February 22, 2004
Dear friends and family,
The Australia group is back in Melbourne after spending just over a week
in Queenscliff and the Otways region of Victoria. We had three lectures
this morning at the Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology to start the
week off right!
Our time in Queenscliff was wonderful. After a week of only lectures at
Mannix College, we really got into the hands-on marine biology in
Queenscliff. Our academic host was the Primary Industries Research -
Victoria facility, and we had three expert and exciting tutors for the
week in Harry, Alex, and Tara.
We began with a series of lectures on Victoria's marine life:
invertebrate, vertebrate, and flora. The southern coast of Australia has
amazing biological diversity, with a high percentage of species found
nowhere else in the world! A marine photographer spoke with us last
Monday and showed us many spectacular slides of her work, and she
mentioned several times that Victoria's waters are more exciting than any
tropical sites where she has gone diving.
Along with lectures, we had one lab investigating trophic levels in the
intertidal zone, and one fish dissection lab. The fish dissection got
quite messy as we located various organs, and it was fascinating to learn
about marine vertebrates so closely.
The highlights in Queenscliff were definitely our excursions. We took a
trip out to Barwon Heads to look at the intertidal zone (basically a great
big tidepooling trip!). Harry turned us loose to look for animals on our
own, and then gathered us together to give us some information about
micro-habitats and various adaptations of intertidal organisms. We also
conducted a survey of intertidal life using quadrats and a transect line.
After returning from the tidepools we all jumped on a research ship and
headed out into a choppy Port Phillip Bay, where we dredged up seaweed
from the bottom and sorted through it for animals. We found sea stars,
shrimp, anemones, decorator crabs, green meenie crabs, pipefish, and
seahorses.
On our way back to shore we stopped at a fur seal platform and
a nesting site for Australasian gannets.
On Wednesday we had two of the most exciting excursions of the week:
canoeing and snorkeling! Our canoe trip out into Swan Bay brought us
within inches of banjo sharks and sea hares living in the seagrass, and we
also jumped out on a small island to look at mudflat communities. Harry
kept promising Jamie a banjo shark to kiss, but alas, that group didn't
catch one. Snorkeling with Alex was an adventure, from squeezing
ourselves into wetsuits to floating gently over sand, seagrass, and reefs.
Some highlights from snorkeling: pufferfish, crabs, seastars, anemones,
leatherback fish, rays, and a school of 30 tiny squid!
After saying goodbye to the PIR Vic staff, we embarked upon a whirlwind
tour of the Otways region of Victoria, which lies west of Port Phillip
Bay. We traveled along the Great Ocean Road, with stops at Bells Beach
surfing mecca, Lorne tourist destination, and the Twelve Apostles, great
freestanding stacks of sandstone along the coast. It was a magnificent
drive. We climbed mainland Australia's oldest lighthouse at Cape Otways,
stayed overnight at an old prison camp, and visited two types of forest.
In the coastal eucalypt forest we spotted about 15 koalas sitting quitely
in the crooks of the branches, and in the cool temperate rainforest we
climbed to a treetop walk, the highest tower reaching 47 meters! Naomi
had a little trouble with her vertigo, but she made it all the way to the
top with the rest of us. It was a spectacular climb. Later that night we
returned to the forest in the pitch dark to find glow worms sparkling in
the darkness. Our guide Mike described it as "the Milky Way fallen to
earth," and he was right.
It's exciting to be back in bustling Melbourne, and we've all made plans
to visit the Queen Victoria Market tomorrow on our free day. Australia
continues to be a wonderful experience!
Yours,
Elin and the 2004 Australia Group
