Captain Megan

"My fate cannot be mastered; it can only be collaborated with and thereby, to some extent, directed. Nor am I the captain of my soul; I am only its noisiest passenger."

~ Aldous Huxley ~

Hey everyone! I'm so glad that my blog is helping to educate you about the whales and other wildlife that need our help. I really am leaning more toward Environmental Law, but I think that also fits into Corporate Law quite nicely so we shall see.

As for work lately...

Yesterday we went on a tour and saw no orca (you can view details of the trips under "San Juan Safaris' Blog" in the Friends & Family bar to the right.) It's my job as the naturalist to blog about what happens each trip so you can go to that link and learn all about what we saw. The trips are much more difficult when we don't see orca, mostly because people come out mainly to see them so when they don't show up... the naturalist takes the brunt of the attention. I don't mind being center stage, but it's tough to keep people interested for 3.5 hours when there's only a small chance to see the whales. However, we saw over 20 Steller Sea Lions off Speiden Island on our way back. They were hauled out of the water, meaning on land, and were talking to each other on the rocks. Seeing them in the water pales to seeing them on land because they are so enormous! You really only see their heads when they're swimming, which gives an inaccurate portrayal of their size. Nancy thought it was rare to see seven or so on the last trip, but seeing over twenty together was a real treat. We also saw more Dall's Porpoises, which I think can be pretty entertaining.

Today I learned how to drive the boat and how to react if someone, God forbid, goes overboard. I'm really hoping this doesn't happen because the life rings are super hard to throw. They're really awkward and hard to get a good grip on. We all had trouble making it land more than 5ft from the boat, thank God the Coast Guard just encourages people to drop it over the side and let it float to the person. I steered pretty well and was able to speed up and slow down to rescue a person (in today's exercises a person was a red, inflatable seat cushion, but you get the picture). We even saw some Harbor Porpoises on our way back to the harbor. They are known to be shy and evasive, but we got a pretty good look at them. The males are also known to have quite the sex drive and mate with their own females as well as Dall's Porpoise females, resulting in a hybrid that I will call Darbor Porpoises. haha. So, I envision the Harbor Porpoises as the college-age males of the sound. Sad, but true. hahahahahaha.

I also talked to Bill recently about economic, political, and environmental issues in Puget Sound and what happens when they collide. This is especially interesting for me because I could see myself working with these issues in the future. I think Bill realizes this, so he always makes sure to fill me in with what's going on. I really enjoy my coworkers and look forward to working with them this summer. However, it will be nice when Nicole comes in May for some company more my age (no offense).

Please remember to check out San Juan Safaris' blog because from now on I will be including the individual trip information there. Don't worry though, I'll still write on my own blog, but these stories will just be more personal.

More Lessons from the Island:

• If you think groceries are bad on the mainland, try paying $180 for $100 worth of food. It sucks.