Location: Guadeloupe
If you know what Murphys Law is, you can probably already guess how the day looked. If you are not, dont worry, it is easy. Basically, it says that if something can go wrong, it will go wrong. And that is pretty much the summary of today.
My day started with a five to six watch time, which is already not amazing. Add to that pouring rain and wind, and it is starting to get bad. But that would be fine, if Murphy didnt decide to add a little bit a drama The drama in question? A stuck door. So, not only was it pouring, but I was stuck on deck, completely unable to get down in the salon. That half hour was long. Very long.
At the time, I honestly thought it was going to be the worst of the day. What a fool I was!
It stopped raining just enough time for us to get breakfast out, but of course, not long enough for us to actually eat breakfast. Lets see the bright side; with the rainwater we ate from our yogurt bowls, we will save on the water tank
We got a short dry moment while taking the first oceanography quiz in the salon, before it was time to move the boat to another French city, one with a custom office (at least, that is what the legend says). A quick, nice, easy two-hour ride Except it was not.
We learnt that Gabe was indeed right when he said we hadnt yet experienced real rain. Now, we have. At some point, it felt like there was more water coming from the skies than from the ocean. My raincoat gave up and I learnt to never have all of your towels drying on the lines at the same time.
But that is not the best. No, the best was the moment the bow-watch person saw a small, innocent buoy in the water, indicating a lobster trap. Then a second. And a third. You can guess where this is going; we got surrounded by buoys, and right and left. As you can guess, a twenty-ish-meter boat is not the most agile vehicle in the world; avoiding them got a bit laborious. At least, Gabe considered it was. Do not ask me, I went down to nap. Not that I actually napped, since, as I said, all of my towels were on the lines, and I was drenched.
Lunch then decided to outdo breakfast; I got so many waters in my bowl that my ground beef was actively floating. Of course, it stopped raining as soon as we stopped eating. It would not be fun otherwise.
After lunch was customs time. As a French speaker (but not French, sorry Molly), I was considered our best chance to sweeten the English-intolerant customs agent. I wish I could tell you it worked, but we never actually found the customs agents. Indeed, the French administration proved that its reputation wasnt undeserved at all; it closed in the afternoon, left two hours early for lunch, had an outdated website for two years, and provided false numbers. We got them all. As you can see in the picture, hope left our captains body.
The good news about this? We are not going to be able to leave the island at dawn tomorrow, so we can sleep. The bad one? We do not actually know if the customs agents are going to show up tomorrow, nor at what time. That means that we dont actually know if we are going to be able to leave this place. And, as much as I like having a baguette, I am excited for the French flag to finally get taken down.
During all of that, we all tried to work on our lit reviews, with varying success. I personally fell asleep on my computer. I tried to fight the sleepiness with an espresso on shore, but caffeine only entered my body for dinner, as if that was the point of eating
Dinner innovated by being a dry meal. Even if our chefs lost part of their minds in the kitchen, they managed to send up amazingly good pasta, and the meal was generally good. As a squeeze, I proposed a game of Two Truths and a Lie. Between biting ostriches, pet donkeys, and marriage proposals, we learnt much more about the others that we would have thought (or wished?).
Now, let me leave you with some pictures. I especially hope you will appreciate Olis ones
Bisous tout le monde!
PS: I apologise for all spelling mistakes and blame the fatigue and the coffee.