Thanksgiving and Winter News

I hope everyone had a fun and safe Thanksgiving weekend. I've been hearing rumors about the winter season staff for 2011/2012 and they are going to be great. All returning Mates with lots of combined experience and incredible energy. If you are coming down to spend your vacation in the Keys with them, you're surely in for a treat.

Look forward to a few posts about what you should be bringing to the Brinton Center for your adventure and other information.

New Wilderness First Aid Requirement

If anyone checked out the link to Capt. Willis' blog, Florida Sea Base News, they would have seen that there are new requirements for medical forms and Wilderness First Aid for the 2012 and 2013 seasons, respectively. As of January 1st, 2012, the Florida Sea Base will require a newer, longer medical form for certain programs (mainly scuba). In addition, after January 1st, 2013, there is a new requirement that all staff and one adult leader from each crew attending Sea Base must be Wilderness First Aid certified. I was having a hard time finding an organization that taught WFA courses and didn't look sketchy and like they might steal my money or give me an unsatisfactory education. Personally, I don't mess around and look for the "cheap" option when it comes to CPR/first aid courses. I jumped to the Red Cross site but was having a lot of trouble finding if they actually give the WFA courses or just approved them. When I had all but given up I found the Wilderness Medicine Institute's website (part of NOLS, the National Outdoor Leadership School) and was given direct, informative, fair information on what exactly I was getting. I signed up 2 minutes after finding their page.
NOLS is a leader in outdoor education and their Wilderness Medicine Institute is second to none. Here is the link to the home page about the course: Wilderness First Aid at the WMI/NOLS
And if you like what you read, click the yellow "DATES & LOCATIONS" box under the title and find your state and locations near you easily. Good luck and get trained!

MUNSON!

The Lottery is Over, Your Time Has Come!

According to the official Sea Base website the lottery for 2012 is now over with the "winners" having been notified already. Given that the program season is about to begin with Winter season only a month and a half away, I'm going to try to get back into the swing of posting here about the Brinton Environmental Center, Sea Base in general, traveling to Summerland Key, things to bring for your adventure, what you can expect, and recreation opportunities for before and after your adventure. There are also some very useful skills that the Mates and Captains are always, literally, ecstatic about when a crew shows up and is already familiar with them. I'll be going into detail on those eventually as well.
Another excellent blog (and the model for this particular one) is that of Capt. Steve Willis called Florida Sea Base News. Definitely check it out if you are staff, alumni, looking to get a work at the FSB, or are a participant at one of the Islamorada bases programs.
I also run a personal blog I call Chasing Breezes. It's quite a mish-mash of topics right now, but as I get free time and the weather gets worse I'll be posting more about my experiences in scientific research, sailing, knots, things I find interesting, and probably a lot of things you won't find interesting. I hope you check it out though and feel free to click some of the ads to help me pay for hosting for this site eventually as well as my tuition so I can go on to do great things and not worry (too much) about my debt from school.

It's a Big Blue Ocean out there, come enjoy it with us!