Seniors travel to Catalina Island for a break from studying

Shaye Holladay McCarthy, Magazine Editor|October 12, 2018

Seniors admiring Avalon and its picturesque scenery upon arriving at Catalina.

Waking up as early as 6 a.m. on a weekday isn’t fun to start with, so waking up even earlier on a Saturday wouldn’t seem too pleasant.

Not so for

the senior class of 2019, who arrived at school on Sept. 29 around 7 a.m. to depart for Long Beach before heading out to Catalina Island. The class arrived earlier at the harbor than anticipated, so some students enjoyed a caffeine boost before the Catalina Express arrived to take the group of students to Avalon.

Nearly half of the 225-member senior class attended the Catalina trip. Five chaperones kept an eye on the students and made sure they all made it back to the docks for departure after the long day. The cost for students to attend started began at $70 for the first week of sales, but the price was raised to $80 for students who bought tickets the second week.

No matter what the students did or wanted to do, Catalina was full of activities for students to enjoy. “Well, when we first got into the kayak, I thought it wasn’t going to be a good experience,” said senior Sangam Sharma. “From the getgo, we were sitting in these puddles at the bottom of the kayak, and we were bumping into all these other boats and everything. But then, when we got the hang of it, it was really fun. We ended up getting wet from jumping into the water and our arms were exhausted by the end of the hour, but I don’t regret kayaking.”

Students were also not only limited the activities on the vouchers. They had access to other activities like kayaking and mountain biking.

Shaye Holladay McCarthy
Seniors bid farewell to Catalina Island.

“The activities were fun, they entertained every single person involved in them,” said senior Aigul Nugumanova. “It was nice that minigolf allowed everyone to participate together and created a sense of competition.”

“The Catalina trip was very successful,” said senior Kai Ferragallo-Hawkins. “The only complaints we received was that the trip wasn’t long enough.” Heading back to Long Beach, the energy of the students sitting on the upper deck had hardly dissipated. The seniors who were on the ship’s outside deck cracked jokes, having the time of their lives on the way back in the cold sea breeze.

Inside the cabin was a lot tamer with students playing cards or sitting with their friends and making small talk or catching up on missed sleep from an early morning. “I thought it was really fun to be able to hang out with so many friends from my senior class,” said senior Aren Petrossian. “Before I was worried there wouldn’t be enough time to do all the activities that we wanted to do, but time turned out to be enough.”