Once a week I go to Riekes, which is a nature program where you go out into Huddart Park and experience nature, hike, learn plant identification and climb trees. It’s really fun. There are about 15 people in my Monday Kestrels group. We learn techniques for whittling, stealth, and tree climbing. Read more here!

UPDATE: I am now Tree-Certified!   — Dec. 11, 2017

This past week in Riekes I completed four tree-climbing challenges, was able to tell 20 dead branches and 20 live branches, and climbed four different trees. One of the tree-climbing challenges that I had to do was walk along a 15 foot tree that had fallen down with my eyes closed. It was really hard!

That means I’m Tree-Certified! Tree-Certified means that you can climb trees without an instructor watching you. The final tree I had to climb was a redwood that had a few branches on the bottom. Redwood trees usually don’t have branches near the base. When I got into the middle section of the tree, I crawled along a branch that ended next to a taller redwood that had no branches on the bottom. I quickly transferred trees and started climbing up the taller one. I was so high up that I could barely see the ground from the branch I was on because of the lower branches. Redwoods are harder to climb in general because their bark is scratchy and a lot of the branches are thin.