Farewell Summer '11

Well, that's the end of another great summer. This has been my second summer working at SH/SB and I'm glad to say that it was more fun than last year's. That being said, last year's summer was also very fun, I did not think I could possibly ever have more fun working in the summer than I did that year, but I have been proven wrong. One of the main reseason why this summer was so fun was all the fantastic people I got to meet. Our staff this year was more than double what we had last year. I also had the opportunity to go on all access three times more than I did last summer, so I got to meet three times the amount of wonderful kids I met last year.

Perhaps the only downside to this summer was the fact that I only caught three fish, compared to last year's 8. Nevertheless I had a ton of fun trying to catch and helping so many kids have a go. Personally, the joy of helping one of the young anglers catch a fish was greater than catching one myself.

So, as they say, all great things most come to an end, with this blog post, another fantastic summer working at Save the Harbor Save the Bay comes to an end. But hopefully just until summer 2012. Look forward to working with all of you again next year.

Enjoy the rest of your year folks.

~Aruna Bah

Last Week

After the fantastic day we had last Friday with all the groups we have been working with though the summer, it only made sense that they would think it was our last day. So today when we showed up for another fun day at Constitution beach, we found that the group had not arrived. They thought Friday was our last day and didn't show up. After waiting for a while, Sheuli made a phone call and eventually the East Boston Y was informed that we were holding program. And so, even though they were only going to have about a half hour of programing by the time they got there, they still decided to make the trip to the beach. And to me, that just shows how well we have done with them this summer and how much they all enjoy spending the day with us. With the limited time we had, we were able to separate them into two smaller groups, one consisting of members that wanted to go exploring, and the others playing games. It ended up being a fun day; a great way to end the summer with the East Boston Y.

~wilshere

Summer Time Splash

Last Friday and Saturday, we held Summer Time Splash at one of the South Boston beaches; both days turned out to be a huge success. On Friday, we invited all the groups we had the pleasure of working with throughout the summer. Over 400 kids were fishing, painting, building sand castles, playing sports flying kites and eating hot dogs. It was a great day to be at the beach. On Saturday, we had much less of a turn out, but it turned into a great day regardless. We built a very impressive symbol for Save the Harbor and got to welcome the Boston light swimmers. It was a fantastic weekend, possibly the best I have had all summer.

~wilshere

Future of Boston Harbor

Hello Mr Mayor;

My name is Aruna and I am 18 years old. This fall I will be attending Wentworth Institute of Technology, and I currently live in South End. This has been my second summer working for Save the harbor; it has been a lot of fun and education. In my two summers working here, I have learned so much about our harbor and marine life in general. I have met so many great people and worked with amzing kids. I enjoy helping them get to have fun in the harbor and I am really proud of what save the harbor has done.

But, as great as the harbor is now, there is always room for improvement. What I would like to see in the near future is better beaches. I have have noticed that whenever my friends/family planned a a day out at the beach, they always choose ones that are hours away when we have so many here. I would for our beaches to be the place to be. Also, for there to be more beaches at the Boston islands, every island should have a beach available to the public.

~wilshere

Awesome Sculptures!

For the second summer running, I have had the pleasure of attending the Revere Sand sculpture competetion. Last summer I could not choose just one winner out of all the amazing works of art, and this summer I was no different. Each and every one of the pieces had something that made it worthy of the prize, so it was very difficult to choose, I feel for those judges. The sculptures were amazing and all but the most fun part was showing the lobsters we had in the touch tank to all the curious visitors, old and young. It was great seeing all the smiling faces and the amazing art. Can't wait to see what other amazing pieces will be made at next summer's event.

~wilshere

Hook-gull

So while others caught 28+ inches of striper, I had to settle for a seagull. Yes, I caught a seagull with a fishing line. Not what I was hoping to catch but it was exciting nonetheless. So Even though no one on my team caught a fish, we still enjoyed the trip. We had the fanciest boat (second to Bruce's of course) and had a great crew. At the end, there was no baseball ticket, but that didnt bother me as I'm no baseball fan. If it had tickets to an Arsenal match, well that would have been a different story.

