Winston's Oceans Experiences

When many people think about California, they think about sunny days and going to the beach to swim in the ocean. In my 18 years here in the bay area, only once have I have gone to the beach to play nearby. Most of the beaches I go to are in other countries of places, such as Hawaii. This is probably due to the fact that the one beach day I had, was not a particularly great one. The first time I ever when to the beach was when I was 8 years old and my younger brother was 5. Even though it was 10 years ago, I still remember the most important parts of the story. I remember arriving at the beach in the morning with all my typically beach stuff, sunscreen, shovels, buckets, towels, all with one goal: to build the best sandcastle that I could. Keep in mind that I was 8 years old, so I had no understanding of how to build anything large and structurally sound. But I went off to do it anyway. After running around for a bit, I began to dig into the sand, gather as much wet sand as I could in...

As mentioned in many of my other posts, I have always loved the ocean. Ever since I was little, I watched shows like NOVA and Discovery Channel (back when it was actually educational and not just people fishing and hunting stuff). And over time, these shows began to influence me. I worked hard talking about the effects of global warming in every school project and discussing ocean acidification in every single blog we had in class. But why was I so attached to the ocean really? Well I was amazed by one single animal: the cuttlefish. After watching one documentary about this alien like animal, I immediately took interest in it. The way that it hypnotized its prey by changing its skin between black and white. The way it could camouflage in any place, even changing the texture of its skin to fit into the background. The w shaped eyes it had and the fact that it could see anything in 180 degrees. The way it could solve mazes and different puzzles To me this animal seemed like a better ve...

When I look back on my "diving" trip in Thailand, I come to the conclusion that I will never do something like that ever again. You will see why I put diving in quotation marks. In 1014, I went on a trip to Thailand with my family. Instead of exploring the country by ourselves, like we normally would, we decided to take our first ever tour. We got to experience a lot of different things like eating tiger and crocodile, going to an indoor amusement park, and going to traditional night market. However, out of all of those things, the thing that stuck out the most to me was our trip to the beach. I loved the ocean. After my trip to Hawaii, I was captivated by the wildlife and would do anything to see it again. So when the tour guide announced that we were going to participate in a short diving session off the coast, I could not be more excited. OUr family and many others went onto a boat and sailed out to sea. After putting on a wetsuit, I began wondering where...

Ever since I have been young, I have had the dream of exploring the Great Barrier Reef. Especially after my brother did a research project on ocean acidification and the effects on the coral, I asked my parents every single year to see if we could go to the reef. Finally, after graduation from high school, this dream became a reality. In the summer of 2018, I checked off the top of my bucket list and when snorkeling and diving in the Great Barrier Reef of Australia. Instead of doing a one day trip, our family decided to live on a boat so that we could dive and snorkel for longer. We stayed on this boat for 3 days and 2 nights. Even though we took sea sickness medicine, the ocean currents were strong and I constantly got headaches and my schedule consisted of diving, taking a nap and the diving again. The eating situation was surprisingly pretty good and the food we had was mostly seafood. Now onto the best part the diving. I had no prior diving experience before this, but the boa...

In 2012, for my birthday, my parents decided that our family should visit Hawaii for the first time ever. We visited Waikiki beach and in turn Hanauma Bay. Hanauma bay is a cove near Honolulu where there is a coral "shield," creating a place where the tides are super calm. This is probably the best place to first start snorkeling because of these lack of tides and the shallow depth of the water. We travelled to the bay at around 10 am, just as many other tourists were getting there. We then watched a safety video discussing the rules of the bay (like do not sit on the coral, do not try to touch anything with very bright colors). After the video, our family rushed towards the water, which was shining with some of the brightest greens and blues I have ever seen, even to this day (I looked at the pictures). Since it was my first time, I was excited to see the marine wildlife that I had read about in books. I distinctly remembering the water being the most clear I have ever s...