Programs Blog

Day 9 at sea

October 12, 2023
conga line leader

Author: Ryan J.

Ship’s Log

Wednesday, 11 October 2023Noon Position: (Lat and Long):  43° 30.3’N 064° 51.8’WShip Heading (degrees): 080 degreesShip Speed (knots): slowLog (nm): 583nmWeather / Wind / Sail Plan (from 1300 Watch Change):  winds light andvariable, sometimes from the south.  Beam reach, starboard tack 4 lowers(jib, fore and main stays’l, and mains’l)Description of location:  About 50 nm south of Lunenburg, Nova Scotia

Starting off – HAPPY BIRTHDAY MRS. STIRRATT!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Ocean is epic and so far it has gone like this: there are fourwatches every day—morning watch, afternoon watch, evening watch and dawnwatch. Each is 6 hours long and afterwards a watch has 12 hours off untiltheir next 6 hours on. Breakfast for ongoing watch is at 6:20, breakfast foroffgoing watch and lazy watch is at 7. When we’re not on watch, we’re freeto sleep, chill, and wander the boat as we please. A lot of us read andjournal on the Elephant table, which is the roof of the ship’s lab. We canalso lie out on the head rig, the net at the very front of the boat.  Thisis the best when it’s sunny out. On watch, we are split into three differentareas: on deck, the lab, or helping in the galley. There are always 3 peopleon deck, 2-3 in the lab, and 1 person doing dishes. On the day a watch hasdawn watch, one person from them is assigned to be the steward for the dayand cook with our lovely Raechel and Sebastian. Tomorrow, for example,C-Watch has dawn watch and our very own Isabel will be steward for the dayinstead of joining us on deck at 1am. On deck, we rotate between being thehelmsman and lookout, or performing hourly boat checks and weather reports.In the lab we help with deployments or processing deployments and all thatjazz.This morning I was woken up by Tessica Gatti from Bravo watch at 6:00A.M,since my watch was on morning watch from 7A.M. to 1P.M. I fell asleep thenight before at around 8:30PM reading 1984 which I found in theaforementioned library. Mom you were wrong I have already finished all mybooks!!!!!!!!!!!!! Except for Little Fires Everywhere – it just didn’tresonate with me. But it’s okay because in the library they have It EndsWith Us which I know you love and I plan to read after Emma finishes.Anyways you’d think that with nearly 10 hours of sleep I’d be ready toattack the day, but I was very sleepy. Luckily Riley was the steward todayand clutched up with the banana bread and yogurt combo for breakfast. Aftermunching up I went back to my bunk to layer up, got my red smartwoolsunderneath my work pants, my white long sleeve with my wool UGA sweater onovertop, and my pink beanie.

Today I was in the lab with my favorite scientist, Jordan Eckstein, ourcrew’s 1st scientist, along with Tally Ho Stirrat and Jackson Ganache. Wehad a busy day in lab today – we deployed a Shipek Grab, Secchi Dish, CTD(Conductivity, Temperature, and Depth profiler), a Neuston Net and a surfacestation. One has to wonder, why are we doing all this science when we’rehere to sail? Honestly, I really don’t know. We need data for ouroceanography projects. The other day though, on evening watch, the wind wasWHIPPIN’ and we were not sailing so that move at the slow pace necessary forscience deployments. But, I argued, we could be whippin’ right now if wejust set a few sails! But we must know the amount of meroplankton instead ofgetting to Nova Scotia earlier. Pick your battles I guess.

The deployments were a lot of fun and being with Tallulah and Jacksonallowed for a lot of laughs. We also set and struck down a bunch of sails sowe were active. Morning watch is probably my favorite because it’s duringthe day, so I can literally see, but also once it’s done we still have therest of the day. I say that even though after watch today I ate lunch, readsome of my book and then sacked out until Jordan woke me up for dinner. Lol!Tomorrow I have dawn watch. Dawn watch is brutal. Here’s hoping that thistime there will be the lovely sunrise I’ve been waiting for. I am HYPE fortomorrow – we arrive in Nova Scotia, we can do our laundry, we can callhome, and we get to meander on land and see what’s up with Canadians. Also Ican see my favorite maritime studies teacher, Ben Caw Hen, our maritimestudies teacher. On Friday we are to spend the entire day ashore with Benmaritime studying, and Saturday we depart Lunenburg and head for Bermuda.Ocean is an intricate mix of challenging and fun. We have so many goodthings on the horizon and I’m soakin’ up every minute of it.

Get ready for those phone calls y’all. Rem, Dad, Blajo and Debbie – be onyour phones! Also – proctor people check your mailboxes. I wrote you.  All my love,Ryan J., Crab watch or “cwatch”