Wednesday afternoon, I was just standing around in the classroom across from mine, chatting with our science teacher. In the middle of telling each other how the school day went, one of the school’s paraprofessionals interuppted us, “Look, there’s a musk ox!”
“Where?” we said as we looked out the window.
“Right there,” he said as he pointed toward the beach.
After a moment of searching we could clearly see them. Yes, there were definitely some musk ox, and they were only a half mile away from the school!
“Well, what are you waiting for?” our science teacher asked as he put on his coat and dug his camera out, “Let’s go see them!”
A few minutes later, we were standing just a few hundred feet away from one of the world’s more unusual animals. As we snapped pictures we reflected on what a once in a lifetime opportunity this was.
I asked our science teacher, “Can you imagine anywhere else in the world where you could leave your classroom and five minutes later be next to something like a musk ox?”
“Well, where I’m from you can leave the classroom and see cows, but this sure as heck beats that,” our science teacher observed.
Such a cool thing. Can we see Koyuk photos instead of the national geographic version?