Journals-Day 5 Boys

Day 5 June 25, 2006--On the Road

Day 5….. I was so exhausted from last night because we worked hard on our journals and went to bed at about 1:30 in the morning. We already are tired for 3 straight days of not enough time to sleep.

In the morning, I am so tired and got up so late. A person yelled at me and said, “We are now LATE because of you!” I felt like, come on JON, GET UP! My spirit was willing but the body says no! So I took a shower in less than 4 minutes, dry off and dress quickly. I ran all way to the kitchen and ate a small breakfast and made my own lunch which was sloppy.

Then we were READY to go to the Fort Clatsop which was our first time seeing such a place. I wanted to see the images of where Lewis and Clark lived and how they living in the Fort. Once we arrived at the Fort, I realized, I needed to go to the bathroom quickly because I drank a whole bottle of water!” I had to find a bathroom fast. Meanwhile, we observed around the site of the Fort Clatsop and it was smaller than I thought. The legend was very strong to believe. This Fort Clatsop is a copy from the bible, journal, and was a guess as to what the first Fort may have looked like. The National Park members don’t have any real proof as to how this building was built.
Whoa, Fort Clatsop really helped me to understand better. It gave me a clear picture of what life was like way back in the days of Lewis and Clark. There was a lot of information about Lewis and Clark. This information about Fort Clatsop and how it really was not designed exactly as the first Fort built in 1805 to 1806 was very interesting.

The other ranger, who’s job was to explain about how to use the rifle, it was so amazing to see the old musket and it took him about 2 minutes to set up the rifle. Two minutes is a very long time.
The Ranger noted the importance for Clark and Lewis and their group who had lived in the Fort Clatsop to work as team because if did not use teamwork, then they will possible failed and also possible to die. The Ranger, Henry gave us a lecture and it was very interesting! He pulled us into Lewis and Clark’s story and life. Henry will be a senior this coming autumn and he is very intelligent gentleman. He already has a gift for business and political science.

Suddenly, I was very interesting in the history about Clark and Lewis’s life in the Fort Clatsop so I asked the Ranger many questions as I can! And I did learn from him and he told me that Clark and Lewis usually had lots of bad experiences during the winter time. There were also only thirty-three men who were lived in the Fort Clatsop. I turned and noticed that all of us were so exhausted maybe because I asked the Ranger too many questions. I felt bad.

We got back to Astoria, Oregon and it was so HOT. Mrs. Nutt told me that her friends told her that in this town of Astoria it never gets hot as it is today. The town of Astoria has strange roads. They are very STEEP. We thought our van could roll down the hillside because the van was almost vertical, which is so dangerous. Lucky, Mrs. French drove very carefully through the steep uphill road.

We drove up hill someway before arriving at the Astoria Column which was so TALL and THIN, we never saw a building like that before! We walked the spiral staircase and did not expect that it would be such a long way to get top of the building! Once we got top of that building, it was VERY beautiful and HUGE. We saw two rivers (Columbia and Clark and Lewis rivers) meet to each other. We took some pictures of us in top of the building.

Soon as we were on way to somewhere else, suddenly we parked in front of a house. That house was the house the movie which was call “The Goonies” was filmed. However the road near that house has the sign, “private road”, so we had to take some pictures a bit farther away from the house. We were excited that we already saw the house which is from the comedy movie.

Last place we visited was at the town deck and there were wild sea lions. Ms. Zurek told me about the sea lions but I did not to believe her. I thought they did lived in somewhere else. Then I saw it with my own eyes, tanning, and very LAZY seals. Mrs. Nutt’s friends left us because they need to get back to their work. I felt so exhausted by that time and wanted to get back to WSD and get some sleep for myself. However we need to eat our last meal then work on our journals. Grr, I just wanted to get some sleep. Well… the dinner was coming to us! I had two rich and juicy cheeseburgers and ate them all at once! Just kidding, eat and chatting each other during dinner time. After that we typed the journal and research that we learned today.

FINALLY, IT’S TIME FOR SLEEP and GOOD NIGHT to myself.

