Location: Underway to East London
Hello Blog followers!
I woke up this morning at 3:30 am as it was time to head off into the ocean to our next destination. I put on my warm clothes and walked up onto deck, greeted by a city of lights. Some might say that Durban is the New York of South Africa. We were promptly put to work. This consisted of lifting up the anchors, which is usually a very easy task to accomplish. However, the mighty Durban winds had twisted our two anchor chains, and this proved a bit difficult to solve. I was delegated the task of flaking the anchor chain, which consisted of feeding the muddy and gross metal snake into a box in a little room below deck. What can you do? As the staff tried to figure out the way out of our twisted chain pickle, Ava and I stayed in the anchor locker for around 1.5 hours until we were graciously relieved by watch team 1. I then went back into bed until it was time for lunch.
Lunch consisted of a great salad and chicken/soya schnitzel (yum). After lunch, we raised the jib and the two staysails, which were now patched with renewed vitality. After raising the sails, we had an oceanography class, where Ben talked about fisheries and how overfishing and overexploitation are a prevailing issue that threatens us today. Post oceanography class, we had seamanship, where we learned things that most of us already knew in preparation for our International Competency Crew test. Dinner was great, per usual, with halloumi, tofu, eggplant salad, and naan. After dinner, we did a nice relaxing scream. It’s weird how these are some of our last days of passage.
ICYMI, this is my last day as skipper, and this is my last blog post. I know many readers will be sad, and I must confess that it’s a bit bittersweet for me, too. I decided to go onto Sea|Mester after days of reading past blog posts and feeling immersed in other people’s worlds. This blog post is one of many. It’s possible that whatever I write here is buried beneath the hundreds of other blog posts, and I end up preaching to nobody in particular. So it goes. But I suppose I have some sort of duty to write a message and leave something behind for those who may still be deciding on Sea|Mester.
I’m writing this now, off the coast of South Africa: a place that I had never really dreamed of going. Something is enticing about crossing an ocean and sailing to places people have never heard of. One of the main reasons I’m aboard Argo now is that going to Mauritius was one of my dreams. I’m still not fully sure why I chose this program as my vector to Mauritius (there are definitely easier ways to go), but I am forever grateful for being on this boat. What is on my mind now is not how far we’ve gone or what our next port is going to be like, but rather, how I will say goodbye to the wonderful people I’ve met on this boat.
I think the best thing about Sea|Mester is not the experiences but rather collective shared experience; There is no group of people who will understand what it was like when our prop fell off, or when Lemuria cursed us, or when we found Clayson, or when the steering snapped, or when we met Riley, or the thousands of times we’ve listened to Dead Sea by the Lumineers, and so on and so forth. Sharing highs and lows with these 18 other people has made me feel truly a part of a community, part of some sort of family.
Sometimes, you’ll sit with a group of people wondering if you belong and ask yourself, are you friends by choice or friends by circumstances? Sea|Mester is not one of those places. Somewhere between the monotony of passage life and spotting animals that we may never see again, we were able to find something in common, whatever that may be.
It’s possible that we never see each other again after leaving this boat. It’s possible that one day, we will meet again, having forgotten each other’s names and faces. It’s possible that the samsara of the seasons takes over, and our memories of this trip fade into the background of more pressing life. However, at this moment, we are here, and we have so many emotions between us, and that makes it all worth it.
So if you’re still debating on whether or not to do this trip, my (admittedly biased) opinion is that you should. I cannot promise that you will have a good time. You may hate sailing. But I’m 100% sure that you will find people on this trip to call a friend.
Seventy-seven days ago, most if not all of us came aboard Argo as strangers, and in 13 days, we will leave program with a lifetime of experiences between us.
Philip W.