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Location: Male atoll, Maldives

Hello everyone! Since Mo did such a good job as the skipper yesterday, I had a great role model and guide for my first time as skipper today.

The crew has already gotten so comfortable on the boat and everything feels normal already. The nice bit about it being day 3 is that almost everyone has caught up on their sleep.

We started off the day with a lovely vegan peach cake that Amy made for us. If there were seconds, I think everyone would have had more! After that we had our Introduction to Academics Sessions with all of our academic staff. We also had a little bit of an Introduction to Seamanship or Nautical Science. Within this course we will learn Crew Competency, VHF use, and Navigation. I can definitely say that I am excited for that course to get started on our first sailing day tomorrow.

For lunch we had a delicious salad bowl. Early in the afternoon, the students without diving experience, myself included, headed out on our first snorkeling excursion. We all had so much fun getting away from the boat for a little while. Given that it was the first ever time snorkeling for a lot of us, we were very easily mesmerized by what we saw. Sierra, Sam, Valentina, Henry, and I were all in a group with Amy today. We saw these bright blue squishy things among the coral that turned out to be clams, the would start to close up when we got within a couple feet of them. My favorite thing that I saw was this bright purple, teal, and minty colored fish. I swear I followed it around for almost 5 minutes. Some people in the other groups saw squid! Apparently Zack, who was in the actual diving group, saw a chunky sea cucumber which he understandably geeked out about.

After our time in the water, we had our daily shower followed by our first big chunk of free time. A lot of us ended up in the cockpit exchanging stories and laughs. I also tried Tom at a game of chess and failed miserably. Luckily I learned a few tricks and was able to help Valentina learn how to play as well. Conversations about astrology and family life came up as well.

We had chili for dinner while DJ Funky Tunes (Zach) played amazing dancing music for us. For the squeeze tonight, I asked everyone to come up with a nickname for the person to their left. Some of the best ones were Cookie for Ian, Pumpkin for Sam, Squeak for Amy, The Big for Tom, Flo for Angie, DJ Funky Tunes as mentioned above, Scary French Canadian for Marc, Boots for Bee, and Sisi for Sierra even though the original thought was Night Rider Fury. Mine was Rara for those who are interested.

Anyway, today was a really fun day for everyone and I can’t imagine a better group of people to have these experiences with. Beyond thankful for this opportunity.

See you next time,

Myra

P.S. Hi everyone at home! I miss you and I love you all so much. I promise I will try to call when I get service. But for now I am safe, happy, and healthy 🙂

Photos

1. Group shot in the cockpit (left to right, back to front) Ian, Henry, Noah, Carly, Sierra, Dylan, Jon, andgt;andgt; Emily, sam, Myra, Max, Robbie, Zack, Trey, Lucia, Madz, Danar, andgt;andgt; Mo, Valentina, Kate, Finley, Seth, Bee, Gillian and andgt;andgt; Angie.

2. Angie and Myra

3. Myra and Valentina

4. Angie

5. Group chilling out before snorkeling