Yesterday was our group service project, a beach cleanup, filled with fun activities for us to clean. First, we went around the coastal line and deep area of the beach searching for trash and had a competition to see who picked up the most trash. While we were searching. One of our group members spotted a Monk Seal on the rocks, the second one we have gotten to see wild this week! I walked up to the seal to get a good eye view of the seal and called the Monk Seal Hospital we visited earlier in the week to make sure they could identify him and track him. Super cool sight! After the Monk Seal encounter, we continued the fun cleanup with a sand building competition. The sand we used covered a anchialine pool, which is a body of water that has both salt and fresh water in it. Our team decided to build a Monk Seal with the sand. What we built, we thought was going to crush the competition, but we didn’t even place! All and all the building was fun plus it was a good teamwork exercise. To end the day, we packed up into a bus and began our drive up to the top of Mount Maunakea, one of the tallest mountains in the world. A early start allowed us to stop and go places that normally aren’t seen on the path up to the mountain. After reaching the summit, we were able to enjoy ourselves, take pictures, and watch the stars shine in the sky, above all clouds!
