When we see animals at zoos and marine parks, doing tricks for our enjoyment,
it’s really hard to see them as wild animals.  And even though we are told they are wild animals,
we don’t get a full sense of what that means and we as humans may never be able to. 
This trip has made me understand a little bit of what it means to be wild. 
To see sea lions performing for fish in aquariums and then to see them in the wild,
doing the same thing they have been doing for thousands of years. 
To see sea otters in a tank and then to see them out in the ocean behaving the way they should be behaving. 
We see dolphins and orcas in aquariums but we don’t understand that they are wild animals that have evolved,
fighting to survive.  Even simple things such as waves in the ocean stop being things we can have fun in
but are life sustaining and life taking for many animals.  As human population increases,
 it will be more and more difficult to these animals to stay as wild and untouched as they once were. 
This trip has made me look at a sea gull, an animal I see every day, in a totally different way. 
As it has used the ocean for thousands of years to survive.  Humans with their complex brains
seem to miss out on understanding the simple things, and with that comes a certain knowledge that
we will never know but yet the animals will.  What I’ve gained from this trip is hard to put into words,
but I’m certain it is some of that knowledge that most people can’t begin to understand and will never have a chance to.   

Adele Donahue