Salish Sea Expeditions

First of all: the what? Salish Sea? What's that? Well, it's a recent term for the inland waters near Seattle and Vancouver, consisting of the Strait of Georgia, Puget Sound and the Strait of Juan de Fuca. Scientists have adopted it to give a single identity to these connected waters. Hence the name Salish Sea Expeditions for today's subject – they cover the whole area, so they might as well use a name for the whole area. Salish is the name for a Native American culture indigenous to the region and the name for their language. And Salish Sea Expeditions is scientific too – in fact their mission is to provide students a chance to conduct real science on Puget Sound and surrounding waters on a 61' sail boat. Which can mean only one thing: sea monsters. There may not be any old Native American legends of a mighty sea monster terrorizing the inland sea of British Columbia and Washington State, but there should be! A fearsome beast one hundred feet long, with rows of razor-sharp teeth and eyes as wild as the foamy sea herself, the kind of eyes that look right through you before the creature's hideous head descends upon your unfortunate scow, reducing all to splinters and flotsam. I call upon you, children of the Northwest (and for Canadians, the Southwest) to mount scientific expeditions on the Salish Sea to find this horror that I have just made up! The water sampling, marine life surveys and sediment dredging can wait; the search for the mighty Salish Sea Monster supplants all!