~wilshere

All Access Ruless!!!

This year I've been at all access three times, which is two times more than I did last year. On my most recent trip to spetacle island, I got to fly a kite for the first time. Yes, I had never flown a a kite before. So it took me about 10 seconds to learn how to fly one, then spent the next hour teaching eager kids how to, and also how to share them with their friends. We were having so much fun up there that the scortching heat did not seem to bother us at all as we just stayed up there the whole time and went no where near the water. We barely made it back down on time for the boat.

~wilshere

MLK

Hello Aruna here with a report on how MLK is going thus far this summer.

We just completed our 4th week this past Friday, and so far they have all been fun and education. I attended the MLK meetings last year as well, but even though we have been repeating the same activities this year, I am still taking a lot from them. The most recent meeting focused on physical fitness. We got a quick lesson on eating healthy and performing physical activities (the focus at the meeting being boxing). So far we have also learned about setting goals, and financing, all very important tools that will help us secceed. Oh and I am also making a lot of new friends there, meeting new people at every session. It has been a lot of fun and I look forward to next Friday's.

~wilshere

All Access Ruless!!!

Hey kids and fellow staffers, just completed my first week and it went by so fast. I started off at Boston Children's Museum where we had a slow day. On wednesday, I got to be on All Access for only the second time and I got say, it was funtastic!! The kids were amazing and the my fellow staffers are those that anyone would love to work with. By the time Friday came along I was wishing I had an extra day of All Access. Looking forward to an awesome week 2!

~RvP

INTRO

Hello everyone. My name's Aruna and this will be my second summer working at SH/SB. I had a lot of fun my first year and learned so much that I just had to come back for a second year. I just graduated from John D. O'Bryant High and will be attending Wentworth Institute of Technology this fall. Looking forward to a fun filled summer and first year of college!!

~RvP

End of The Road

Just for this summer I hope. This past Friday was our last day of work for summer 2010, and I was sad to see everyone go. I had a blast working with everyone at Save the Harbor, from the senior marine educators to the interns. I made some great new friends and gained a lot of valuable experience this summer.

I wis everyone from Save the Harbor a fun and successful rest of the year. Hope to see you all again next summer.

Cesc

All Access

Today I finally got to go on All Access and it was even more fun than I had hoped it would be. We got half of the kids from the Bank of America pavillion then picked up the other half from Piers Park. Some of the kids we picked up from Piers were ones I had worked with earlier in the summer, and I was very excited that they all remembered me. I also met some new kids who I have not worked with and they were very nice as well. And we even saw Denise's younger sister Dalia (she sounds exactly like her older sister lol).

When we reached Spectacle Island, we all split into smaller groups. Alize, Caroly and I took a small group hiking to the top of the Island. We came back and had enough time to take a quick swim. I was having so much fun that I hadn't even noticed that it was time to go, I would not have objected to statying an extra hour, but sadly we had to leave. The boat ride back was also fun, I took the time to dry off in the sun, as I did not bring a towel. It was a very fun work day; Can't wait to go back on Thursday!

~Cesc
p.s. Bye, Carolyn, was fun working with you finally.

Nautical Day

Yesterday was the last day at Blacks Creek for the summer, and I'm glad I had the opportunity to be there on that day.

Michelle had this awesome plan to get the families at nautical to go on a scavenger hunt for things we have been catching at the site all year long. Unfortunately, we arrived there only to find the tide super high, the highest it has been all summer long. with the beach gone and no where left to search for critters, we had to come up with a new plan. We set up a crab trap on the dock and caught a ton of green crabs in no time with our hot dog bait. With that, we set up a touch-tank and attracted a lot of interested families. A couple of the girls we had been working with since day one, Maria and Rachael stuck around the entire time. We also had a few younger kids, hopefully future campers, that hung around with us for a while. One of then was 4 year old Matty, he was so brave.

It was a great last day at Blacks Creek, a lot of the parents came up to us and thanked us for giving their kids a great summer. The kids were all amazing at blacks creek, and I hope to see them again next summer.

