Location: 43 06.8N 006 51.1E
This morning began with what I consider to be the best wake-up routine of the trip so far. The soulful rendition of Cotton-Eye-Joe was fit for royals. After everyone was awake, we had a hearty breakfast of cereal and milk and set about our passage prep before setting off on a three-day passage from Villefranche to Tarragona.
After a busy two days, the crew of Vela decided we had seen enough of France and that it was time to move on to something new. More specifically, we decided to go to Spain for a while. We prepped and set sail around lunchtime, but not before sending three brave crew members out to restock Vela with cereal and milk. Our intrepid adventurers set off into the small coastal town of Villefranche and seemingly bought every box of cereal in a two-mile radius. At this point, we have about one box of cereal per resident of Vela, and our hope is that the supply will last us at least until we make anchor in Tarragona. Once we left the marina, we were able to enjoy a few good hours of sail-only travel until the wind died down and we had to turn on the engine again. During this time, the rest of the students and I aboard had classes to attend. For today’s schedule, we had Marine Biology and our leadership class, where we had our first student-led discussion by Jack and Emma. They kindly led the class in a discussion on paradigms while our fearless Captain Freddie wrestled with a shepherd’s pie just behind them in the galley. After class, we center-lined the sails and took down the jib and the flying jib. During the jib takedown process, we were accompanied by some rather friendly dolphins who decided to swim along with our bow. For many, myself included, this was the closest we had gotten to dolphins outside of an aquarium and was an experience we are sure to treasure.
Pictures:
1- a fleeting view of the French coast as we departed from Villefranche
2- A very cool ship
3- the same cool ship, but we were now closer and could see that it was called “Fryderyk Chopin,” supposedly after some famous musician or something.
4- the headmasters and trash master showing us that you can have a great time even while cleaning the heads
P.S. Hello to my Mom, Dad, Sisters, and Dog Zeb. I miss you all and love you very much.