The WaterFront Center: May 2011

Exploring Oyster Bay's Estuary - Harbor Habitats

It was a beautiful, warm, sunny day when a group of students from the Centro Cultural Hispano (CCH) of Oyster Bay arrived at the WaterFront Center, ready to dive into a day of educational exploration. Their mission for the day: learn about the local sea creatures, and even try to catch some. The students were eager to get their feet wet – literally – and headed over to Beekman Beach to begin their adventure.

Under the guidance of instructors Dan, Joanne, and Karin, the students took turns at three stations. Dan taught the students about saning, a method of capturing critters in which you drag a large net through the water. The students were fascinated by the jellyfish, shrimp, and small fish that they found in the net, and examined them more closely with the help of their educator. The students then headed over to the river, and learned about the American Eel, which swims up the river during high tide to lay their eggs in fresh water and then swims back out to the ocean.The goal
was to catch some of these mother eels, as they made their way

back to the salt water, by using a small net, a dip net, and planting it
downstream.

The students had a blast wading through the river in the hopes of catching something, and worked together to identify what they had found. Finally, they headed to the touch tank, where their instructor, Joanne, taugh them about clams, oysters, and many other animals. The group was most excited, however, to get a chance to hold them, and examine the animals more closely. The students left the Waterfront Center with a new-found knowledge and appreciation for the many interesting creatures that live beneath the waters of Oyster Bay, and a new appetite for discovering the ocean’s many mysteries!

WFC Blogger/Editor

As the WFC receives more visitors each year and more people become increasingly interested in all we do; we decided it would be a good idea to keep people informed about what is going on and how people spend some time at the WFC. Needless to say, we like keeping people informed. As a result we began a search for a blogger/editor to cover all the action happening during the summer months.Be sure to be on the look out for feature stories about our instructors, junior program participants, people taking cruises, people chartering Andiamo and our Sonars for regattas, kayak and SUP adventures and everything in between! We hope you can keep up with all the action!

Our search ended when we found Marina Carlson, an energetic sailor who grew up in Massachusetts and she was hired as the WFC's Social Media and Editor for the summer. After completing her junior year of college at St. Mary’s College of Maryland, Marina packed up her things and headed directly to the WFC to get started covering all the action! At St. Mary's her studies focus on French and Spanish where she is earning a minor in each. Marina spent her most recent fall semester studying abroad in France where she studied political science and history, refined her French and all the while kept an active blog of her travels and experiences. As a result of her trip and studies she is fluent in both Spanish and French, a seasoned traveler and has experience running her own blog and writing creative stories.

Last summer Marina was a sailing instructor at Tabor Academy in Marion, Mass. There she spent the last two summers coaching kids of all ages, but mostly younger children, in Optimists. She is a member of St. Mary’s Varsity Sailing team which is a nationally ranked and very accomplished team. Marina is also a member of her school's Dance Club where she organizes multiple dance performances a year and choreographs many of the pieces! Her aspiration after college is to be hired in the field of social media. With all her experience in sailing and her thirst for adventure we thought she would be a perfect fit at the WFC this summer where she can combine two things she enjoys and loves while learning all about our estuary and all the critters that call it home.

If someone comes up to you asking questions about your kayak or sailboat rental or following your school or camp group around it's probably going to be Marina giving everyone the inside scoop about all the fun that is happening!

Welcome aboard Marina!

High School Sailing Spring Fling

Twenty Two High School Sailors came out to compete in our Spring Fling Regatta on May 22. The weather was iffy, but our now High School Sailing veterans were ready for anything. The morning was spent waiting for the wind to decide what to do, north, south, north east, south east; it couldn't quite make up its mind. But when it finally settled in the racing was solid and the competition tight. We were able to get in five short races before the day was over and everyone was able to learn quite a bit about upwind and downwind tactics, starts, rules, mark roundings and everything in between. We used the regatta as a tune up and coaching opportunity for our newer sailors to get a better grasp on how sailing regattas go down and in preparation for our Spring Championship Regatta held on Bay Day, June 5th from 11am to 3pm.

As the season winds down we are excited about all the leaps and bounds the sailors coming to practice have made and we are excited about the Fall Season as we look ahead with strong teams and leaders taking the reins of what is going to be a very busy fall High School Sailing season. Great job everyone; see you out on the water!

Number One Pearl of Oyster Bay

The WaterFront Center and Oakcliff Sailing Center were voted as the number one Pearls in Oyster Bay.

Artist Jerelyn Hanrahan and the Chamber of Commerce's Tracy Dellomo congratulated the WaterFront Center and Oaklcliff Sailing Center on being named as the number one Pearl of Oyster Bay. The Pearl signifies parts of the community people feel most attached to or would miss the most if they were to move to a different location. We are ecstatic about the impact we have made over the first ten years of our operation and look forward to making an even larger and dramtatic impact as we move forward serving the community and surrounding areas with all the activities and programs we have become known for.

Artist Jerelyn Hanrahan has designed a public sculpture which will be placed at Theodore Roosevelt Park. It will consist of different sized pearls laid out as a necklace almost 40 feet long. The project is still looking for donations and hopes to have the pearl necklace laid down shortly. For more information or to donate please call Ellen at 516 922 2479

.

Bay Day!

Register for our Anything that Floats Race by Printing out the forms and sending them in. Forms can be found online by clicking HERE.

Christeen Launch Video

First Sail!

On a beautiful Monday afternoon, with breeze of 15 to 20 knots. Christeen took her first sail since her major repair. Shiprwirghts, volunteers and Christeen's mainstay captain were all able to enjoy the ideal conditions. They took it easy on the old girl by putting in a reef, with a full season ahead it's nice to cut her a few breaks every once and a while, as she would have had no problem handling these conditions under full sail.