End of Internship

Hello again everyone!

The past month or so has been another busy month for everyone here at HKDCS! We have been out on the water rain or shine and it has started to get really warm! There is no shortage of sunscreen on the boat that is for sure! Michelle and I have even manage to get some really funky shoe tan lines.

This is what happens with you leave your phone out for 5 minutes with doing a land based survey at this time of the year!

The other day I went to Fan Lau for the very first time, we got to take a walla wall (speed boat) over and it was a lovely day for it. I think it was one of the hottest days yet that I've had here in Hong Kong and I was so grateful for the sun shade that we had set up.

Hiding from the hot sun

Boat ride to Fan Lau

We were really lucky while we were there, we had 6 separate groups of dolphins show up! This gave us lots to do with tracking the dolphins and the copious amounts of high speed ferries and ships that pass around Fan Lau. It also meant that at the end of the 6 hours tracking Michelle, Taison and myself got a chance to try and use the Theodolite. This proved to be a lot harder for all of us than expected. After a few goes tracking the high speed ferries became easier. However, the dolphins were much, much harder to track! I think I only got about 3 or 4 fixes in 40 minutes, and the lack of fixes was not due to the lack of dolphins :s. It certainly gave me a greater sense of respect for Perry, Leo and Vincent who are truly masters of the Theodolite!!

Perry operating the Theodolite

This month we also had a really lovely treat of going out to lunch as a team! This was to say goodbye to Jackin and Michelle who have both just left us to go to Vietnam and Canada. Lunch was a buffet and we all certainly did our best to eat as much as we could! I can without a doubt say it was the best meal I have had since being in Hong Kong! Thanks you very, very much Samuel! Here are a few pictures from lunch:

Michelle and her love for chocolate (and cheese)!! 

The team :)

The last two standing!

And the clear winner! Tony came to lunch fully prepared to eat more than anyone with that t-shirt on haha!

And the girls :)

Even though my internship is now over I am lucky enough to be staying on a little longer to help a graduate student with her PhD data. This will give me more time with the amazing people I have met while I have been here and more time to do what I can to help the amazing marine mammals here in Hong Kong. These mammals need all our help and what HKDCS is doing for them is invaluable! I am so grateful for the amazing experiences I have had while here and for everything that I have learnt from those around me (including the dolphins and porpoise :) )!

Thats all for now! Thanks again to everyone who made this experience so great!

Mairead :)