Freshman Retreat: Free Post

My first reaction to figuring out that we had a freshman retreat and that we would be working all day was not a good one. How were we supposed to bond if we were planting trees and plants the entire day. When I should up to school on Friday it was freezing. At least I was prepared I wore my sweatpants over my nikes and brought a light jacket. To be honest I wasn't extremely thrilled with the fact we would be with our advisories the entire day; since we were going to be stuck with our advisories the next four years of high school anyway. The bus ride to Greenwood Park was not pleasant, there weren't enough seats on the bus so we had to triple. It was a good thing I wasn't on the aisle otherwise I would be halfway on the seat and gripping on tightly so I wouldn't slide off.

When we got to park my advisory joined with other advisories and we got started on making our own nature trail. We had to cut down small trees, trim excess branches, and rake the pathway. It was actually kind of fun, but I think I probably did a lot more talking than work. Surprisingly I wasn't a fan of the activity most people enjoyed...canoeing. Our job in the canoe was to paddle to the banks of the lake and pick up the trash. No one in our canoe was that experience and we really didn't know where we were headed. Well for starters we couldn't see that much trash, but after about 15 minutes I spotted a beer can floating in the lake. The can was stuck behind some big branches and we didn't want to risk getting stuck, so we moved on. While paddling we were headed toward this weird mushroom- like floating plant, and I thought it was a turtle so a screamed stop we're going to run over a turtle. Of course it wasn't a turtle just a piece of floating algae. Then, we realized we should come back to shore with at least on piece of trash so we turned around, but someone had already retrieved our can. So we paddled until I saw another can. As we were paddling to approach the can we ran straight into the tree branches and they flew towards my face. I wanted to lean out of the way, but that risked flipping over, so i resisted. As Alissa reached for the Sprite can with her alligator clippers a flying fish jumped out of the water. Alissa and I totally freaked and screamed. Everyone near us gave us strange looks. One guy was like it is a lake there are going to be fish. The can of Sprite bobbed up and down in the water. Alissa attempted again to retrieve the can but failed as she was lifting it out of the water. The can dropped down and we had lost the can. Annie was like come on guys we're not going to find it; but I said we had to come back with at least one piece of trash. Well we never found the can and once we reached the shore we sprinted to the trash can so no one could tell we didn't have any trash. Long story short, the retreat was definitely not what I expected.