News

Thursday, 13 August, 2026
Dockside Boothbay Harbor, Maine

Hello everyone, this is the last full day on the ship!

Today we woke at around 0600 to 0645 depending on the watch group.   C watch and Others had their wake ups first for breakfast and then it was A&B watch.  Breakfast was blueberry pancake biscuits with freshly baked bacon. It was fire and we finished the whole pan of bacon with everyone eating a whole bunch as well.  After our meal my watch mates and I did chores:  I wiped down and mopped the salon with a green rag (green is for the floor) and envirox.  Meanwhile my watchmates divided up the cleaning for the heads (bathrooms), the showers, doing dishes in the galley (kitchen), sweeping and wiping down the ladders and the handrails, and wiping down the handles used for balancing while the ship is in motion.  The next thing that we did was bunk love — where we take everything out from our bunks (bags, mattress, and sheets) and do a nice deep clean.  The first step was to shake the mattress out really well, so the dirt falls off, then I used a small broom to collect any sand, stones, hair, and other things that had collected in the bottom of the bunk.  After that I used a weird-shaped vacuum cleaner to suck up the dirt that was trapped inside the two storage areas inside my bunk that are used to store personal items during the trip.  Lastly, I used different cleaning solutions ( Murphy’s Oil soap for the wooden surfaces, and Envirox for white painted metal surfaces ) to wipe off all the remaining dirt left in my bunk (and yes that includes the top part). When I was all done and checked by the Marine Tech that it was indeed all clean, I went back up on deck and called my bunk mates living below me for their turn to do the same process to their bunk.  

After that we had an all hands lunch, it was make you own style bagel sandwiches, and it was very good.  After lunch we had “Field Day”, which was not like the normal ones onshore where you go outside and do something. It was basically just a more serious and deeper version of daily chores with more people crowded below decks. The good thing is that for both Bunk Love and Field Day we could listen to music on speakers and make requests for our favorite songs. I loved that a lot because I haven’t listened to any “real music” for 12 days!!! 

After field day we were all dirty so we had a ‘splash mountain’ to clean ourselves!  This involved using the large seawater fire hose to spray everybody down with cold saltwater.  This was followed by a freshwater rinse with a normal sized hose afterwards.  Then it was time for dinner which was chicken nuggets with fried potatoes and a sweet salad.  It was amazing with super spicy hot sauce or just ketchup. 

Finally, we had “Swizzle”, which is basically a talent show for the students and pro crew to have fun and enjoy the time and celebrate the last full day of the trip. The Main Salon was set up very nicely – Christmas lights were hanging all around the stage, and a special drink was shared for the opening toast by the captain (It was amazing), and the normal overhead lights were shut down.  All of the shows and performers were amazing and I love them all, however my favorite ones were the “little apple” singing, the “sit down, be humble” singing and dancing, the drama show performed by the pro crew, and the poem and sea shanty performed by 2^nd mate Binh at the end of the Swizzle show.  Well, this is the end of the blog and now I need to go to bed, because it is now 2250 and I need to be ready for tomorrow’s one hour watch starting at 0600 in the morning. (It will be officially the last watch, so sad)  

B Watch — Cheng (Author), Xavier (Author)

P.S: I’m so excited to get my phone back tomorrow at 9:00 A.M 

C-328D: SEA Expedition IV (2-14 August 2026)

A Watch — Owen, Alex, Hayden, Mario, Sheldon, Thomas

B Watch — Cheng, Xavier, Ruben, Olivia, Allison, Connor, Daron

C Watch — Sky, Charlotte, AJ, Ethan, Tad, Suren, Sebastian