Location: St. Vincent
Hello from St. Vincent! The day started out dark and early for Watch Team 2 (my team!) as we had the 0400-0800 watch. Upon taking the deck, we could clearly see St. Vincent up ahead, and we worked hard to strike the running backstays, centerline the 3 boom sails, drop and flake the sails, and bring us into the mooring field next to St. Vincent. And that was all before 0700! Though we didn’t get to shout “Land ho!’ (Watch Team 1 got that honor), we did get to bring ourselves to our destination. Lance manned the helm as we approached, and we could smell the land long before we arrived. All of us exclaimed that we forgot how pretty the color green can be! St. Vincent is very beautiful, with rocky formations on some of the shoreline and lots of lush green trees.
As the skipper, I had the honor of waking everyone up at 0700 to come to see the beauty of our new destination, help us get on the mooring, and have breakfast on deck in the breeze. After cleanup, we swiftly got ready and departed Argo to go get our brains tickled, aka get another COVID test. Everyone agreed that this test was less unpleasant than the one we got in Tenerife, and the people in charge of it were much friendlier. I personally am SO glad to be back in the Caribbean again. The sun is shining, the water is clear and warm, and the general feel and vibe is a little more slow and relaxed. After the COVID tests, we had a lunch of “Wy Wy Potatoes” from head chef Wyatt and his galley crew, and we got back into dive training! The divemasters in training went in with Lolo to practice their skill demonstrations, the already certified divers did a checkout dive with Sam and Ben, and the open water divers worked on learning dive tables with Smash. It was a fun and learning-filled afternoon, and then everyone went for a refreshing swim to cool off. After dinner, we celebrated JP’s birthday with a delicious chocolate brownie cake and lots of off-key singing. I think I can safely say that we are all very ready for a good night’s sleep after night watches last night and such a busy day today.
We all feel very happy and accomplished for completing 2 Atlantic crossings this semester- something that is not typical on a Seamester trip. To all the family and friends out there, you should be very proud of what your loved ones have accomplished together this semester. We’ve traveled over 6,500 miles together, and we’re not done yet!! Now that we are in the crystal clear Caribbean waters, we will be hitting dive training very hard, finishing up academic classes, going on hikes, and learning and growing together as a group even more.
Pictured:
A Smash selfie from yesterday
St. Vincent views
Sunny lunch cleanup crew
Check out dive
A final passage sunset
JP’s birthday cake