09 Jun This is just the Beginning

I have almost completed my first week here at Fire Island National Seashore. I started the Sunday after my birthday, and I was more excited about the internship than I was celebrating turning 23. These first couple of days have been a little slow but full of information. On my first day I visited the William Floyd Estate. William Floyd was one of the signers of the Declaration of Independence. It was my first time at this site, and walking through the building was like walking through a time machine into the past. The house had been passed down through eight generations, and was later donated to the National Park Service by the family. The house initially consisted of six rooms and today it has 25. The furniture in the house was beautiful. My favorite part of the house was all of the books! It’s fascinating to think that someone from a different time period actually held and read them. The house is an amazing piece of American history on Long Island.

On my second and third days I went to Sailors Haven Sunken Forest. I had only been to the Sunken Forest once prior to my internship, so there is a lot to learn about it! Several schools and groups go on field trips to the Sunken Forest. I observed the rangers as they gave the classes an orientation. The orientation consists of some safety rules and informs the students and parents that they are at a national park. The goal is to be able to do an orientation myself. Every ranger has so much information to share! I really enjoyed hearing what they had to say about the forest and other parts of Fire Island. Everyone taught me something new and they showed me that each person has their own way of interpreting information to the public. I am looking forward to learning more about the birds, as I had no clue that there was such a large variety in our area. I also saw a fawn for the first time; it was so cute! Although things started off slow I know the pace will pick up quickly. This weekend we have a lot of activities going on and I will be all over the place. Hopefully I can get some pictures for the next blog. ¡Hasta luego!