Early Sunday morning, 26 March was a busy time at school. Not only were the Kapahaka students still there, but also the 2 Biology students descended on the school to pack and board the buses to Temple Basin for a three day field trip.

On this trip, students learnt about the distribution patterns of plants along a gradient as we walked from the car park at 990m up to the ski field buildings at 1200m, followed by another climb the following day to Bill’s Basin at about 1700m. 

The weather was very damp and occasionally windy. This gave everyone good idea about just how tough the conditions in the mountains could be. 

Not surprisingly, as we walked up, the plants were smaller, and we were starting to see some clear adaptations to the harsh climate they have to survive. 

Some of us were brave enough to try a dip in the tarn, which was ice cold, before we walked down again to the warmth and shelter of the ski lodge. 

That night, students drew up the graphs showing the distribution pattern we found and the following day they wrote their explanation for the patterns they observed, before walking down to the bus.