Camp InternetField Report - Kathy Derfler -
Camp Internet
August 1999
My name is Kathy Derfler and I'm a teacher at Indio Middle School in the Desert Sands Unified School District. I am fortunate to be involved in the TLC grant in our school district, which enabled me to attend Camp Internet this summer on a full scholarship. Camp Internet consisted of four full days of travel, sightseeing, exploring and learning.
Our group of teachers met at Ventura Harbor about 11:00 a.m. on Monday August 23, 1999. We were greeted and briefed by the Island Packer Crew, then boarded our boat and set sail for Anacapa Island. Anacapa Island is one of a group of 8 Islands called the Channel Islands. Anacapa Island is 14.5 miles from Ventura and it took us about an hour and a half to get there. Anacapa is actually composed of three little islets, and is 5 miles long and 1 and half miles wide. There are 130 caves and movement in the earth has caused a natural 48-ft. bridge to be created, for which this island is noted.
On our way to Anacapa we were very fortunate to see some wonder marine life. We saw sea lions and porpoises playing in the ocean. For a long while we couldn't see Anacapa because of a layer of fog surrounding it. This fog is actually responsible for the name Anacapa. The tribe of Indians which inhabited this Island until the 1800's, the Chumash, named the island Anacapa because it means "mirage". Once we arrived at the island, we climbed a ladder up to a landing then walked up 154 steps. One of the RAIN team of experts, an environmental science major from UCSB, Jean.
Jean was our trail guide and gave us a detailed history of Anacapa Island's former inhabitants, animals, and plant-life. There are thousands of birds that nest on the island, mice, lizards, sea lions, seals, and that is pretty much it. After the hike, we went back down to the landing and Jean gave a "critter talk" and did a show and tell on sea anemones, snails, starfish, sea urchins etc. She was quite knowledgeable, which was very impressive.
The next morning we all drove to Santa Barbara and met at the RAIN headquarters. Some teachers involved in Camp Internet last year gave some awesome presentations and gave the teachers ideas for this fall. That afternoon we met at the Schott Community Center Computer Lab and listened to another RAIN expert, this time a geophysicist spoke to us about GIS, Geographic Information System. Then we had some computer time to interact with the RAIN web site.
Wednesday a.m. we met at Santa Barbara Harbor, where we met with yet another expert from the Channel Islands National marine Sanctuary, Julie Goodson. Once again we were dazzled by the plethora of information Julie had on marine biology and the creatures of the marine sanctuary. We saw a neat slide show, then took a walk down to actual docks and saw a state of the art weather predictor. Later that morning we drove to the Santa Barbara Botanic Garden situated right in the foothills of Santa Barbara. The garden is on 65 acres of land and was founded in 1926 to enhance the understanding of plant life. There are over 1,000 species of plants on this site, of which our botany expert, Steve Januk, gave a detailed explanation. We then had lunch there and headed to the computer lab again to begin field reports.
The last morning we were in Santa Barbara, we went to the Museum of Natural History, which is located right near the Botanic Garden. Our expert anthropologist gave a talk on the Chumash Indians and the artifacts that have been retrieved or bought by the museum. Once again I was amazed by the amount of knowledge the docent expounded upon, as I worried about how I would ever remember all I had learned. I consider myself very fortunate to be part of something that was such a terrific learning experience. Many thanks to the RAIN staff and their team of experts.
The end.
August 1999