The past few days have been relatively uneventful. Yesterday, the woman who hired me and works for the entire refuge complex came down to visit, and we spent the day sprucing up the visitor's center, dusting it off and making it pretty for the new season.

Today I spent the day preparing for a presentation I'll be working on next month, which is part of a celebration for 300th anniversary of the town we're in. Although the bulk of the research has been done, I had to organize and construct a timeline for 300 years of history! Times three, as it includes information for our refuge, for the town as a whole, and then comparing it against national/worldwide events. How daunting!

This weekend will be my first time running the Center alone, as all the regular employees have the weekend off...I hope I do alright! It's been rainy and overcast the past few days, not to mention still in the off season, so there hasn't been too much traffic. I kind of hope it stays that way this weekend, so I'm not too overwhelmed by myself!

And now, time to work

The past few days have been rainy, windy, and chilly (I guess this is Massachusetts's way of saying welcome), so we didn't spend much time on the beach. We did plenty of sight-seeing, including Provincetown and the Pilgrim Monument, which honors the Pilgrims first landing there in 1620. We also checked out the Cape Cod Brewery, which is pretty amazing! They had a special Cinco de Mayo brew this week, where they infused one of their brews with poblano, serrano, and jalapeno peppers - it did have a kick, and you could definitely taste the peppers, but I really liked it!

Throughout the weekend, we had been craving ice cream (especially when we first arrived, when it was warm and sunny), but as it is still the off-season, most of the places weren't open. We were determined, though, and investigated every ice cream shop we drove by. We finally found one with the lights on, but quickly discovered that the store wasn't open, the woman was only in there preparing it for next week. However, she was kind enough to sell us the ice cream she had just gotten in that day!  Everyone here has been incredibly nice so far.

Sadly, our mini vacation had to end, and my family went home this morning. Shortly after, though, I began my first day on the job! As most first days go, I spent the entire time listening to my new bosses talk to me about the upcoming summer. I'm definitely being thrown in the deep end - a week from today, a group of students will be driving up from New York to listen to me for an entire afternoon! I have to prepare at least 2 hours of material, including some special requests from the teacher for wildlife we don't really even manage for (namely whales...which swim by but don't really need our help). Hopefully I can do it! I also have to prepare for the town's 300th anniversary celebration, and World's Ocean Day at a nearby aquarium.

It Begins!

Well, it's nearly a month later than predicted, but I am finally up here in the indescribably beautiful Cape Cod!

My family drove up with me to help me move (and also have a small vacation), and what a drive it was! It took us 14 hours to get up here, but most of the drive was gorgeous so it wasn't so bad. 

Today, we basically spent all day at various beaches...how could you not? First we spent a few hours at the beach that is behind my dormitory - how many of you can say you have the Atlantic Ocean as your backyard? It was lovely, and we discovered an osprey nest!

the beach outside the dormitory

Osprey 

We stopped around noon to get something to eat, and explored the Main Street of the local town. We found a cute cafe, and got to sit outside and eat yummy sandwiches! After that, we had originally planned on visiting Provincetown (the very tippy top of the Cape), but we caught a sign for Nickerson State Park, and stopped there instead, what a lucky find! We found a small lake, nearly a pond, and spent a few hours there, too. It was a lot of fun, especially watching my brother do crazy antics, such as diving into the freezing cold water!

beautiful lake, the water was crystal-clear!

Billy climbing a tree

Billy decided to go swimming
 despite the fact it was freezing cold

By then it was late afternoon, and after reading about a beach that was described as spectacular for watching the sunset, we migrated to that shoreline. We got there too early, though, so after walking on it for a little while we got some pizza to bring back, then sat in our car for dinner and a show...it was a bit chilly to sit on the beach and watch, especially as it was getting dark! The sunset was gorgeous, and after we couldn't see any more, we came back here for the night.

Billy and I enjoying the sunset

(pictures coming soon, having technical difficulties)

More adventures to come...

A New Summer

Well, it's been a while since I've signed back into this, but I am back to start getting ready for a new summer adventure!

