Everything Day
Location: Jolly Harbour, Antigua
Today started out very early for a few of us as watch team 3 (Tom, Julia, Sam, and Tessa) finished off our passage and anchored us in Jolly Harbor at 1:30 am! All was well until Megan came to inform us that their (Megan, Francesca, and Sofia's) bed was soaked due to undogged hatches. (All is well as all three got new clean sheets and a dried out bed for tonight!) After that excitement, everyone got a nice lie-in with a late wake-up set for 8am and a rolling breakfast for a slow morning.
Many bowls of cereal later, everyone gathered to take the seamanship final while Gabe and Tom went to customs for the last time this trip. The great news is that everybody passed! Sad news is that after the exam, some of the students went down to organize their belongings, as we are unfortunately getting close to the flight day. Sandwiches were had as Gabe and Tom came back from customs, and after some delicious food, Zoe introduced the students to Cards, a beautiful GXG tradition that is done for every trip. Soon after, we started getting a little stir crazy and began playing pranks on each other, namely clothespins, and thought of pranks to play on our crewmates aboard Ocean Star.
After all the boat shenanigans, we Gintini folk wandered over to OStar for an afternoon of boomswinging, backflipping, swimming, snorkeling, and for a few hoisted up the mast for some good views of the Harbor. Fun can only continue for so long before we separate boats again for an early dinner in order to complete our night dive for advanced open water certifications. We had a nice calm dinner of using anything but a up and then a crazy clean up that ended with Zoe, Tom, Tessa, Lusi, Megan, Katie, and I in the water. Quickly after, we went for a quick dinghy ride over to Ostar with a beautiful sunset as a backdrop, as we got ready for our night dive!
Gintini girls and TJ, Yanyu, Woodrow, Tom, Perry, and I dove first and had a blast underwater, seeing some bioluminescence, crabs, and starfish. The Ocean Star girls dove next with Annika, Zoe, and Gabe. They are still underwater as I write this, but I can't imagine them not having an absolute blast!
Overall, a crazy, relaxing, fun-packed day on board, with every new inside joke and memory making it harder and harder to grasp the fact that we have only a bit more time all together. I have loved getting to know all of our crewmates these past few weeks and will be laughing at all our jokes for a long time after we separate. What a privilege it's been being a part of such a lovely group. Gintini/Ostar 20-day crew: much love to you all and thanks for making this an amazing experience.
- Nat