~Cesc

Treasures of Spectacle Island

On staff day we went on a trip to spectacle Island. When we got there, there was a little debate about what game we were going to play. We eventually settled on playing capture the flag, and it proved to be a good choice. We played to games of capture the flag, the first of which only lasted a couple of minute. The second game was a little more fun because it lasted longer and involved a bit more strategic work.

When Patty and Bruce arrived on their boat with food, we made our way quickly to the dock and had a good time. There were lots of hot dogs and steak, as well as a lot of my favorite fruits. After eating and relaxing, Bruce asked us to go on a treasure hunt along the beach. We found a lot of interesting sea glass and pottery. My favorite find was the marble, it was pretty cool, not something thats easy to come across.

~cesc

Cirque Du Soleil

Yesterday was one of the most funtastic days of my summer so far. It was just awesome!
Ok, so it did not start so brightly as I made a trip to Courageous Dorchester only to find out that the site had been cancelled for the week, and then made another trip back to the office, and eventually to the Boston Children's Museum. That is where the day started being fun; at the museum, I worked with new faces (well faces that I see whenever I am at the office but never have the time to converse with) as well as meeting some great young anglers. We also had luck with fishing, though not at the scale of our exploits on Monday. Still, it was a blast. My team and I then made our way to Castle Island where we also had a blast fishing and exploring. I made my way back home afterwards to prepare for the evening.

I had been looking forward to Cirque Du Soleil eversince our awesome boss, Bruce, announced that he had scored us some tickets. When we finally got there, we had to wait (thanks Tom, BJ & Conor lol). But yeah, we finally got in and prepapred to be amazed. That is exactly what happened, the entire audience was in awe at the talented performers. They were simply amazing. I loved every part of it, but perphaps my favorite performance was the one of the girls (ants) spinning produce on their feet while balancing on each other's feet. It was great stuff!
Oh, and the firefly (guy with the yo yo) was also very cool.

~Cesc

One Goal, Five Assists!!

In my 4 previous weeks of fishing, I had failed to catch a single fish on my own, and only had one assist, back in my first week at Camp Harbor View. This however is no longer the case after we had our most successful day of fishing so far this summer. We started with one being caught by Conor. That first catch started drawing in the kids. When I decided to try my luck, I also caught one, just a few seconds after I placed my bait in the water. By that time, we were surrounded by eager kids looking to try their luck. Satisfied with my one catch, I turned my attention to helping the kids. By the time we reached the end of our most successful day, we had caught an amazing 18 cunners, and I had five assists and one goal (caught one on my own). It was a very exciting day of fishing.

~Cesc

Boston Children's Museum Sets a New Record!

Today at the Boston Children's Museum I was joined by a fabulous crew from Save the Harbor, including Conor, Tom, Aruna, and Alex. As we set up for the morning Aruna mentioned that he has not caught a fish this summer! His luck was about to change.

As the kids arrived so did the fish. One after another the Save the Harbor Team assisted almost every child that participated in fishing 101 program reel in a fish. Between the time of 10:00 am and 11:00 am we already had eight fish and one crab in the touch tank. By 12:15 we had tallied around eighteen total fish. You could say it was a very successful morning.

Thank you to all the participants. You did a wonderful job reeling the 'cunners' in and helping us release them at the end. Throughout my four years fishing at Save the Harbor, today was the most successful day in regards to fishing!

WELL DONE,

Jennifer Last

Day Two, Week Two at Piers Park!

We finally caught a fish at Piers park, albeit it was not a very large one; but whatever, I'll take it!! On Tuesday, only Emily and I were staffing Piers Park as Tom was absent, but we did a great job and had lots of fun with the kids. We started the morning off with a quick game of sharks and minnows to get the kids excited and engaged. Once the sailors sailed off, we went down on the dock to catch some fish.

