Location: Vaiorea Bay, Tahaa, French Polynesia
Today was a really fun day with a little more downtime than most (which still means it was packed), a day enjoyed by all hanging out on Argo. After a breakfast of eggs Benedict today, we had our introduction to OCE (oceanography) with Maeve and to MTE (the boat course) with Sam. With that, we have had our first class of all of the academic classes on board this summer. Most of the students spent the late morning down in the saloon working on their species identification books or the first essay assignment for OCB (marine bio), which made me proud since I am the OCB instructor. After lunch, we set up the boom swing – moving the boom from the center of the boat out over the side of the boat and attaching one of the dock lines so that we could hold on and swing off the boat. A few have mastered the backflip, but the rest of us just enjoyed jumping off or had fun with a game in which someone yelled out an animal while you were swinging, and you had to act out that animal as you jumped off. Our excitement for the day was when a Go-Pro camera was attached to the end of the boom during the boom swing and then proceeded to get knocked off and fall down into the water. We all thought it was lost forever, but our fearless captain Sam and first mate Matty donned some SCUBA gear and went down on a rescue mission, and using their stellar navigation and diving skills, were able to recover the camera, complete with some pretty sweet footage since it was recording video the whole time. Also, this afternoon, a few more students also got trained by the staff in driving the dinghy Smoke. I led a yoga/stretching class for about nine students on top of the chart house, and everyone took “showers” in the beautiful blue water. As we waited for dinner, we watched yet another gorgeous sunset with the sun sinking down behind the island of Bora Bora – another day in paradise.