Upcoming Meeting Times

TUESDAYS

January 6 11:00-1:00.

January 13 11:00-1:00.

January 20 9:30-11:30.

THURSDAY

January 29 9:30-11:30.

The Full Story

Trip leaders: Catherine Gobron and Joe Seitz. Joe’s partner Vanessa Serotta will be joining us as well as a 3rd adult. Joe, Vanessa, and I all participated in last year’s North Star trip to Vieques, Puerto Rico.

Dates: Wednesday, March 11 to Friday, March 20.

We’ll be flying out of Logan Airport in Boston early Wednesday morning. Change planes in Miami, change again in San Pedro Sula, Honduras, and then on to Roatan, Honduras. We’ll land in Roatan about 7 pm their time.

We are working with The Roatan Marine Park. Here’s a link to the Roatan Marine Park

This is their mission: To facilitate enforcement of Honduran environmental protection laws, provide infrastructure to reduce impacts of human activities on the marine environment, educate to create a sense of environmental responsibility among local communities, and conduct research to inform local decision makers on appropriate action to protect the marine environment from human impacts.

James and others at the Marine Park will be spending time with us in several capacities: As teachers; teaching us about the reef, its value, and the dangers it faces
As leaders; directing and assigning our work at the park and
As ambassadors; keeping us informed about where to go and what to do in Roatan

Accommodations: We’ll be staying at Posada Arco Iris. It looks to be a very nice facility right on the water of Half Moon Bay, walking distance to the marine park. Here’s a link

Scuba Training: We will be doing our scuba training and certification with Westfield Water Sports on the weekend of January 24. We'll be doing the PADI fast track program over 3 straight days. When we get to Roatan we'll do our 4 more open water dives to complete our certification. Coconut Tree Divers will be helping us with this as well as taking us out on recreational dives on 2 other days.

Note: Vanessa will not be scuba diving. Instead she will be holding down the land end of things while the rest of us are in the water. If any of the travelers are unable to dive for some reason, they can hang out and work with Vanessa.

Another note: every diver will need their own set of mask, snorkel, and fins. All the other gear will be provided.

hw for 12/16

Coral Review Lesson
There are 11 short pages reviewing what we've learned about coral reefs. Read all of them thoroughly. We'll have a test in class on 12/16 to be sure that everyone has a thorough working knowledge. After the test we'll continue planning which points we want most to convey in our teaching to others and how we want to present it.

online videos

Here's a short list of free, online videos about coral reefs that I recommend:

Reef Check: short video about Reef Check program from National Geographic.

National Geographic
This site has lots of short videos on a wide range of environmental and wildlife topics divided into categories by habitat. This link is to the ocean videos, of which several are related to coral reefs. There are 24 3-5 minute mini documentaries. I recommend focusing on the coral reef related ones, specifically, but they are all good.

Marine Life Identification
In this Expert Village series diver Don Stark walks you through the identifications of a long list of marine life through a series of short, informational videos. Very clear, concise, and thorough.

NOOA (National Oceanic and Atmospheric Association) has a You Tube channel with lots of short videos. Scroll down on this page to see the gallery of videos, or go straight to the You Tube channel.

You Tube Discovery Channel has lots of ocean related videos including tons of clicks from various Shark Week(s). Go to the link above and type shark week in the search box for a long list of choices.

other updates: tickets, online courses, homework for 12/9

I bought the plane tickets! We are committed. We are definitely going to Honduras, flying out on March 11. We have about $19, 500 to raise. (donations are tax-deductible, don't forget!)

My daughter, Hope, was one of the people newly inspired to pursue a career as a marine biologist. As a start on that path we found an introductory biology class offered free through University of California, Berkeley. We watched our first webcast lecture tonight. Take the course with us! Check it out here. (There are lots of Berkeley classes offered free online, btw, in webcast, podcast, notes...)

