Dear Dad,

Happy Birthday! Another year older, but never seeming to slow down. Did you ever think you would be here?

Congratulations, the acceptance letters have arrived and you’ve been accepted to your school of choice… with one caveat. They don’t have room for you until the spring term.

Before you lose heart and settle for your second choice, remember that this is a regular practice and needn’t affect your overall college experience. In fact, it could be a great opportunity.

The second to last field day of the voyage is scheduled for today, but as I have learned with life aboard, the schedule is always subject to change. Since I am part of A watch, that means I have the joy of cleaning every surface and dish in the galley.

We started a new phase in our watch-standing, having departed Port Antonio, Jamaica a little over twenty-four hours ago.  Now we begin what is called the shadow phase on board, in which a student is selected from the deck team to “shadow” the mate during the entire watch, listening closely to all of the information, as well as calling the set and strike of sails and other maneuvers (with some guidance). We switched the watches as well, so it is a big change on two fronts.

At this moment in time, I am certain of three things:

1) There is no better place to watch the sunset than on the ocean, - with friends - on top of the Elephant Table.
2) Community is everything.
3) Ginger beer is (and always has been) better than Ting.

Today is the beginning of the end for S-283; we began the last leg of our voyage from Napier to Auckland. It is simultaneously bittersweet and exciting to think about how far we’ve come. This morning, all hands were on deck to help us get underway.

During a cruise with SEA Semester, there are many truly amazing things that happen and (for some reason) they always get all the attention on the blog. So this blog post is about a mundane comfort on the ship that is hardly ever mentioned. The title requires an explanation.

Greetings from the Corwith Cramer!

SEA Expedition Session I has arrived safely in Boston! We were lucky to find many family members waiving excitedly as we emerged from the thick fog.

Ahoy!

Day four here on the SSV Corwith Cramer.  Today we finally left anchor, and are taking on the open ocean!  A relatively relaxing day here, filled with sunny skies and a gentle breeze from the south-east. After a fantastic breakfast of cheesy grits and a spread of fruit, we embarked on our daily watches and learned all about Neuston Booms with J-bear (our first scientist).

Hi Everyone! My name is Rosie Wigglesworth and I’m bringing you the 6th installment of the S-281 blog series!  We’re almost a week and a thousand nautical miles into our journey.