Things were moving slow at first as we failed to get even a nibble on any of our baits. A couple of the kids decided they would try their luck elsewhere and handed their rods over to the others who had not yet gotten their chance to fish. One of the boys, named jose, called me over to assist him. I took his rod and demonstrated how to cast (perfect cast), then I handed the rod over to him to give it a shot. Using everything I had thought him, Jose threw a near perfect cast. I patted him on the back and told him "well done". After just about a minute, Jose wheeled in his line, and at the end of it was...yes, a FISH!! Finally we had caught a fish, only the second one during my two weeks of working there, and the first one for Emily. It was a great scene as all the kids stopped what they were doing and rushed to see the fish. Unfortunately, it was not nearly large enough to keep so we had to release it. It was a great morning.

~Cesc

Piers Park & CSC Week Two!!

Hello everyone, hope you all had a good weekend. Today I started my second week working at Piers Park & CSC after a one week absence. We had a new group at Piers Park and I had fun getting to know them. As we waited for the sailors to leave from the dock, we played a quick game of sharks and minnows, but sadly I failed to get to base even once the whole time so I was stuck being a seaweed the whole time. So after the sailors left, we headed down to the docks where we got some fishing going. Even though we did not catch a fish, we all had lots of fun trying.

After finishing up a great morning at Piers Park, we took a boat ride to CSC. I enjoyed my first week working at CSC, but based on today, it seems week 2 is going to be even more fun. We pulled up a couple of lobster traps, on one of them we caught two red-rock crabs, and on the other we found two gigantic lobsters (ok maybe not that big, but big enough to eat). Tom said he would take the bigger one home for dinner, I do not know what will happen to the less gigantic one, maybe it will get lucky and be freed. We then got some fishing done but again, we could not catch any, but it was also still fun. Soon after that the call was made for sailing, and unfortunately only two Save The Harbor staffers were needed so I had to head back to the office to do some blogging (which is also lots of fun). That was the end of another great day at work, looking forward to an even better one tomorrow.

ps. Congrats to the SH/SB volleyball team!! 4th out of 14, not bad at all. lol

~Cesc

Finding a New Home in the Harbor

I know I've taken over the blog a bit these past couple days with crab and water testing, but I can't resist sharing my amazing week with you all and thanking everyone who was a part of it. I'll bullet-point my highlights to try and keep it short, but, coming off the my favorite week of the summer so far, I can't make any promises...

• I got to work with the Dream Team this week- LaToya, Aruna, Tommy, and myself meshed amazingly well together, and I can't thank them enough for the passion they put in to what we were doing. Plus, I really just had so much fun with them. Thanks guys!
• I felt very at home working at the Boston Children's Museum, getting to talk to families and have those quick windows of time to really connect with the great kids that pass through. Practically every child that comes over to our touch tank or our lobster trap encounters something new and has this unforgettable look of awe and wonder on his or her face. I'm never going to get sick of that look.
• I got to work alongside Jen Last a TON this week, who, aside from providing such a great support system to our youth staff this summer, is a great role model for anyone who seeks a future in marine education. I'm incredibly lucky to be learning the ropes from her and developing my own style of teaching in the process. Thank you, Jen!
• My kids all week asked some amazing questions, ranging from "Is a barnacle growing on a whale the same kind of thing as if my dog had a worm?" to "I know we can't use a native spider crab for bait, we should use an Asian Shore crab... what if a spider crab was in Asia, could we use it for bait there?" It was so rewarding to see those scientific wheels turning.
• Combined, my sites caught 5 fish this week-- the 5th of which was a 27-29 inch striper that we reeled in RIGHT as we were starting to pack up in South Boston this afternoon. I couldn't have asked for a better final note to finish the week!

For those of you who don't know, I moved here on a whim at the beginning of June. It was pretty scary to take a leap like that. I left the most important people in my life at home in Maryland, and I miss them all the time. I blindly hoped that Boston would present an outlet for my passion for environmental education, but I moved up without a job. Then Jen, Lindsay, Patty, and Bruce took me in and gave me the opportunity to be a part of this amazing group of people. It's not always easy to be 22 years old, in a new city, far away from my family, apartment hunting, trying to figure out what the next step in my life will be; but it's weeks like this that leave no doubt in my mind that I'm exactly where I'm supposed to be.

From the bottom of my heart, thank you.

Lots of Harbor Love,

Michelle