Programs Blog

November 1st, 2024

Location: Port DEMONrau (Port Denarau, Fiji)

Weather: Hot, but with a chill in the air

Legends have it that the Robert C. Seamans is a haunted ship, but most of our trip has been ghost-free…until now.

We are the ghosts of the Bobby C’s former topsail (Talia) and course (Brooke), and we’re here to take you on a tour of the frightful festivities that occupied our entire ship’s crew yesterday, the day of HALLOWEEN.

Overnight, messages from Bobby C’s other ghosts began to appear on the mirrors, and soon afterwards our student crew began to notice strange things about the ship—crew and professors crafting strange items, or sneaking off to different places. Then, a manifestation! In one of the aft heads, a figure dressed all in black with a volleyball head (Oscar, our man overboard for safety drills) lurked awaiting for any entrants to his domain. The ghosts of the topsail and course confess that they, knowing he was there, were still spooked to find him, as were many of our students.

Following some morning work on oceanographic research projects, student crew had the opportunity to find or fashion their own costumes either from clothes that they’d brought or a store of costumes hidden on the ship (haunted!). Everyone took this time to finish up whatever they’d had in mind, and our usual muster time for ship’s meeting—which generally involves announcements, reports on weather and creatures from our net tows, as well as a longer class session—was dedicated to viewing and announcing each of our costumes! We had a huge range from both staff and student crew: Emma as the Bananaphone; Isabella as our chief mate, Rocky; our second mate Hila as Orion with third mate Spatch and first scientist Supi as astronomers; Hatuey as Supi; Sophia as Yoda; Mira as a 100-count filled with copepods; Quinn as The Birthday Boy; Anika as a Zumba instructor; and Rick Miller, our captain, as Neptune himself.

And then it was time for the activities. Split up by watch, each group rotated through three sets of activities. First, bobbing for apples, which was carried out with impressive speed and enthusiasm; second, carving Fijian pumpkins into jack-o-lanterns—smiles, fanged smiles, ocean waves, and more; and third, a corn maze! Given that we’re on a ship, and corn fields are hard to come by, our lovely stewards (dressed as the Dread Pirate Roberts and Buttercup from The Princess Bride) hid cans of corn, and one can of button mushrooms, in different locations aboard the ship for each watch to find. C Watch found 4, B Watch found 7, and A Watch found them all.

Next up: trick-or-treating. All of the staff crew went to their bunks or cabins, and student crew came by in groups of two with specially made trick-or-treating bags. Every few minutes, we’d hear a knock on a bulkhead or bunk, and the call “trick-or-treat!”. “Wooo-oooo-oooo, Happy Halloween,” we’d say in reply, and dispense a Kit-Kat and a paper crane (made by topsail ghost). Other staff handed out candy, Sunny D, haikus (made by Katherine, our second scientist), turks-head rings (made by Matthew, our third scientist, and Sam, our assistant engineer), and so on.

Later in the afternoon, we played games, and for dinner had blood-red focaccia, pumpkin soup from our jack-o-lanterns, and ribs (skeletons). In the evening, we had a shipboard movie night, featuring The Princess Bride. This finished off our hot and haunted Halloween festivities—from the Robert C. Seamans, Happy Halloween!