Location: Fiji to Palau
Wowee, what an exciting day! It all started at 7:30 AM when Watch Team 2 was woken up for their 8-12 watch. We enjoyed the remnants of the sunrise while planning an Office-style episode of one of our last watches together before we switched watch teams in Palau. There were many snippets filmed, much drama spilled, and perhaps it will continue later on, when we reunite, delirious, for our 4 AM – 8 AM watch… During our 8-12, four out of the five PSCT candidates took the first and hardest of their five exams: the COLREGS exam. We were relatively confident going in and quite a bit less confident coming out, but we all passed and are happy to have the toughest one out of the way before the passage is over! Lunch today was fantastic; Olivia’s, Kackie’s, and Mathilda’s burritos (or burrito nachos, for those of us unable to find a mold-free tortilla) hit the spot, and we were able to find a bit of shade thanks to the mini-tarp put up for the afternoon. After lunch, we set our watches back an hour, which was exciting but nowhere near as exciting as getting our worlds rocked by Steph’s announcement: after waiting for Neptune knows how long, the stars finally aligned to create perfect conditions for GETTING AQUATIC: Offshore Edition! We cheered and danced our way through cleanup and arrived in the cockpit with swimsuits and smiles donned. We spent the next 40 minutes or so jumping off of the bowsprit, floating atop gentle waves, and watching two of our resident free divers (Anna and Kelsey) swim beneath us, blowing bubble rings! It was truly amazing to look below the surface and follow the sunlight as far as our eyes could see; how many other people get to say that they’ve swum in water over 4,000m deep?! After our swim, the fun continued.
In marine biology class, we had a coral lab where we crafted our own anatomically correct corals out of the best construction materials money can buy: candy! While our reefs were all colorful and creative, they did not last very long, and the coral-crafting judges enjoyed a taste, too! In seamanship, Gabe continued to prepare us for our ICC certification exam. In typical Gabe fashion, he taught us through stories, about broken (and subsequently, jerry-rigged) propellers, wild sea states in a river in Thailand, and his adventures tacking a larger-than-Argo-sized sailing ship with a tiller instead of a wheel. As many of us worked frantically to submit a literature review on time for oceanography, Olivia and Mathilda multi-tasked while cooking a yummy green curry for dinner. After hearing about everyone’s dream dinner party guests during our post-dinner squeeze, we joined hands and shouted for Palau against the backdrop of a beautiful sunset. Tomorrow will bring more incredible moments, I’m sure, and we sail forward with renewed determination to make it to Palau. And we may make it there sooner than we thought. Upon observing the strength of the north equatorial countercurrent while we were swimming today, Tomer decided to take a gamble and alter our course to cut across the West Caroline Basin. If we, as a seasoned team of 22, can work together to stay on course, we could arrive in paradise in less than 40 hours! Wish us luck (and some wind behind our backs!), and we’ll take care of the rest! See ya soon in Palau!!!