. I'm not scared really, just a bit nervous. I can see myself getting turned all around in a big airport, and today I will be visiting several (DTW, Chicago O'Hare, & LAX to name a few!!) I will also be meeting my classmates today. I think there are a total of 20 of us enrolled in the program, and we all come from different places in the US. You know what they say about first impressions!! Really, though, my main emotion is pure excitement. Today is the first day of the rest of my life, right? I plan on doing everything I can to make this next month of traveling Down Under amazing :-)