The Outdoor Adventure Club took road tripping to a whole new level when they traveled all the way to Crystal River, Fla., to swim with the manatees.
Thirty members went on the trip from Nov. 8-10. They stayed at Peter's Pier, and took a pontoon boat out with a river guide to see the manatees.
"When he would see a manatee he would kind of like pull up to it," said Kelsey Woodworth, senior in public relations and vice president of The Outdoor Adventure Club. "Then we would get in the water and circle around and look for it."
Woodworth, who has been in the club since her freshman year, said they saw approximately 10 manatees in the water.
Grant Dohrenwend, junior in building science, is the event planner for the group. He said he suggested swimming with manatees because he was already familiar with the area.
Woodworth said some members of the group were able to get photographs of the manatees with underwater disposable cameras
"You can hear them munching on the grass," Woodworth said. "They just float; they're really weird. It was cool."
Woodworth said she had never seen a manatee in person before.
"You could reach out and touch them if you wanted to," Woodworth said. "They just ignore you so it's not like we were playing with them."
Dohrenwend said the younger manatees were more interactive than the older ones, but John Young, sophomore in forestry, said one of the older manatees let him swim beside it and pet it's back.
"I was kind of bummed, they weren't the most talkative creatures," Young said. "They just swam away a lot of times."
Dohrenwend said one of his favorite parts of the trip was playing with the baby manatees. After their early morning of playing with manatees, some of the group kayaked at a local spot named Three Sisters Springs.
Woodworth said Three Sisters Springs are natural springs with really blue water and Young said going to the springs was his favorite part of the trip, describing it as surreal.
The group also had time to walk around, view the area and get breakfast at a local restaurant named Mama Sally's.
The manatee excursion was just one of many of the Outdoor Adventure Club's diverse activities throughout the semester.
"We do a lot of different things," Woodworth said. "We go backpacking, white water rafting, rock climbing, skiing, snowboarding (and) sky diving."
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