Field Trips Galore!

I never break a promise and I believe I promised to tell you all about my field trips this weekend! First of all, both of them were awesome and second of all, I am still tired from being on the go all weekend.

On Saturday I left for Paluma Rainforest with my Rainforest Ecosystems class to learn about certain species of plants and trees within the Paluma range. Sounds a little boring for whoever isn't all into botany (me included), but it was actually a really good experience to understand what's out there and how everything works together so we can eventually preserve it. It is about an hour and half from uni and once we arrived, we split up into two groups to go on two different hikes, H-track and Witt's Lookout. My group explored Witt's Lookout first, which was only appropriate given the name! :) Anyway, it was a beautiful part of the forest and we had our lecturer, Bob, tell us all about the different families within the area. We eventually had to identify 10-15 families of plants on our own, with his help of course. The hike in general was uphill and downhill and it was actually quite a work out. We ended up at about 3,000 feet! Along the way I got curious and saw a leech on the ground attached to some sort of leaf. I picked it up to show people and it latched on to my finger! I quickly pulled it off before it could steal any blood from me, thank heavens.


Once we got to the top of the hill, we could see everything! There were beautiful rock formations in the background with waterfalls down the mountain. The water was visible out in the distance and the clouds were right along the horizon. Such beautiful scenery! I think this was what I was named after, a girl can only hope.

On the other hike, the H-track, there was much more diversity and streams running through the forest. Beautiful spiders, birds, and other wildlife were spotted along the way. This was a windier track and it was deeper into the rainforest than the lookout was. I loved it to say the least and our guide was much more entertaining this time around. On this hike, we learned about the uses of certain trees in the aboriginal culture which was very interesting. They used the buttresses of trees to make sheilds and spears since it is flat and easy to carve out of the tree. There were many interesting aspects of the trip, but when it was all said and done, I was ready for a nap! We headed back to uni and Todd and I watched a movie and then I crashed for the night, after a shower of course. Tomorrow was another field trip day, trawling on the Cleveland Bay. That adventure will be on the next post! I will post more pictures from the rainforest on flickr! Cheers.