Annabelle ’24, recounts the groups last day at the Island School.
On our last day, we were supposed to meet at 6:30 am to take boats out to the sandbar. Thus, despite the 6:15 am wake-up, I found myself leaving bed at 6:25 am to throw on my slightly damp swim suit and rush out to the octagon. I doused myself in DEET on my way, praying that my collection of bug bites would not increase.
We hopped into the boats with Dan and Aly and quickly got to the sandbar. We anchored in deeper water, wading until we reached the sandbar itself. To our delight, there were many sand dollars resting in clear view on the top of the sand. I grabbed some too, but they promptly broke when I attempted to place them in a plastic baggie later. After we made our slow way all the way to the beach, Dan had us lay down on our bellies in the sand. We were instructed to use the special sand around us to exfoliate our faces. The sand we learned was called ooid sand, and is unique due to its spherical shape. We got a little lesson on how they were formed as well. Microscopic pieces of fish poop were at the center, and layers of lime and carbon slowly built up to make these balls. Of course, he informed us of the internal nature of the sand after we had smeared most of our bodies in it. After we all rinsed the sand off and some more wading while the sun rose, we headed back to breakfast.
In the girls dorm we packed a bit more until our morning activity, heading to High Rock to symbolically jump back into “the real world”. We jumped many times, even the most scared of us made the leap. We also had accidentally formed a girls only van on our way there and saw a chance to listen to some Taylor Swift.
Then, when we got back we finished packing up, mopping and sweeping our dorm and taking out the trash. We popped into the school store and acquired some assorted T-shirts and stickers and enjoyed our final lunch. Our clean-up was now done, and we found ourselves waiting until 1pm. Many enjoyed a small nap or some reading in the down time.
We packed up the vans and we once again formed an all-girls van to listen to All Too Well (10 minute version) by Taylor Swift. We managed to listen to many more bangers on our little road trip after as well. Our first stop was Sabrina’s Ice Cream Shop, where we got more delicious ice cream which was much appreciated in the burning sun. Sabrina had a toddler with her we said hi to as well, and she imparted parenting advice to me when I tried to help her round up the child that was running away from his impending bath.
We got back on the road and came to Cathedral Caves and Boiling Hole. Boiling Hole was much more green than Sapphire Hole, but we learned that underneath about 20 feet of freshwater there was crystal clear salt water and a diveable connection to the ocean. We moved onto the caves, which were incredible. Natural skylights and columns of roots had given it an elegant feel, along with the arching ceilings. On our short walk back to the vans, Mr. Lee also got up close and personal with two lizards, who decided to dive bomb him and crawl all over his shirt until they jumped on Chloe behind him. I decided to save myself and speed walked the rest of the way to the vans.
Our final stop was a small hike to a group of banyan trees, where we saw a wild horse and were awed at the odd structure of the trees. Then, it was 3:45 pm and we had to say goodbye to Dan and Bronte with hugs. After we checked in, we got our phones back and boarded our flight around 6pm. When we landed in Nassau we popped in another van to get to Orange Hill, a quaint family run hotel. After a quick dinner we showered and all fell asleep, grateful for the A.C. our rooms were equipped with.
