For this assignment, we took the traditional, "What did you do on your summer vacation?" and turned it into a twist of adventure! This could be a mystery, a tall tale, or even a journal entry. See if you can see where non-fiction becomes fiction as you read these samples!
Every year, my school partners with a volunteer organization to send about half the class to Costa Rica. The trip is mainly volunteer work on a farm in a small town, but the other half we get to surf and swim. We were looking forward to this trip all year. How could we have known that it would turn out to be this dangerous?
This year we would have a total of fourteen students traveling to Costa Rica from seventh grade. We all took a red eye flight from SFO airport to weird smelling LAX, stopping for dinner, then continuing on to SJO. After not sleeping a wink on the plane, (miraculously my friend was able to doze off), we arrived in Costa Rica, exhausted and hungry. We took a shuttle to get breakfast and sightsee, on zero hours of sleep, and finally went to the lodge. We settled in, and quickly went to the restaurant to eat food and journal. Then we went back to our tent/cabin hybrids and with that, the first day in Costa Rica was over.
In the morning, we were woken up by Brian, the lead volunteer. “GOOD MORNING!” he yelled at 6:00 am as he rang the bell by our tent. We sleepily got dressed and headed over to the restaurant, seeing a truck parked outside, though at the time, I didn’t think anything of it. Jonathan, another volunteer, greeted us, way too cheerful than was probably humanly possible at this hour, and we ate breakfast.
Afterwards, we were confused by the noticeable lack of buses. How in the world would we get to the work site if there was no mode of transportation? Then Jonathan pulled a step out of the back of the truck we had noticed earlier and said, “Come on! This is how we’ll travel.”
We stood around, perplexed. How could fourteen people fit in the flatbed of a truck? Somehow, we all clambered into the back. It was a tight squeeze, but we made it. We were instructed to stand and hold on. The truck had a tarp over a metal cage. Brian started the engine and backed out, then drove out onto the road. The drive itself was rather bumpy, though in a normal car it would have been fine. However, the problem here was just that. Remember this, we were NOT in a normal car; we were standing in the bed of a truck, getting bounced around, bruised, and hitting our heads, because in addition to being metal, the very same bars we were holding on to were too low for us to stand up straight, so we had to brace ourselves against the bars, or against the truck wall. On the drive, we passed an eerie cross with a dove on it, at a hairpin turn. I shuddered to think about why that had been there.
After getting violently tossed around in the back of the truck for a while, we arrived at the volunteer site. It was on a steep hillside, so steep that you could be one misstep from tumbling all the way down at any moment. Our job on these precarious hills was to tend to the baby trees that would later shade the plants. We went out onto the hillside, clutching shovels and bags of leaves that we gathered ourselves the other day in a forest that would serve as fertilizer, and cardboard to keep the grass down.
Two unfortunate things happened that made us question our luck. First, a GIANT spider lept on my friend, freaking us out, and someone somehow managed to throw it into the grass. The leaves had been collected from a rainforest, so it wasn’t too strange to find a spider. We were spooked but alright. Then when walking to the site again, someone dropped a bag of leaves down the hill! And it was just so annoying, but I could only laugh, because of all the places to drop something this was one of the most annoying; down a steep hill. But it just rolled, and rolled and rolled. Someone in our group had to trek down and get it, but half the leaves had come out.
At this point, we were exhausted, but it started raining, no joke. We hiked back to the fondly named, “The Battle Bus” and got in entirely soaked. We bounced around inside on our way back, but it got so wet on the road, we started to hydroplane! We slipped off the main road, and bumped our way down the hill! We stopped at a lower road unscathed, well, as unscathed as you can get from riding in “The Battle Bus!”
We were all safe, so we drove back (at a considerably slower speed), to the lodge, and tried to relax, though it didn’t work out that well. I don’t think any of us slept that night, but it was definitely a memorable part of the trip.
A Surfing Adventure
By: Kyle (8th grade)
“I’m not sure about surfing…” I complain to my parents on the drive to the beach, “I could fall off get hit in the head with the board then get knocked out then drown and die. OR I could fall off and then some sort of unknown creature will attack and kill me. You really wouldn’t want that to happen would you?” I get no response, so I repeat. ”You wouldn’t let me die, would you Mom? Would you?”
“Of course not,” my mom finally replies. However, she doesn’t seem overly confident on this point.
My parents and I arrive at the beach. I walk to the edge of the beach and look at the water. It’s very clear. I grab a couple smooth rocks. I attempt to skip them. Because I'm not too good, I get one skip before the rock splashes and sinks. The second attempt I don't get any skips. Near the beach, the water is not too rough but not too gentle either, for if it were, I wouldn’t be able to surf.
We meet my instructor, Lance, and he proceeds to teach me how to surf. “First, you lay on your stomach. Your feet, two inches from the back of the board. Then you paddle. Once you catch the wave, you arch your back for two seconds. You bring both your feet beneath your chest. After that you bring your right foot a bit farther forward. Then twist and stand. And you surf! (With shakas for good luck.)”
After that he takes a velcro anklet and attaches it to my right leg. The anklet is attached to a long elastic cord, which in turn, is attached to the back of the surfboard.
We carry the blue surfboards to the water, lay down on them, and paddle. We paddle out to sea and wait for a wave. It takes a while but eventually, a wave comes. The wave isn’t too big, maybe 2 feet, but it’s my first time, so I am glad for the small stature of the wave.
I start paddling and the wave pushes me. I arch my back and pull my legs forward. I stand up with shakas for good luck. The wave crests behind me, white water at the top. The breeze brushes my face. The wind blows loudly in my ears. “This is amazing!” I think.
Out of my peripheral vision, I see a long black silhouette swimming beneath my board. I get close to the shore and lay back down on the board to start paddling, more than slightly worried about the shape I saw.
I paddle back out to sea, and get ready for the next wave. When it comes, I arch my back again, then I stand up. But instead of surfing, I fall off with a splash! The water feels very cold, and I frantically swim back to my surfboard, afraid of the same shadowy figure, which has now started to loosely circle my body. I scramble back onto my board, trembling with both fear and from the cold.
All goes well for a while, and I even wipe out a few times. But every time I surf, I see the same black shape swimming near me.
I paddle out to sea to surf again. When the wave comes, I stand up to surf, and I catch it. For some reason, I don’t see the black shape. “Good thing it left me alone,” I think. “It was very scary.”
While I’m enjoying my new surfing experience, something hard smacks the bottom of the board with a loud “Thump.” I get tossed violently off the board five feet into the air, and the board flies into the air even higher! And then, a huge sea serpent launches itself out of the water.
The sea serpent is huge! It is about three stories tall, with a thick body. The sea serpent has beautiful glistening blue scales, the color of the deep blue ocean.. It has a sharp-angled head with slanted eyes. Its fangs are long and sharp, and its tongue, forked. As quickly as it appeared, it dived back into the water.
The serpent severed my anklet, the only thing keeping next to the board. It wrapped its slimy body around mine and pulled me under. I squirmed and kicked and flailed, but the serpent held on, tighter than ever. My arms finally got some leverage, and I pushed as hard as I could. I moved a tiny bit. Then, I kicked the serpent hard in the belly, which caused it to finally let go. I swam up to the surface and took a huge breath.
The serpent grabbed me and pulled me down again. The serpent glanced at me and I punched it in both eyes. It thrust its fangs into me, puting venom in me, and then let go. I swam to the surface and got onto my surfboard. I paddled to the beach, my vision blurring.
I climbed onto the beach as my vision faded to black…
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