Finally, reminder to all travelers that your presentations begin on Tuesday. We meet at 9:30 am. You are each researching 3 problems and threats currently facing coral reefs and will teach the rest of us about them. Here's the list of who's doing what:

Ben: boating impacts, mass bleaching, overfishing

Dexter: bomb fishing, integrated coastal management, marine ornamental trade

Jonah: coral mining, disease, restoration

Lachlan: crown of thorns, live reef fish trade, seagrass

Abe: diadema, industrial pollution, mariculture

Amby: mangroves, nutrients, reclamation

Campbell: marine protected areas, poison fishing, storm damage

Hope: divers/walkers, inverts for curio trade, siltation

aquarium follow up

We had a super fun and smooth trip to the New England Aquarium in Boston this past Tuesday. There were 20 of us in all and it seemed like everyone enjoyed themselves. At least 2 people came back with newly realized life missions to become marine biologists. Clearly, it was inspirational. The Imax, Dolphins and Whales, was really well done and interesting and educational, but the soothing ocean sounds and Daryl Hannah's voice were lullabies to a few.

My favorite exhibit: sea horses. I knew I liked sea horses, but now I know I love them. The jellyfish were also spectacular.

New England Aquarium

Getting ready to visit the New England Aquarium in Boston this Tuesday. I expect it to be really fun- 23 of us in total!- and of course we're sure to learn a lot. In addition to increasing our knowledge and understanding of ocean life I'm looking forward to getting ideas on how we're going to share this information with others. In January we'll start visiting other groups to teach what we've learned through games and other interactive tools that we will have created. We're still in our power learning phase, which will continue throughout, but next week we'll start to build curricula for sharing, and gearing up for a big community event on January 24. Save the date!

cohesive group

We had an excellent meeting this past Tuesday. I had assigned a good deal of reading and homework and everyone showed up ready to talk about coral and zooanthanelle and spawning. Really exciting stuff. I'm particularly enjoying bringing to light and discussing the interconnectedness of it all. Every part affects the whole in complex chain reactions. Humans included, of course.

The internet is as always a fabulous resource. I am very happy to find piles of short videos on a variety of coral reef topics. It's so great to be able to read about coral spawning, for example, and then see it in action.

Check out this short National Geographic video about Reef Check, the program we'll be volunteering for:
Reef Check Video

Our group seems to have stabilized. Everyone who is in is all in and tackling the required work. We have a lot more to learn in the coming weeks. We'll be visiting New England Aquarium on December 2. Then we'll spend the rest of December creating ways to share what we have learned with others. In January we'll start visiting other schools and groups to teach them what we know about the reef, its importance, and how our actions on a local level affect our global realities.

It's Coming Togther

The trip is fairly well laid out. We will fly out of Logan on Wednesday, March, 11 on American Airlines, landing in Roatan that evening via Miami and San Pedro Sula. We will return on Friday, March 20. We have reservations at the lovely and affordable Posada Arco Iris (http://www.roatanposada.com/alojamientos/index.html), and the deposit is non-refundable so we are definitely going!

I've been planning with James Foley of the Roatan Marine Park (http://www.roatanmarinepark.com/index.htm) and the vision is for the teens and I to participate in Reef Check, an international reef monitoring program. (http://www.reefcheck.org/). This will entail all of us becoming scuba certified and trained in the Reef Check methodology. There's a lot to this trip but I think it's going to be worth it.

My co-leader, Joe Seitz, will be joining me, along with his partner, Vanessa Serotta, the third adult supervisor on our team. Joe and Vanessa and I took a group to Vieques, Puerto Rico last year and are now a seasoned traveling team. I will also be bringing my daughter, Hope, who is 11. (You only have to be 10 to become scuba certified!) Hope did not come to Puerto Rico but did accompany me on my other 2 long distance North Star trips, to New Orleans in 2006 and Costa Rica in 2007.

Just now I've been working on a sponsor request form. I expect this trip to cost at least $20,000. Yikes! We're really going to need some help.