Location: Rodney Bay, St Lucia
The day kicked off to an entertaining (and, to some, heartbreaking) start with the Netflix documentary My Octopus Teacher. Truly a romantic masterpiece. After spending an hour and a half appreciating the beautiful bond between man and octopus, we turned our attention to charts (NOT maps). In seamanship, we focused on finding the set and drift of currents while also reinforcing the skills learned in previous lessons. I’m always learning something new and exciting, and with each class, I can see everyone becoming more comfortable with the tools and concepts.
After our two morning classes, we were all pretty hungry. Lunch featured an interesting combination: veggie chicken nugget fajitas. Maybe it’s the vegetarian in me, but I honestly really enjoyed the veggie nuggets in the fajitas. Would recommend.
Next came the highlight of everyone’s day: siesta time90 minutes of silence for sleeping or relaxing in your bunk. While I opted to read rather than sleep, the quiet, restful time was much needed. It took quite some effort for me to finally crawl out of my bunk and rejoin the rest of the world. Yet, there were things to be done. Some of us opted to work on our oceanography projects. Others did more Navmaster work with Calum. Zoe and Isa went for a quick, fun swim. Still, others worked on fish IDs and marine bio essays. Later in the afternoon, Zoe, Calum, and I each taught Ash and Adelaide how to assemble and disassemble their dive gear: they seemed to have forgotten. We had to be very thorough. Once we’d each completed our explanations, Zoe and I jumped into the water so that I could complete my tired diver tow. As a side note, I believe Riley, Will, and Ben had quite a great time playing Boggle during this time.
Dinner consisted of mass quantities of pasta. This just about brings me up to the present: writing this blog.
Before I sign off, I’d like to say: Happy birthday, Dad! (He’s pretty cool, and I know he’s quite a dedicated Ocean Star blog reader, so I wanted to give him a quick birthday shout-out).
Photo 1 – Mike and Luke prepare for Seamanship
Photo 2 – Sophie chilling on the bow
Photo 3 – Julia and Will busy navigating
Photo 4 – Julia, Lenox, and Zoe hanging out between classes