Seal Survey

                                                            February 21, 2013 (3:37 P.M.)

 After resizing the photos, I've had a lot more success uploading them. Over the next few days I'm just going to put all the pictures up I hadn't had the opportunity to before...

So last I went on my first seal survey. For the survey, four people and the skipper of the boat ride out to seal island and anchor up about 20 meters away. The idea of the survey is to document the movements of the seals to and from the island for migration purposes. You calculate how many seals there are, where they are heading, which section of the sea they’re in and the time of day the survey is being done.

The first group of people watched the island and recorded all the necessary information.  After three hours they switched with another intern and me. I was a little nervous about being bored on the boat for all that time, but I have to say I enjoyed it. The seals are obnoxiously loud and entertaining. Once the sun goes down, you’re required to listen to the seals and count the number of splashes to determine the number of seals in that particular group.

The whole time I was waiting for a breach but unfortunately it didn’t happen. I’m sure it will; just have to be patient. Floating out there on the boat in the middle of the night was rather peaceful too. I kept estimating how far I would have to swim and how long it would take me to get there if for any reason the boat sank. I’m happy to say it did not, but if it had, I created a concrete plan to make it safely back regardless. The plan pretty much consisted of swimming to seal island instead of the beach. Eventually I’d be found.

As we we’re leaving the island, I happened to look at the island one more time and catch a glimpse of a nice sized dorsal fin silently slicing  through the water. It was an eerie sight, but something I’m definitely getting more used to. Just another night on the water.

I did manage to make a little video for Luke and upload it onto his blog site. It’s nothing special, but hopefully enough to get the process started. I emailed his teacher and he said he would be in contact with me soon. Hopefully by that point, I will have been able to add a number of videos and pictures onto the site.

Here is the link for the video if anyone is interested: http://youtu.be/sSQkom5ZAA4

My week has been nonstop this week and I am definitely looking forward to a little relaxation time this weekend. To the best of my knowledge I don’t think it will happen. They’re trying to reschedule our bungee jumping as well as our other activities. The plans change regularly so I couldn’t even begin to guess when it will happen. I started my free diving course last week. It was only the theory and lecture section, but I’m excited to get started. We start the practical training this evening. Hopefully by the time I’m finished with the course I will be able to stay under the water for more than 30 seconds. That would be fantastic. Hope everyone is doing well.

P.S. Since I resized the images to a smaller size, I have been able to upload a lot more so over the next couple of days, there are going to be a lot of pictures.