Thank You!

It was a fantastic educational journey!

To our sponsors, TFE, LUNAR pharmaceuticals, PLEASE, AGS frasers,MOL and PHARMAKINA, we are grateful for your support!

Our thanks also go to Dr Lorien Pichegru for the knowledge shared with us!

ALGOA BAY JOURNAL: Day 4

Thursday morning, we woke up at quarter past seven and we had our breakfast at quarter to eight. After that, we headed straight to ‘Cape Recife’, a national reserve. We had a lot of fun there searching for animals (in the intertidal zone), under all the rocks that we had to gently lift and put back as they were. We saw many starfishes, seaweeds, two common octopuses and other species, some quite rare like peanut worms. Lorien Pichegru, the scientist, was also there to give us information about these sea animals.

Common Octopus

Ophiure

 Some of us had big cameras for the photo contest, while others had smaller cameras to take pictures of what we found.

Later on, we took the bus again to go to Sardinia Bay. This bay has huge dunes and an incredible landscape. 

Sardinia Bay

We had the big cameras once more but this time, we took turns so everyone got a chance to take nice photos of the beautiful spot where we were. We got to swim in the warm water and do some snorkeling. We saw some fishes, seaweeds and others.

After having lunch and spending some time playing in the dunes, we had a great lesson on the beach. Lorien explained us some important facts about fishing and overfishing and the consequences it has on many species. We learned a lot. Then, some of us got to interview a calamari fisherman for our article for the school’s webradio. We also studied the plants and animals that we found and the way they survived in the sand.

At the end of the afternoon, we went to Boardwalk mall to do a treasure hunt our teachers had organized. We had to find special places in the mall and take a picture of them. To find those places, we had to ask people in the mall if they knew where each place was. It was great fun !

Finally, we went back to the resort and after dinner we played a scary game ‘Le Loup Garou’ (The werewolf) in French. We all laughed a lot.

It was a really fun and educational day.

By Erika and Ofure

Algoa Bay Journal: Day 3

On Wednesday, we woke up at 6 o’clock in the morning. At 6:30, we had breakfast. Then, we went to Addo Elephant Park. The drive took about one hour.

This park is the third biggest park in South Africa. Guide from the park showed us some animals such as elephants, kudus, warthogs and others. We came back to see the museum at the reception and we spent some time at the bird’s hide. We had a great time watching the animals and taking pictures of them. We had lunch at quarter to one.

Later, we headed to Swartkop’s estuary to meet a lady, Jenny Rump from an NGO, Zwartkops Conservancy.

Jenny Rump, Zwartkops Conservancy

She explained us how important the estuary is for many species, what kind of species live there and how pollution is affecting the estuary and the oceans. It was very shocking to see all those plastic bottles and other waste polluting this beautiful and essential area for the oceans’ diversity but, it was interesting at the same time. 

We came back to the resort at 5:35 pm. We had one hour to rest.

We ate dinner at 6:30 then, we went to our rooms and spent some time chatting with our classmates. We finally went to sleep at 9:30.

By Paul and Danaïs

Acidification des océans

Aujourd’hui, mardi 10 novembre, nous avons fait une expérience à propos des conséquences de l’acidification des océans.

On a appris qu’il existe plusieurs types de liquides : acides, basiques ou neutres.

On a ensuite pris une petite quantité d’eau de mer dans un bécher dans lequel on a incorporé quelques gouttes de BBT (bleu de bromothymol), et on a mélangé : l’eau est bleue. En ajoutant à ce mélange quelques gouttes d’acide chlorhydrique, l’eau change de couleur et devient jaune. On ajoute plus d’acide chlorhydrique et l’eau devient rouge : elle devient donc très acide.

Le BBT devient rouge

Dans la deuxième expérience, on a pris un peu d’eau de mer, on y a incorporé à nouveau quelques gouttes de BBT, puis un camarade a soufflé dans la paille : l’eau bleue devient jaune-vert. On a donc conclut que l’eau de mer devient acide en rejetant du dioxyde de carbone par une paille. Donc le dioxyde de carbone rejeté en surplus par les activités humaines (pollutions) acidifie l’eau de mer.

Enfin, on a pris une roche de calcaire et nous y avons déposé quelques gouttes d’acide chlorhydrique : le calcaire a été dissous par l’acide.

En conclusion : Si nous rejetons trop de dioxyde de carbone dans les océans, celui-ci s’acidifie et cela détruit le squelette calcaire des animaux marins.

Danielle et Janina

Algoa Bay Journal: Day 2

On Tuesday, we woke up at 6am and had breakfast at 7. Then, we took the bus to go to the harbor where we met Lorien Pichegru who is a specialist of Penguins. We set off for St Croix Island with Raggy Charters.

Raggy Charters boat cruise

 On the way, we saw a mother and a baby humpback whale, it was so cute. They were jumping around the boat and they came very close to us. It was awesome!

Humpback Whale

 Then, we saw the African Penguins on the island f St Croix. They were so many! 22 000 penguins on a rocky island it’s quite impressive. She explained that the numbers have been decreasing for the last decade due to overfishing.

St Croix

On the way back, we saw a pod of dolphins. They came very close and they kept on jumping around us. It was amazing! There were even some very little ones!

When we came back to the harbor, we had a picnic and then we went to Samrec, a rehabilitation facility for marine birds. There, we met a volunteer who explained us how they helped penguins, cormorants and Cape gannets. He also taught us how important penguins are for the wild life and the biodiversity of Algoa Bay. It was very interesting, particularly the feeding of the birds.

Feeding of the penguins

Then Lorien explained why Algoa Bay was chosen as a Hope Spot: Algoa Bay hosts a unique ecosystem where a large number of marine species can be found. The concept of Hope Spot is to get people to involve in activities around the ocean in order to restore or maintain the ocean’s health. She asked us to: talk about the protection of the ocean as often as possible, to not throw plastics, and to ask our parents to buy fishes according to the SASSI list (http://wwfsassi.co.za/sassi-list/).

Dr Lorien Pichegru

Finally, we went back to the resort to do an experiment on the acidification of the oceans (see next post). We learnt a lot of things. We ended the day by having dinner and having some fun outside by the beach. We went to bed quite early, some of us were exhausted!

By Hugo and Vincent