Programs Blog

Saturday, March 8, 2025

Position: 42° 21.385’S  X  175° 28.078’E

Ship Heading: 230° / Log: 1402.9 NM

Ship Speed: 5.30 knots

Wind Speed: 5 knots

Hello to all the lovely families and friends reading this blog post. My name is Eamonn and I am here to ramble about my experiences on March 8th 2025. I got my wake up for dawn watch around 12:30. It is definitely one of the only times I dislike hearing my friend’s voices but once out of bed the day is always good. Except for last Wednesday I was making donations to Poseidon left and right… “On the low side, please”.

Dawn watch started off on a pretty silly note. During turn over with B watch we learned that Caitie had gotten bombarded by a bird while on helm not too long before my wake up. They said they couldn’t identify it but Eric, our first mate, eventually got it over board. I definitely feel for Caitie, I’m so used to getting a bird to the face while steering a tall ship, it sucks (lie). That moment had me thinking, would I rather catch a bird to the face every time I steer 5 degrees off course? Or, get 5 flying fish to the face guaranteed every time I take the helm.

Once we took the deck it was pretty smooth sailing. A little too smooth if I am being honest. The ocean was as calm as a pond and there was hardly any wind. We were still moving at a whopping 1 knot over ground but it was okay, we didn’t really need to be anywhere since we were on schedule for tomorrow’s science station. This lack of motion prompted silly dawn watch activities. A few days ago the dorrade vents were turned towards the quarter deck and our mate Shell thought of the idea to put big eyes in them. This idea evolved into drawing members of the boat inside these vents. On the Robert C. Seamans we call these vents “tubas”, hence the shape. So we got started, thinking of my beloved mother and her love for art history I tried to take a Picasso approach by configuring shapes into a face. This face turned into the one and only Captain Sean. We got an exciting interruption in the middle of our artistic adventure with a loud blow spout noise off our starboard quarter. “WHALE!” it was pretty exciting to hear these magnificent animals; it would have been cool if we could have seen them too. It was cloudy this morning so it was almost impossible to see anything. We did manage to see a few of these blows but only for about half a second until it was consumed by the darkness.

The sun came up slowly and we finished up by striking the Jib and turned over to A watch. The next part of the day was also extremely exciting. I slept until 12:30 in the afternoon just in time for lunch. Class was low key today, we ran through our drills (fire, man over board, and abandon ship). Before these drills though we did our daily reports. C watch had the science report and weather report. Madi and Kinga gave a pleasant presentation on Chaetognaths and Karma’s weather event was called “Horse Latitudes”. Similar to the doldrums Horse Latitudes got its name because when sailors got no wind they would have to throw the horses over board because they consumed too much water. These latitudes were around 30 degrees. We performed a little skit in which some of us refused to give up our horses which personally I thought was quite hilarious. Class finished and we devoured our snack for the day which was nachos.

            A little nap ensued before dinner and watch. Today my watch started JWO which pretty much allows for the students to lead and take control of the watch under close supervision. So Madi was acting as the MT (scientist in charge) and Kinga was acting as the Mate, all with a little guidance of course but those two did a great job. Evening watch always does galley clean up but also allows for time to get interrupted by the sunset. Today when we went up to look at the sunset we stumbled upon an intense game of butt wrestling. Now before you make a weird face and mutter to yourself “Their playing what?” Butt wrestling is more like those games where you stand on a bucket or wood stump and pull a rope to make your opponent step off. Butt wrestling was taught to our chief mate Eric 12 years ago, so a real veteran of the game. It includes two people with a piece of rope and they stand about 5 feet apart. Their feet are about 3 planks apart and they go back and forth tugging and giving slack to the rope and they can use their butt to get a bigger pull until one of them gets off balance and takes a step. I went down to finish up galley clean up and when I came back up the night seemed to be finishing off with tunes. Eric was on his guitar accompanied by Ira’s fiddle solos. Everyone was singing along and Madi, Karma, and I thought “ah what the heck the white board can wait.” After Hey Jude, Nine to Five, and many others it was time to get back to watch. Especially since we were right above the aft cabin and Captain Sean was trying to sleep. “Sorry cap but one can’t silence art.” All jokes aside, though, cap is the best and loves the tunes. Until me and Karma start doing moon dances as well things can get a bit much.

            Once we got back to watch activities it was pretty smooth sailing once again. We were tasked with fixing a white board that we use for class reports but it was a lost cause. For some science to happen (specifically our deployments) the boat has be either still or moving very slowly. In turn, some sail handling took place, we struck and furled the JT which took some cuss words but the whole process was enjoyable. After successfully gybing twice, led by Kinga, we got the neuston deployed around 2330. Unfortunately, we didn’t catch a shark in the neuston, again… I’ve been waiting to do that but people keep telling to a shark can’t fit in the net, (I know their lying). No shark is okay because the neuston was a party anyway. Bioluminescence was lighting the net up for 30 minutes straight. The last hour of watch consisted of processing the nightly surface station for pH, chlorophyll-a, and nitrates. After we turned over to A watch at 0100 we did a quick round of rose bud thorn and KNOCKED OUT.

Shout outs!

Miss you mom I hope work is calm and Alec and dad are emptying the dish washer. Dad, I miss you too and I’m sad we can’t constantly gossip about Iowa State’s upcoming march madness run, Go Cyclones! I love you and hope all is well. Alec, enjoy these last few months of senior year, mine were so amazing, good luck on Chicago you got this!

Olivia good luck with your capstone I hope the term ends on a high note and you get to do something for spring break. 24 days until the Appleton airport!

My Beloit and Lawrence brothers I miss you all as well hope life is has been good these past two weeks and you’ll get a call in a few days once we get to Wellington.

Eamonn Rougvie, C Watch, Lawrence University