Location: Underway to Richard's Bay
Today started with, you guessed it, another watch. Today was the 6-8 pm sunset watch, followed by the 4-8 am sunrise watch. Both had beautiful shows put on by the sun. Each was mesmerizing and really took my breath away as I saw the beauty of this world and life in the middle of the ocean. We are over 2/3rds of the way through the program, and every sunset and sunrise has me wishing for one more day to be added on out here in the peace and tranquility of the open ocean. With that being said, life on a boat does not stop, so the day continues. Our morning watch consisted of some crazy excitement! For the past several days, there has been no wind, which means we have been motoring. It is loud, makes me long for some wind so we can sail again, and leaves all of our sails tucked away with sail ties, except for the forestay sail and the main staysail. This morning, we got to ease these two sails out slightly and switch the main stay sail preventer for the main stay sail boom vang, I know crazy stuff. Haha, but I handled more sails than Id done for three days, so I was happy!!! We also did some dinghy shimmying to get Plaai off a D-ring, Charlie, Hannah, Drazka and I tackled that job, which ended up taking much longer than I thought it would. Throughout our 4-8 am, Drazka would disappear down into the galley to make her bread for her famous breakfast English muffins, topped with eggs of all kinds, spicy aioli, and bacon! They were delicious again, and the gluten-free bread was superb! Her meals are always a big hit! Philip was bread maker today and helped make those delicious muffins. After a fabulous meal, it was time to clean up watch team 1, which included Bodhi, Travis, Juliette, and Kiley. All had super important jobs so I was tasked with staying on the helm, it was the first time I listened to my own music while helming and I actually really liked it, so it will probably happen again in the future. Then Gabe relieved me so I could get ready for class. It was Oceanography today, which was a fun review game for our quiz after dinner, followed by the second group completing the practice Navmaster exam. I was part of this group alongside Juliette, Kiley, Ainsley, Hannah, and Ali. We had an hour and a half to complete the exam. The salon was hot and stuffy, which created some interesting conditions when paired with the boat rocking. But, we made it through, I think I did about as well as I expected and now its preparation time for the final Navmaster exam scary!!! After that, it was watch again until dinner, where we had a nice review session with Ben for our oceanography quiz. Then it was dinner time. Again, another meal for the win was prepared by Drazka and her sous chefs, Charlie and Tomer. We had Jerk chicken wraps with a watermelon salad, which was absolutely delicious! After that, it was time for a Squeeze, which is the inspiration for todays title. My squeeze question for the group: Describe the perfect date that lasts for a whole day. We are not all romantics on this boat, so answers ranged from about an hour or two long date to a full weekend date trip. There were laughs, mainly lots of laughs, we found out some have a very detailed perfect date and others, well lets just say, we need to watch more fairytale romance movies on this boat to get inspiration for what a perfect date should look like. One nice idea included walks through botanical gardens, food, and books. Another idea included hikes, a lovely mountain cottage, and some good quality time. Others had nice ones as well, while some had ideas that I would personally avoid if at all possible. It was a lovely and funny squeeze, though, that ended with a Macarena dance. After clean up was our quiz and review session for our Marine Biology test tomorrow. Ava and Ali also made some delicious popcorn, which was a perfect treat to end the day with. Until next time! Shoutout: I am thanking God for the perfect sunsets and sunrises these past few days! Also, sorry family I did not tell you we were leaving Mauritius but here is my goodbye until Richards Bay, I love you all!