This year, I will be a visitor services intern on Cape Cod, Massachusetts. This mostly means running the visitor's center and answering questions, leading trail walks, teaching workshops for young kids, and that kind of thing. I will also be helping with some field work, when possible -they are known for endangered shorebirds, which will be really exciting to see.

I don't know much yet, aside that it will probably last from April to September...I'll keep you updated as things progress.

Well, yesterday was my last day of work. It was thunderstorming all day, so unfortunately we couldn't do any fieldwork to have me go out with a bang. Instead, I spent the morning entering in all that vegetation data, hanging out with the biologist in our office. After lunch, I laminated all the pages for this little guidebook I've been working on all summer - how fitting, to finish it on my last day!

As we were filling out my "exit paperwork," my boss gave me a little gift bag full of goodies - some water bottles and such from the office/FWS, and then she personally bought me a hoodie/sweatshirt of the local city - how nice! (:

There were lots of goodbye hugs...I'm going to miss these people.

Last night I picked up my mom and brother from the airport, and now we're spending the day in the City (where I had my conference), visiting the Mall of America and such. Tonight we're going back to my "hometown," because the fire guy wants to throw me a goodbye party!

Yesterday we did even more vegging, which went fairly smoothly. We only had one snag, when the GPS unit decided it would be cool not to track our movements, so it took us a little while to find the stake - as it turns out, it was on a completely different hillside than the GPS unit told us it would be, and engulfed in some kind of shrubbery that was nearly as tall as the stake itself (which is just a little shorter than me)!

Highlight of the day was when we were getting into the truck and I spotted an apple tree! Even though they were insanely underripe - they were so tart our faces puckered while we ate them, not gonna lie - they were really good! It was a nice little break, to sit and munch on the apples. (:

Today I had to drive roughly 2 hours away to work another festival, this time it was an agricultural fair thing. More birdhouses, I'm basically an expert by now. Phew!

Monday didn't amount to much - did junk around the office in the morning, and then veg monitoring again in the afternoon. Poor biologist tripped in some animal burrow at the very first plot we went to, so he was in poor shape the entire time. I felt bad for him, but we managed to amuse ourselves enough so he wasn't in too much pain. I hope?

Today was much more interesting! Yesterday, the fire guy asked me if I had accomplished everything I had aimed to do this summer, to which I half-jokingly replied that I wanted to ride the Marsh Master, which is basically a tank-like machine designed to go in...well...marshes. Cattails and the like, shallow water. To my surprise, today he set it up so that he could take us (me, another intern, and the YCC gang) all out for a spin while he did "recon" - gathering info about future burn sites. So that is how I started off my morning...and it was a blast, to say the least. The cattails we were going through were a good 10-15 feet high, which easily was taller than the machine, so finally we decided to stand on the little platforms that extend out over the...tread thingies (I don't know the proper name, sorry gang!) to get a better view. We had to cling on for dear life to avoid falling, but it was worth it! Since the platforms were only about a foot wide, when I looked down, I could see the water right beneath me, it felt like a glass-bottom boat!

We had to cut the ride short, though, since apparently the biologist told him (the fire guy) that I needed to be back ASAP! So I get back to the office, where we (biologist and I) ate an early lunch - over which he told me stories of his brand new puppy dog, that he got this weekend - and then we took out the trusty ATV. We had a pretty good time! The vegetation was pretty tall, the area had marshy spots, and it was hard to see too far ahead of us, so we had many instances of '[thunk]...that was a rock' or suddenly finding ourselves driving into water...the reverse gear was heavily used this afternoon, to say the least.

Probably the highlight of my day, though, happened midafternoon. We were writing down some information, when suddenly I hear mooing. I point it out to the biologist, who informs me that i am going crazy, because there aren't any cows in that area of the refuge. I insist that I'm not crazy (not in this case, at least!), and there are definitely cows. We turn around, and lo and behold, there are 11 cows that had broken loose, wandering probably about 25 m from the ATV! Not only was I vindicated, but...come on. COWS ON THE RUN! I actually did see them run, when the owner came by later with his SUV and was herding them by blaring the horn.

That's about it for this time!