California Trip Reflection

Just a couple weeks ago I sent out on a trip to Santa Barbara, California. We were in California for a little over eight full days, but the full trip altogether was a total of ten days. Also, while we were there, we spent part of the trip on an island called Santa Cruz Island, and the other part of the trip we were in Santa Barbara or on a train. I liked this trip a lot, like seeing a new place. Though there were some hard parts to like getting lost on an island. I learned a lot when I was there, too, that I could use anywhere. I am really bummed out that this trip is over because I like being somewhere new.

The most fun part of this trip was going to a place I’ve never been before. I went to California for the first time in my life. The weather was really nice for the whole time we were there and we got to go swimming in the ocean. We also got to go on a train for thirty six hours which I thought was kind of fun because we mainly just chilled and hung out the whole time. The next fun part about the trip was being on an island only with your classmates and one other guy just exploring and doing whatever. I liked having the freedom of being able to go off and explore by myself and not having my parents around or my sister bugging me. It was really relaxing and really exciting looking down at everything from the top of the kind of like foothills.

Even though I had a lot of fun, there were some difficulties along the way. One of those difficulties was getting away from those weird druggies or alcoholic people on the train and in the city of Santa Barbara. One man that was homeless threatened my friend, my teacher and me that he was going to shoot us. It was kind of a weird situation, but luckily we kept walking and ignored him. Another difficult situation that we came upon was getting lost in a canyon. The thing is that we saw a canyon and we weren’t sure where it went, but we went down it anyways because it looked like fun. What we found out later was that it was getting dark and we were going in the wrong direction so we sent two people up one canyon wall and they said it was too dangerous. Next we had to turn around and go back to the trail and now it is dark with no flashlights and we had to get back to camp. Finally we reached camp with what felt like a three hour delay. It wasn’t very fun at all. Though I did learn something from that experience.

After this trip I thought about it a little bit and I found out I did learn a couple things from it. One thing I learned is to saver your money for food when you need it, for example, when you DON’T have any food left, don’t blow it all at the beginning. Second the most important thing I learned is to trust other peoples choices even if you don’t like it, but if It’s smarter then stick with it. I learned that because when we were in the dark on a hill I chose the wrong way. My choice was to follow a fence line down because I went up there before, but it wasn’t really the best way to go. I wanted to go that way because it was faster, but really you never know because you couldn’t see much so maybe you might have to go slow, I don’t know. The next thing I learned was to take deep breathes and thing of good things when something is dangerous or scary because it really works. The first day on the island we climbed a steep, really tall hill and I am slightly afraid of heights I used that technique and I was good all the way to the top. I guess you could say I made it through the challenges that came at me.

Again I have to say I loved this trip. My whole life I have wanted to go to California, and I went there and it was awesome, I even got to go by myself. The really cool thing about Adventure Ed is that I’m pretty sure that no other school get to go places for ten days or even two. This is the best class that you could take in my perspective. This trip was also one of the most fun trips I’ve ever gone on. Though this class sounds like it is a guy hiking class, there were girls in this class. It also is a good workout on your leg and back muscles. I encourage anyone who reads this to go outside and just explore, go walking, see where it takes you and enjoy it.