Grown-up Sandcastles

     So tomorrow morning we head up to Leigh, in Northland New Zealand to begin our marine unit! We'll be staying at a marine lab and helping out with a survey program monitoring fish populations and the presence of sea urchins in the Goat Island Marine Reserve. We're also going to Poor Knights Island, which is apparently one of the top ten diving spots in the world. So lots and lots of snorkeling and cool fish and who knows what else. I'm pretty excited.
     We get back in about a week, and then we jump right into our Directed Research Projects. I'll be helping with a monitoring program at a montain reserve that has a pest-proof fence excluding pretty much everything that damages native ecosystems, so I'm pretty excited to see the site. We're collecting invertebrate samples to try to keep track of how pest eradication is affecting large beetles and Weta species (Giant grasshopper type bugs).  I think I have a pretty good group, too. So that's up next.
   But this weekend... this weekend was fun. We had Saturday off, so Friday after lecture 12 of us piled into a 10 person van (there were some... complications with renting the vans. Somehow the group with 8 people got a 12 seater... anywho. so we had some pretty good bonding going on) and drove to the Coromandel Peninsula, which is a pretty popular vacation destination because it is SO BEAUTIFUL!! We went to Hotwater beach, and got there for the low tide, which meant we got to test out the beach's namesake: the stream that bubbles up on the beach from being heated by near-to-the-surface volcanic activity. Then as the tide came in and cooled down the pools, we set up camp right on the beach, watched the stars, and had an awesome campout.
    A couple of us woke up at 5:30 to catch low-tide and the sunrise the next morning, so we got to basically build grown up sandcastles and dig our own hotpools. It was pretty cool! See:

Since it was only 5:45am, we had the beach to ourselves, despite Hotwater Beach being a SUPER popular tourist spot.

Anna testing out the pools.

  It was actually quite an art... you have to pick the right spot where you wont get washed away by the waves too soon, but aren't at the mouth of the stream where you get scalded. The water was actually REALLY hot... we had a bit of trouble finding a comfortable spot. But eventually, everyone got settled in. It was also really nice to go jump in the ocean and play in the waves. The water was so clear!

By about 9 am, the tide had come in and washed away our efforts, but what a way to start the day: hotpools and swims in the ocean.
   We moved on to explore some more beaches along the Peninsula, and did a really nice hike to a bunch of beautiful coves. Unfortunately, it kind of started to rain, but since we're prepared for all weather here, we just added raincoats to our swimsuits and continued on our way. The beaches were stunning:

Looking through the natural rock arch at Cathedral Cove

Cool rocks!

More cool rocks! Actually, the same rock from a different angle.

Arriving at "Secret Beach"... you have to do some serious bouldering to get to it, and I don't think that it's *technically* open to the public. But one of our field leaders told us how to get to it and we'd heard good things from previous ecoquesters, so we had to go. It was pretty neat! And we obviously weren't the only people who were in on the secret: there was a little "house" (more like floorplan) with some chairs and a "fireplace" and a "door". It was cute.

Everybody up on a rock ledge at Cathedral Cove. There were some pretty amazing rock formations all up and down the coast.

However, the rain kinda cut our stay short, so we were on our way home early when we stopped for lunch in a small town and ran into one of our on-again-off-again field leaders who lives nearby. Of course, by this time the weather had remembered it's early summer, and was gorgeous again, so when she told us about an amazing swimming hole in the river, we just had to go.
 It was super cool! It was really deep, but intensely clear. At one point, I went to stand up because I could see all the way to my toes and the rocks, but was still out way over my head and apparently just lack depth perception. There was also an awesome rock right over the deepest part of the pool that was obviously used as a jumping point, as there were handholds carved into the sides. So of course we all had a blast jumping off the rock into the beautiful water... someone has a million pictures of that, but not me, so you'll see some of that eventually.
   So it was a weekend very well spent. Now, I need to get ready to leave for the week and then turn in a handful of term-long running assignments when I get back, so I'm gonna get on that.
 but I'm sure to have exciting stories about snorkeling in the subtropical marine reserve!!
smiles!