Gulf of Biscay

Hey everyone!
We left Cherbourg on the 4th of November. Since then so many things have happened but I have completely lost track of time, so I’ll just tell what has roughly happened in the past week (4th November – 11th of November).
First of all, I am very proud to say that I am one of the few who hasn’t thrown up. I think there are only nine out of the 34 students here who haven’t thrown up. Because almost everybody was either throwing up, sleeping, or seasick the atmosphere wasn’t very cheerful. When you walk out the door of the common room there were usually one or two people throwing up. The trick was to look at the floor and not look around. I did however swallow a few car/sea/plane-sickness pills and in the beginning I much preferred sitting outside over being inside because I wasn’t feeling at my best. But after a day or two your body starts getting used to the fact that you’re constantly moving and now it’s I feel almost as good as I would on land. After a couple of days less and less people started feeling seasick, but of course this didn’t last. Yesterday or a day or two ago (as I said, I completely lost track of time) the sea and the wind started getting more aggressive. The wind was coming from the exact direction we were going, which is not very ideal in a sailing boat. Thus, we had to take down the sails and turn on the motor. Since moving forward and clashing into the waves was going to break the front part of the ship we had to basically lay still. For about the whole day we constantly sailed one or two knots. For those of you who don’t know how fast that is, well it basically means you’re not going anywhere. Till now the usual speed has been around the five or six knots.
The movement of the boat hasn’t only affected the people, but it has also affected the number of plates we have. At home you take a cup put it down, get your drink, pour the drink, leave your cup, put away your drink and find your drink where you left it. Well, in this ship that’s not exactly how it works. Let me tell you what has fallen on the ground over the past couple of days. First someone decided it was a good idea to stack plates ten high on an anti-slip table mat and leave them there. I was calmly sitting in the common room when I hear two plates fall, then a silence, and then another five plates fall to the floor. Yes, they almost all broke except for one plate which fell down the stairs and magically is still alive. This was quite amusing to watch, but not so funny for the people who had to clean it up.
At home you can calmly lie on your couch or sit in a chair; well from experience I can tell you that this is not the case. One day after my ‘wacht’ I decided to eat some pasta salad since I was hungry. I was sitting with two other people from my ‘wacht’ with my legs crossed on the wooden bench. A big wave came I screamed “oh no I am almost going to fall!” and there I was, on the floor being laughed at by the two other people I was sitting with. I was also once calmly lying on the couch when the pillows started moving of the wooden bench it is supposed to be on. So I decided it would be a good idea to stand up and push the pillows back, but with my unlucky timing a huge wave came and me and the pillows basically flew across the room into the other couch and I fell backwards back onto the pillows which were supposed to be on the couch. Yes, the whole room was laughing at me. But that was okay, I couldn’t stop laughing myself. These kinds of things are quite amusing especially when on a boat full of seasick people. However, I do have a couple of very blue bruises from these incidents. A lot more things have fallen to the floor such as ketchup, two buckets of yoghurt, laptops, and all other kinds of foods and drinks. I wonder if I get so used to the movement of the ship, that when I am on land I have the urge to hold everything that can break or fall.
Being at sea also has some major perks, one of them being that we saw plenty and plenty of dolphins. Dolphins are much more beautiful and cool to see then I expected. Most of the time they are in groups of four or five and the come to the front of the ship and swim along with us. This makes it seem as though they are trying to protect us. The dolphins also don’t swim very deep underwater, so you can see from the ship how they swim. It is absolutely amazing. Especially when they jump out of the water, it is just like you see in movies or other TV shows.
Another thing that was really cool was that I talked to a big ship which passed us. It was a Dutch ship, which was carrying containers of salt from Morocco to the Netherlands for the winter. This was kind of funny since I remember last year there was too little salt in the Netherlands for on the roads. We also told him about what we’re doing and just like everybody else he was very intrigued about our journey.
I also did something else that was really exciting. A knot went loose in the sail which was up quite high and it needed to be tied again. The tie that had to be made is a ‘paalsteek’, I don’t know what is called in English, but it’s quite complicated. I, being able to do that, was allowed to make the knot. First I had to get something that looked like a swing and wear one of those climbing belts. Then I had to sit in the swing. The swing was attached to a rope which went all the way to the top of the sail and all the way back down. Two or three people had to pull me up. So there I was hanging ten meters above the ground, in a swing looking seat, on a sailing ship. It was quite cool. But of course I still had to make the knot into the sail however the knot had to be upside down from the way I normally make it. I got quite confused and a bit nervous. Luckily, after a few tries I got the knot right and without any scratches our bruises I was let back down to the ground.
I spend day and night with the people on this boat; however you don’t truly get to know about their life at home since of course we all can’t relate to each other lives because we don’t know each other’s friends, parents, sister, brothers, etc. This could also be because we have only been with everybody here for about two weeks. However, you do really get to know the people you are in the ‘wacht’ and I especially get to know my “roomies”. One of them has become probably my best friend on the ship. This is really nice to have because now I kind have someone to confide in and also talk about what life is like back at home. However, there are some people on the boat I would really like to get to know better, but since you have a really different day rhythm then the people outside of your ‘wacht’ you don’t get to speak to them very much. But I’m not worried about, since ‘wachts’ will change and so do the rooms.
- Meilin