Hi everyone! Sadly, this is the farewell post as our trip to San Salvador has come to an end. Although this experience only lasted a little over a week, we were able to make so many memories and have lots of adventures! Nearly every day was packed full of snorkeling trips and sight-seeing to help us better understand how San Salvador came to be -- whether that was through looking at its anthropological or geological history. This is an Earth Sciences course, and we spent a lot of time thinking about the geologic history of San Salvador Island; however, I think it was both more engaging and necessary to talk about the history of humans on the island. In the classes before coming to San Salvador we discussed how big of an impact even early communities, such as the Lucayans, had on the island. The Lucayans left behind artifacts that helped us understand the resources that were available to them at the time and how they used these resources. Later we know that non-native plants were brought over to San Salvador and plantations were built beginning in the late 1700s. Humans can have such a large impact that anthropological and geological information go hand in hand, so I am grateful that we were able to learn about this piece of the puzzle in addition to the geology.
Another very prominent feature of this trip was snorkeling. Every day there was an opportunity to snorkel which brought an entirely new level of engagement to the experience. We were able to see first-hand the state of the ocean environment. You don’t have to look that hard to see trash floating around and the effects of coral bleaching. But even though times are hard right now, there is still so much beauty to be seen in these environments. The variety of ecosystems that we had the opportunity to see was mind-blowing. We snorkeled in environments dominated by sea grass, environments with sand and rock floors, patch reefs, and even right next to a steep drop off where there was so much life visible. Overall, snorkeling was an amazing learning tool for this trip and I had so much fun doing it!
A big thank you goes out to everyone who made this trip possible! I am so incredibly grateful to have had this experience and I can’t wait to reflect on it more in class!
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