Day 3

Today we explored Ferd's Bog and then hiked up Black Bear Mountain. I have never seen or visited a bog before and I was excited because I was able to read about one in Adirondack Green by Jon Slade. Before I even left to go to the Bog I knew that I would have a little bit of a challenge because I easily get grossed out by certain things. It is not because I don't want to do it, but sometimes it just freaks me out. Needless to say, I was nervous about going to the Bog because I was unsure of what we were going to encounter. After spending time at the Bog, I started opening up and trying new things. I was able to take a net and fish for small critters with Karl out in the Bog. It was very exciting to actually be stepping into a wet, mushy and squishy surface. Unfortunately, Karl and I couldn't find any critters, such as frogs or salamanders in the water. It made me sad. While I was busy looking for critters, Kathy was out exploring the bog and found a spider that had a white sack attached to her. I was actually able to look at the spider (briefly) and see that she in fact had a white sack attached to her. That was a huge step for me due to the fact that I am deathly afraid of spiders.

After we left the bog, we hiked up Black Bear mountain. I have always enjoyed hiking, and today it was absolutely amazing.  I have never had the chance to hike in the Adirondack mountains and the forest is just so different to what I would normally see. There are tons of different plants and flowers that I learned today that I have never even seen before. Some of that may have been due to the fact that I never slowed down and took the time to explore it like I am now. I am thoroughly enjoying taking the time to explore the forest and use the different identification tools to figure out what type of tree/flower/bug we found. We found three different caterpillars today and we were only able to identify one of them because the other two were not in the book we had. Being able to hold that caterpillar and look through the book to figure out the name of it made me feel like there was this completely new world out there that I have been missing all my life. I am truly proud of myself for the baby steps I took today. I feel that it is important to experience these things before entering a classroom because these are the types of encounters and explorations and findings that we will expect and hope that our students will experience.

I am also happy to announce that we finally made it onto the lake today. First we were kayaking and then Cherith and I decided to give a new tubes a try. I haven't kayaked in a long time, so it was exciting to try it in a new place, especially up here! Floating in our tubes was relaxing and it was definitely what I needed because I felt very much relaxed afterward. I am overly excited about the new experiences that I have encountered so far because I feel that I am growing as a person. It is exciting to see where I started in the beginning of the week and where I am ending up. There is one full day left and I am ready to make the best of it!