Down to the Seas: Green Eggs, Ice Cream Sandwiches, Lobster Togas, Whales!

March 17, 2012

Top o’ the mornin’ to ya. St. Patrick’s Day on board is celebrated with green eggs (but no ham), potatoes, and limeade. Some are sporting green shirts and pants as well. It has been an exhausting past couple of days, probably the most tired I’ve been here. We’re bobbing in Kalohi channel, between Molokai, Maui, and Lanai, hove to because we have a bit of time to kill. We want to be at a certain point 12 nm offshore tonight so we can take care of our trash.

So, March 15. It feels like at least 2 days. We were woken up with “One Day” blasting through the boombox, which took me back to summer camp when the cabin that made breakfast would come around to the others and wake us up with loud music. I enjoyed the wake up. I must say, I’ll miss the personalized wake ups we’ve been getting. Breakfast on the deck was a peaceful event, sitting in Kealakekuna Bay off the Big Island. We split into two groups and one went snorkeling in the morning. I was conscripted to bake 144 chocolate chip cookies for a mysterious purpose that would not be revealed to me, but when I was asked to make exactly 144 perfectly round cookies of uniform size, I assumed they’d be for ice cream sandwiches. And they were. So good. But that was for later.

I went snorkeling in the afternoon and it was chilly! The water was a mere 72°F. You must feel so bad for me. Though the site wasn’t as good as it was in Rangiroa, where we snorkeled the first time (and where I was promised any snorkeling experience afterwards would be subpar), it was still pretty cool. The neatest thing was seeing freshwater and saltwater mixing. You know when someone (never you) pees in a pool? That’s what it looked like. We were all confused at first because we thought it was our masks fogging up and obstructing our view of the fishes and coral below. The odd part about this area was the large number of tourists. It was weird, and the most people I’ve seen in a long time. They even ventured to interact with us…

Before dinner, which was cooked on a grill hanging over the starboard side of the boat, I went aloft on the forem’st. One of the things I wanted to do before departing Mama Seamans was to climb to the very top of the forem’st. Since we were anchored and the wind was calm, I figured it was as good a time as any to try, so I asked permission and climbed my way, very slowly, to the top, talking myself through it the whole time. I was rewarded with a bird’s eye view of the preparations going on below and a beautiful sunset.

What preparations, you might ask. For Swizzle! Swizzle is a celebration, and we had our first when we crossed the equator. Everyone dresses crazily, performs songs, skits, and stories, and we have nice evening under the stars on the quarterdeck. This Swizzle began with the ‘females’ swarming the deck, attired in dark clothing, covered in war paint, and presenting funky hairdos. We assumed a fierce stance and began our haka, a warrior dance intended to intimidate your enemy. Then we changed into our gods/goddesses/togas and toasted the sea and each other with our Swizzle drink. One of our professors had a very well tied toga and when this was mentioned he merely said he’d had a lot of practice.

Waking up the next morning was difficult, after having a ‘normal’ 12+-hour day awake. Swizzle hangover, someone termed it. The day’s activities began around 8am and lasted until 1530. We cleaned Mama Seamans, inside and out, for that entire time. I was sent to the rescue boat to circle the hull of the ship with acid, which we sprayed onto any rust spots. Wind meant quite a bit of the acid ended up on me which was tingly, but I hung over the side of the rescue boat to wash it off, the way we hung off the sides of the boats while waiting for races to began for crew. Cleaning bunks was next, followed by settee cushions, overheads and bulkheads back aft, soles, and housetops/vertical surfaces up on deck. We were rewarded with a swim call in water so clear I could see the bottom, even at 90ft deep. Around mid afternoon we got underway again, passing through the Hawaiian Islands on our way to Oahu. We’ve actually been sailing, without motor, and hitting speeds of about 8 knots. Pretty darn fast! To put our speed in perspective, we’ve walked across the Pacific Ocean at a brisk clip when you average our speed over the entire trip.

This morning on dawn watch we finally saw the whales and dolphins we’ve been expecting this whole trip, spotting humpbacks and bottlenose dolphins just as the sun burst over Molokai. Last night we saw some pilot whales off the starboard side.

Everything we do now has a bittersweet tone to it. I woke up in my bunk for the last full day today, we ate our last lunch on the ship this afternoon, we held our last afternoon class, and (thankfully) a final dawn cleanup.