Story Time
Location: Underway to Richard's Bay
Watch team 1 started their day off early with the 12-4 am watch. We emerged tired but excited as the following night, 12-4 watch reported large amounts of bioluminescence. When we arrived on deck, the reports from watch team 3 were found to be accurate, with a bright moon illuminating the sky and the water hiding any bioluminescence that may be around. So, with no sparkle breaks in sight, we naturally moved on to the topic of “Which deep sea creature is most like an alien?” and “What do you think is the scariest undiscovered marine organism?”. Most answers were related to the giant squid or creepy-looking worms. As we got sufficiently creeped out by what may or may not be swimming below us, Kylie suggested we start storytime. As we have moved into our 3rd round of watch teams and I am on my 3rd cycle of the same stories, Gabe has kindly come up with a new story to tell. Set in another world, Kylie is a barista, Juliette is a journalist, Bodhi is a navigator, and Travis is a harpooner. There are wars and corruption, and our mismatched team of outlaws is figuring out how to navigate it all and escape to a safe planet. This passed most of our 4-hour watch until Bodhi did the final boat check and reported what we were all waiting for... Loads of bioluminescence off the bow of the boat. So, with that said, we all took turns walking forward to take our sparkle break. As 4 am rolled around, we handed watch over to watch team 2, where Ben and Kackie led their team of Hannah, Charlie, Drazka, and Amanda M through some sail handling practice by putting a reef in the main staysail. Watch team 3 took over at 8 am and took some time on their watch to tidy up the galley as it has been getting a lot of use between granola breakfast and popcorn evenings. We all came back together at noon for lunch, where we were greeted with our first marine mammal sighting in this passage. As we all lined up for lunch, we spotted around 20 dolphins just off our starboard side. They hung out for a while surfing our wake and jumping around our bow. As the dolphins headed off, we sat down to eat some delicious chicken wings and French fries cooked up by our head chef, Travis, and his sous chefs, Kylie and Ben. As lunch wrapped up and the wind filled in, it was time to raise some more sails. We un-reefed the main staysail, Philip led the forward staysail raise, and the deckie team raised both Jibs as everyone else cleaned up lunch. With sails up, it was time for classes. Today was jam-packed with a VHF exam for seamanship and an ID quiz for marine bio, followed by a lecture on marine birds and reptiles. Then, it was time for leadership, where Ava and Hannah did a presentation about Richards Bay, and Charlie presented on change. As the evening is wrapping up and everyone is cleaning up, Pretty Ali is standing beside me, telling me to let everyone know how pretty, smart, and funny she is. She also says she has big muscles.