Location: Devil's Island
The long-awaited Challenge Course Day has finally come and gone, and everyone had a blast! Between the glitter, colorful sunscreen, and the pink, green, and blue accessories everywhere, I think well be reliving this day for a few more to come (especially with the sheer amount of glitter used on Grants head to create an avatar arrow)!
The students found out about the challenge course as part of their leadership class long before Emma told them about it, but they still had no idea what to expect, especially because even though some of them had seen videos and photos from previous ones, most had not been from Devils Island – one of the most peculiar places I have ever been.
We dropped anchor early in the morning and the three islands ahead of us looked like they were straight out of one of the reality TV shows like survivor or naked and afraid – small islands packed with super dense foliage and an eerie vibe going on. The rumors go something along the lines of political prisoners being brought here with no way of escaping through the shark-infested waters (literally) or heavy currents, then tortured.terrible. The waters were also incredibly shark-infested because all of the scraps from the slaughterhouse would go straight into the sea, attracting a healthy and hungry population of some of the worlds biggest, scariest sharks.
Anyways, with 70 years since the end of all of that, the island proved to be super interesting to explore and a fun place to put the crew’s leadership skills to the test. The students were split into 3 teams: Green (Vittoria, Camilla amd Hannah Y), Pink (Hannah k, Alexa, Erin, Nashota) and Blue (Grant, Reed, Henry). Trees were climbed, structures were built, courses were obstacled, and so much more. The biggest debate of the day came from the string-tying challenge, where green tied the highest string after Nashota climbed all the way to the top of the tree (pictured above), but then blue went back after all teams completed the challenge and bested green’s height. Blue swears that this was a fair tactic and they were just using the advantage everyone else had from the start, but no one else is convinced.
I thought the fort building was especially impressive. Blue used sturdy palm leaves to create a base where shelter could be built on top, the pink team used their surroundings to their advantage, tucking into the bushes and creating a shelter around that, where green was extra crafty, weaving palm leaves together to create a rain-proof roof. Apparently, they had a deep conversation about all things life while building the shelter. How fun!
The day finished off with a bit more island exploration and so many photos of the peacocks, capybaras (or something similar), and tiny monkeys (which I find terrifying). The winner of the challenge course is up for a little bit of debate, so youll have to ask who you know about who really took the crown!