UWF was great, but exhausting!

Our trip is coming to end. Just one more week, it is truly unbelievable! The second to last week I visited Pensacola for the first time ever along with the very cool University of West Florida. I think this was the week I got a full blown workout in. Consisted of a ton of hiking! The first day was learning about the protected forests in Pensacola along with the upland water systems. This week was to learn about freshwater discharge and how it effects estuaries and the Gulf. To learn about how much these forests rely on fires amazed me. Also how logging plays a huge roll in the water quality of these creeks. Through the middle of the week we took a number of water quality tests and spent a bunch of time on the beaches in Pensacola (what gets better than that, WOW I love this major!). It was quite hot on those days doing beach morphology and what not but being able to swim made up for it. Taking a tour of the Environmental Protection Agency was by far the coolest thing I have done in this entire class. I would absolutely love to work and spend time at the lab. The property was placed in the most beautiful area for a work space... water on 3 sides and the old pretty historic buildings were awesome.

We ended the week visiting dune lakes and there are only 5 places in the world where they form; Florida being one of them! It was pretty cool to learn about how they form and the different organisms that can live in them. We were able to seine net one of the lakes and actually caught two mating blue crabs which was very interesting to see. After the cool day we took a long drive back and ended the day and entire week watching the Blue Wahoo's baseball team win by a walk off error which allowed the player on third to make it home. It was perfect, hung out and talked with everyone ending the game with a thrilling win for the team. Professor Jeff is a heck of a guy and had a great time learning from all of his knowledge!

One more week to go!!! SO happy I have spent so much time getting to know so much about everyone!