Amazin' Trips

by ~Dr3@m$~

In my past three years, my middle school years (6th-8th grades), I’ve gone on multiple trips (with classes from school), but I’m going to talk about two, plus trips that have happened with band. The trips have showed me…how fun, educating, and interesting it can be to go on trips with classes and friends.

Point Bonita was very pretty indeed. We were there for three days, a Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday. We went when I was in 6th grade. Once you’re there it seems like you’re so far away from the city, but really you’re not too far away at all. We stayed in these two buildings, the boys in one, the girls in the other. There were multiple schools there. The buildings had separate rooms; some rooms had about four beds, bunks. I’m pretty sure there was a building to eat in, and when we were done eating, if there were leftovers, then we had to put the food into like buckets I think, to compost it. We had to wake up fairly early and go to bed at a reasonable time. To get there we rode in people’s cars, we had to get to school early, I think before 7:45am but that’s just a guess. Don’t expect me to remember everything, it was two years ago.

I remember that we hiked/walked to a part that had a pretty high cliff/drop off, the person my group had had us link arms and walk slowly, not go too close, but to look over the edge of the cliff. It was kind of scary, but fun. We, well I, saw a few deer one day pretty close by. I like deer, they’re cute/pretty. I also slightly remember a small part of a day, we had went to a spot to sit in a circle, then we got read a story by Dr. Seuss. After the story was finished we all wrote on the back of a pretty postcard like a vow or promise of something we would do differently to help the environment. I think I wrote that I would turn off the lights when I leave the room. I also remember one thing that I’m sorry I did when we were on our free time, I accidentally poked my good friend in the eye and a blood vessel had popped. Then one night some of the girls (from our school) went into the room with the women chaperones and played some M.A.S.H., I don’t remember how to play, but I want to know again, it was fun even if it was parents and the school counselor. Well, if I’m going to write about any other trips then I should.

So, in 7th grade I went to Yosemite with some 7th graders and some 8th graders and some teachers and parents. To get the money to go to Yosemite we went on a hike-a-thon one day after school, we got sponsors to give us money, I think we had a few bake sales too, and our parents paid some too. We stayed there for a week. Even if we went on few hour hikes every day, I thought it was very fun and worth the time and energy. We went during the last few days of March and the first few days of April, and there was snow on the ground still. We had to get to the train station early, at 6:30am on Saturday, but I think the train got there at 7:30am. After the train ride a bus came to the station and we all had gotten on that for a few hours. Even if we were probably all tired on the bus, it was fun anyway.

We ended up staying in cabins with heaters and nice beds. There was a dinning hall, nice enough bathrooms, a building where we went to watch something, a museum with a store, a store, food places, main building, etc. I don’t remember what time we got there. We had to get up, out of bed, dressed, and out of the cabin by 7, I’m pretty sure, to get breakfast. It is so pretty at Yosemite, we stayed at Curry Village. My group leader person’s name was Mindy, and we also had Mr. Finch help. We had to come up with a name for our group so we came up with “power puff people” (PPP), our group even has ‘gang/group’ sign. Now Mr. Finch and I have a handshake thing for it. Some of the hikes had some really steep parts, but we lasted. We went on hikes to waterfalls, the view, just to hike, and just see the sights that were there. Our groups even got to touch the bottom of “El Capitan”. We had one snowball fight with everyone, and then part of my group had our own secret snowball fight. At the secret one my pants got soaked, my face pegged a few times by Mr. Finch, but it was also fun anyway. On our free time we mostly stayed by our cabins, we hung out and talked and played. We didn’t eat lunch in the dinning hall, we ate it on the hike. On the last day or second to last or something like that at least my group wrote letters about our week. Mine was amazing and very well done, Mr. Finch really liked it too and I wanted it back after but a week later Mr. Finch’s car got broken into and random stuff got taken including the letters. Which really sucks but it happened anyway. I wish I could write more about my week there, but I need to finish up and I still have more to say.

Alrighty, so band…I have been playing clarinet since fourth grade, and I started playing tenor sax in 7th grade on top of clarinet. I play tenor especially for jazz things. This band that we have right now with Mrs. Briggs as the teacher started when I was in 5th grade. It started at about 6-8 students and grew to, now, a hundred and something students. Our band has gone on, I’ll just say many, trips. We have gone to contests, other concerts, and Great America, etc. We’ve played at assemblies, graduations/promotions, for street fairs, CMS Spring Flings, and contests. We have won 7 trophies in total between the orchestra and symphonic band. So, I have learned that hanging out with friends, going on trips with classes at school can be super fun, exciting, interesting, and educational. I hope in high school I can go on more school trips.