On The Road Trip Day 5

Last night, I did stay awake to 12am because I was really busy with my journal and investigation about Chinese Gardens. In the morning, we woke up at about 8am and we got dressed. Then I ate two English muffins which are not great but it is okay for me. After that, we have to make our lunches as sandwiches, chips and water. We were excited and ready to go to Fort Clatsop National Park today!

When, we arrived to Clatsop National Park at around 11:30am, it was my first time to see and touch a national park! It was a very hot day and I was very sweaty! I was really very glad that I got the golden access passport because I am deaf. I was lucky to get it because it would be free admission when I go in other national parks.

Next, we must walk on the trail because the wasp would sting at us if we did walk off the trail! We have to be very careful. Then we saw the red alder and it wasn’t red bark and it only has brown bark. We didn’t know why it is called red alder. Then we saw the Fort Clatsop and it seemed smaller than I thought it would be! But it was okay for me and we went to the first house. We took the noon photos and we took Richie and Jon dressed up in the old fashioned clothing. The ranger presented us about the plants that can make the medicines as hemlock tree have a tannic acid that can make the leather pliable and Sitka spruce can be a cure for coughs. If people have the cuts and they used the red alder, that can stop the bleeding! The red alder felt very flexible and was a very orange color!

At that time, my stomach was a little growling and I have to wait a bit longer because I don’t want to interrupt the ranger who presented. The man who presented to us name was Henry who is a senior in high school this fall. He seems very young and he did remember all of the plants and history of the Fort Clatsop and told us about everything! I was really impressed with his presentation! Then we went on a medicine tour and he talked about the fruits and berries which made me more fascinated because people used them to cure their sicknesses. One thing that is really interesting for me was the sitka spruce which can cure the cough and Native Americans used the sap for chewing gum but it didn’t taste good.

Then we went back to the Fort Clatsop and we listened to a man who tell the story about winter in the Fort Clatsop. After that, he explained how he loaded the musket and when he shot the musket, there was very loud BANG! I did see the fire on the musket when it fired! I can imagine that people have to patience and take the time to load the musket. Next we ate the same old rotten lunch!

Later we went to the Visitor’s Center and watched a short movie about the winter of 1805 to 1806. We almost fell asleep because we were tired from walking all day! I was asleep for a while because I was really not tired at all but I wanted to go to sleep! After that, we were just looking around about the history of Lewis and Clark. I saw Clark’s family tree which was kind of cool that their family’s descendents are still alive!

When we are finished, we went to the shuttle bus to get on the van to go to see Ms. Nutt’s old friends to show us the Column Astoria and Goonies’s house! We have to go to McDonald’s to meet them and I ate crispy chicken sandwich and French fries. I drank vanilla milkshake and it is my favorite kind of milkshake. But I am a little crazy because I will eat the dinner when we get back to WSD! I wouldn’t eat the dinner and I will get a drink. I don’t care about that and I continued to eat my dinner. After that, we went to see the Column Astoria and it have huge height on the top of the Column Astoria which it made me very afraid to look down. In the view, there were two huge rivers: Columbia and Lewis and Clark. Then we went to see the Goonies’s house where the movie took the place. I was really shocked that I did saw the house by a popular movie because it was my first time to see that place. Then, we went to the town dock and saw the sea lions on the dock! We can’t get close to them because they are very dangerous and we took pictures of them! But it was my first time to see the sea lions near me and I almost want to walk down to them and pet them but I can’t. They were relaxing and laying down the dock.

Finally, we went back to WSD and it took us only 1 hour and a half hours. We took advantage of a lot of time to type in our journals about today! When we got there, we ate dinner and I ate one hot dog but I was still thirsty. After that, we still have to type about investigations of Lewis and Clark National Park and it shouldn’t take us for a long time! Have a great time to reading our journals! ?

DAY Five June 25, 2006 On the Road

Today was just a dead day for us all. We all went to sleep past midnight because we had tons of unfinished work to catch up. Some of the kids were still working past midnight last night; I stopped working around midnight because I was really tired and dead so I got into bed earlier than the others. We didn’t have a much of plan today because we all went to Astoria to visit Fort Clatsop. It’s our second time going to Astoria counting our visit to Cannon Beach last Friday as well.

