BUCKET LIST ITEM✅✅✅
Location: Underway to Gibraltar
Makayla here to hit ya with a good afternoon America!
Today was a great one! Its goodbye Palma, and Gibalter monkeys here we come!After a great nights sleep following my 1-2am anchor watch with the GOAT; Lexi, I woke everyone up with some great music to start the day right (not country music after the hate I received last time😒).
Most of us got in some last minute review for our oceanography quiz right after our smoothie bowl breakfast. The general consensus was feeling pretty confident about it, props to or fantastic teacher Kyler. After that, we completed the most efficient passage prep session to date and got nicely underway on the smoothest seas we’ve had so far. Knock on wood it stays that way, we’ve got a couple doubters calling it the calm bare the storm. I’m optimistically choosing not to believe that. Super excited for our 3 day passage, but I’ve definitely got the Dramamine locked and loaded just in case.
The second half of the day, following nachos for lunch, we had Seamanship with TOM! (Legit my best friend guys, he’s awesome) We took our VHS Exams, which again most were feeling pretty good about. But just as we had finished the exam and the things were calm for a moment, Mac walked in with a suspicious lil grin on his face, specifically looking at me. Little did I know, my dreams were about to come true. All the sudden he whips out the fire drill plushie and pretty much laser beamed Owen with it from across the room. IT WAS MY TIME TO SHINE. Practically before anyone had yelled FIRE DRILL I had sprung from my seat to get to the fire alarm pull, through the water tight door and down the hall. As an impulsive button pusher, pulling a fire alarm has sincearly been pretty high on the bucket list for quite some time. The different teams made pretty good time getting updeck with all of our emergency supplies and executed the protocols much better than last time, however we still have room for improvement (yay more fire drills!!😁😁). While we were resetting our equipment and re-raising the staysails post fire drill, Fransisco spotted a pretty big pod of bottle nose dolphins just off our port side. They swam right up to us and were playing in the wake of our bow. It was so cool to see them that close. Most of us have seen dolphins before in aquariums or otherwise, but it’s a whole nother indescribable experience to see them that close in the wild. After that we finished getting a couple more sails up, although we still are running the motor (we’re pretending to be a sailing vessel as Mac likes to say). Time then rolled around for Baywatch (Watch Team 3) to take the helm. It’s a little bittersweet to realize this is our last passage with our first Watch team groups, but nevertheless the Baywatch vibes were high as usual. I was on helm for about an hour and a half, which is always a fun time but is also a different ball game with sails up. We finished the day with chef Alexis’s delicious taco bowls, and will soon be enjoying a little honey cinnamon Nan dessert on each of our watches. Baywatch of course has our favorite; DELUSION WATCH(12-4am). The conversations are so unpredictable but never disappoint.
See y’all again in 30 days!
-Makayla Hinton