Field Trip Friday: Niña and Pinta

I was excited to learn that replica’s of the Niña and Pinta would not only be making a stop in Huntsville, Alabama, but that they’d be docking not even 15 minutes from our home. One of our all time favorite field trips was to see the replica of the Santa Maria in downtown Columbus, Ohio. The kids were much younger on that trip and we’d just wrapped up a unit study on Explorers. Our tour guide was amazing and we had the ship all to ourselves. What a perfect outing! When I found out we’d have the opportunity to visit Columbus’ companion ships, I couldn’t wait! 

Arriving at the dock, we were surprised to find that both the Niña and Pinta were smaller than we imagined they would be. After spending a few days on a rocky cruise ship, I couldn’t imagine sailing across the ocean in the boats that were on the water before us.         

The Niña and Pinta are both caravels, a type of cargo ship commonly used during the Age of Discovery when Explorers roamed the seas.   These two great replicas of Columbus’ ships were constructed in Brazil under the direction of an American engineer and maritime historian, John Patrick Sarsfield. The ships are both historically accurate replicas of a 15th Century Caravel, built using techniques dating back to the same time period. 

The Niña

The Pinta

Since both of these ships are both sailing vessels we were warned before boarding that we were not to untie any of the ropes. We could look at them, touch them, photograph them but under no circumstances were we to untie them. Ropes were everywhere!

The boats were also painted black to represent the icky, sticky pine tar that would have been used to preserve the wood on the boats.

We also found it interesting that the ships had square sails rather than triangular ones to catch the trade winds.    

 

Today these ships spend warm weather traversing the rivers and lakes of the Western Hemisphere offering tours to the public as the ships dock in various locations. The crew members volunteer and we found it extremely interesting that our tour guide had just joined the crew three weeks earlier in Kentucky while vacationing with his family. He saw the Crew Wanted sign and away he sailed. He hasn’t been home since and will spend the winter in Mexico while the ship is dry docked for repairs. Now that really is an adventure, isn’t it? 

You can find a schedule for the ships here and if you are lucky enough to have the dock in a marina near you, check out this easy Ships in a Bottle tutorial at Noggins and Nonsense. It would make a fabulous follow-up activity that your younger students will enjoy.  

Have a field trip that you’d like to share? We’re all ears, so please do. It’s really simple. Just link up with Linky Tools. It’s not necessary, but I would be grateful if you included a link back to my site so more people can learn about Field Trip Friday. Don’t forget to stop back next week for more Field Trip Friday fun! Until next week~ Happy Field Trippin’!

Field Trip Friday: Exploring with Friends

Like much of the country, it has been so hot here in Alabama that honestly, I’ve had a really hard time coercing encouraging my kids that they want to leave the comfort of our air conditioned HOME- note I did not say RV- and head out to our non-air conditioned van for a field trip. 

That changed last week when we had some special friends from Ohio visit us. Suddenly I wasn’t just field trip coordinator for my family but also tour guide for our friends, Tours by Tonya- what da ya think? Kinda catchy, huh?

We drove through downtown Huntsville, through the historic Twickenham District and past the oldest operating hardware store in the state of Alabama before stopping at Big Spring Park. 

I love this part of the park because though it’s right in the middle of downtown, across from the art museum and beside the Y, it doesn’t feel like it. It’s not crowded it’s so peaceful. We love to stroll along the path that runs along the waterway that was once a canal used to transport cotton.

I promised the kids that we wouldn’t stick around long and though they had grumbled (yes, that does happen on occasion)  a bit on the drive, they really enjoyed being outdoors and acting silly. 

Of course since they are teenagers, what do you think they really like to do? For one, they like to eat. So, we stopped by Krispy Kreme because the store here is really cool . You get to watch the employees make the donuts and sometimes they even pull your order right off the conveyor belt, warm and fresh. Sounds lovely, but we’ve discovered that when it comes to creme filled donuts, it’s not quite as messy to eat them if they aren’t quite as fresh.  

If you know teenagers, you’ll also know that many like to go to the mall. We have three near us and though we typically don’t buy anything at the mall unless it’s a great deal, they really do like to go and have a look around. So we went and had fun and did manage to find a Star Wars t-shirt for my son’s birthday, who just turned 17. 

We also went on a few walks at  several different places. One of our favorite places to hike is Madison County Nature Trail on Green Mountain. It’s an easy walk along a wooded trail that circles a lake and crosses through a covered bridge.

We also went for a quick walk at the nearby marina, Ditto Landing.  I’ve not been to the marina before so I wasn’t really sure what there was to do other than the obvious, boating.  There is a nice walkway along the Tennessee River that doesn’t take much time but we were hoping to find more trails. We did discover a bike trail, but once again, it was so HOT that we chose to hop in the van and head home. It will probably be the perfect spot to ride our bikes this fall though, so I’ll have to keep this locale in mind for later.                                           

We had planned to take our guests to Nashville to visit the Parthenon and eat at the Rainforest Cafe at Opry Mills but alas, the mall has not reopened since the flood several months ago. Instead we dropped the boys off at Gandert Mountain while the girls shopped at the thrift store for the tackiest clothes they could find. They ended up with cute instead of tacky, but tell that to the Walmart shoppers that seemed to find them amusing.  

This was all fun but the highlight of the trip was when we drove to Bankhead National Forest so we could hike 1 1/2 miles to Caney Falls to introduce our friends to swimming Alabama style. Doesn’t this look incredible?  I’d taken the boys to this exact spot last year when they visited us from Ohio and they decided that every time they visit we’ll have to go back. What can I say? It’s sure to be a tradition.

Thanks for stopping by Field Trip Friday for a slightly different version this week. I hope you’ll consider linking up your own outings. If you do, I’d be grateful if you’d help me spread the word about Field Trip Friday by linking back here. If you’d like to find out where we’ve been on some of our other outings, you can do that here.