This morning, I woke around seven forty, ten more minutes later than my alarm was supposed to go off. The vibrator wasn’t connected to my alarm and that’s why I overslept. I still didn’t have a good night of sleep but at least I got some sleep. All of us ate some breakfast and packed as usual. About nine o’clock we all left to start off our day by driving to Astoria. On the way to Fort Clatsop, Ms. Zurek said that everybody was dead especially me. I really felt horrible because my eyes were on the verge of shutting into sleep. My brain’s going zzzzzzzzz and stimulating to my eyes to slowly close down. I honestly don’t want to go on this trip because I want to sleep more. It’s even more worse that it’s more than ninety degrees outside and my brain was getting fried from all of this heat and no sleep.

As we arrived at Fort Clatsop’s parking lot, we all waited for the shuttle to come and pick us up. It’s about two or three minutes of a drive to Fort Clatsop’s Visitor Center. We walked to the site of Fort Clatsop throughout the forest. This Fort Clatsop is actually a replica of what the historians and archeologists believe it looks like. We arrived at the site of Fort Clatsop and it wasn’t what I expected because we all know that forts are usually huge and more concealed. Fort Clatsop is actually small and I still cannot believe that thirty-three people were able to live in such cramped space.

We all went inside the fort to listen to a presentation about medicine by a ranger named Henry. Henry will be a senior this fall same as me and he’s a very intelligent person. I was amazed that he knew a lot about the Lewis and Clark expedition. But I am impressed with his knowledge to identify different species of plants or berries and explain how these species were used for medicine. We all followed him into the forest as he described each plant. It was very interesting to see many different kind of plants and berries all around the fort site because I didn’t know that most of these plants were able to help cure something or used for eating. After the walk around the forest, we all asked Henry questions about the Lewis and Clark expedition. We also asked him some personal questions such as what college he wants to go and what he want to major in. He said that he want to attend a college in Washington for two years, then to a college in Michigan then to Harvard in the east.

After talking with this young man, we all went back to the fort site to hear other presentation by a ranger. The ranger described how Lewis, Clark, and the crew had to escape the horror of being killed by a grizzly bear which was believed to be a tough kill. He also explained the importance of being a team because without a team, Lewis and Clark wouldn’t have killed the bear and probably had no dinner. Most of this presentation was about what weapons the men carried through the journey. The ranger also displayed how to shoot a musket and how to load it. The process of loading a musket and firing it is very long. A skilled shooter can shoot three bullets a minute but this ranger only can fire two bullets a minute, far away from being a sharpshooter.
Our day at Fort Clatsop was done as we began to drive to the town of Astoria to meet Ms. Nutt’s friends. We all met her friends at McDonald’s, some kids went to get drink but one boy came back with a dinner meal. He must have been hungry because he said he would still eat dinner when we all came back to WSD. Ms. Nutt’s friends gave us a tour of Astoria. We all went to top of a hill where there is a tower called Astoria Column that overlooks the town of Astoria and the Columbia River meeting the Pacific. It was very cool because we got to go up the tower and see the beauty of the nature. As we got on the top of the tower, the view was just fascinating because you can see three rivers joining to form a bay which blends through with the Pacific. The background of mountains and hills really blended well into the surrounding with these bodies of water. It was cool and a little warm up there and the weather was just perfect for a day of sightseeing. This view is truly one of the most beautiful pieces of artwork that Mother Nature had ever made.

This didn’t make my day but something really made my day as we drove to see the house that was filmed in The Goonies. I was really thrilled to see that house because as I saw that house, I immediately knew that was the house although it looked like it went through a paint job. Unfortunately for us all because we cannot go any near to that house because somebody is still living there and it is against the law to trespass their property but we still got a good picture of the house.

Afterwards, we all went to the Astoria Port to see some sea lions there. We saw three sea lions laying and swimming around the port. I would estimate that we were less than fifty yards away from the seals. It was surprising to see the sea lions here in Oregon because sea lions are well known in California. When we were done with viewing the sea lions, we all went back to WSD. On the way back to the cottages, most of us slept because we’re so tired and so dead especially me because I’m still tired although I had my nap. That rounds up the most of our day. Our dinnertime is approaching so I guess that’s it until tomorrow as we continue our journey to Mt. St. Helens. It’s going be a thrilling day tomorrow. Good night to y’all and don’t let the bed bugs bite y’all.