Now that the skies have cleared, the seas have calmed, and the activity level of the passengers has picked up again, “What? “ You might ask, “Do you do all day long on a ship in the middle of the ocean.” The answer is, “Lots!”

Our day usually begins with a trip to the bridge to check on the night’s progress, the current speed of the ship , whether we are under sail or (heaven forbid) having to use the engines, and of course to make sure the captain has us going in the right direction.

Some days we are up before the sun and then we watch enthralled by the quietly beautiful sunrises –

 “Mornings at seven, the grass is dew pearled. God’s in his heaven all’s right with the world.”

Once we have made sure all is right with our world, Tom heads for his computer time – internet access is very difficult and if you have any hopes of getting on, it will be early before most passengers are up. I head for Tai Chi with Captain Sergey (Sare-gay).

Our captain is multi-talented – martial arts, Tai Chi, plays acoustical guitar, sings, as well as being an excellent sailor with a PHD in maritime physics. He is also very friendly and loves to sit and chat with the passengers. Anyway, he leads Tai Chi at 7:15 each morning.

Then I join Tom for a quick 2 – 3 mile jaunt around the sun deck. I probably should say “around and around and around the sun deck since one lap around is a tenth of a mile so it takes 20 to 30 laps.

Storms are often visible on the horizon and occasionally we are delighted by distant rainbows as we walk.   

After working off some of the calories that we are about to consume, we head down to breakfast where we eat and chat with different people each day. We now have friends from Australia, Belgium, Germany, Netherlands, England, Canada, Scotland, Japan,.., so there is a lot of chatting to do.

At ten there is usually story time by the captain or one of the officers.

Story time is usually true tales of the sea – rogue waves, hurricanes, methane sea bubbles; or the physics of sailing –square rigs versus triangular sails, the mathematics of hull length to ship speed, really pretty interesting stuff.  

After that Tom and I head up to the bowsprit and the widow maker for some net time.

Lying in the netting watching the clouds and the waves go by, listening to the power of the ocean and feeling the rocking of the ship, the warmth of the sun and the cool breezes – it doesn’t get much better than this.

After lunch there is reading/chatting/blogging time in the piano bar or sun time on deck. There is usually some activity at 2:00 – mast climbing ,

  the Clipper Olympics (a fierce 5 day event), the Neptune Festival (very bizarre).(More about these later.) 

At 3:30 we go to the forward lounge for Joe’s (a passenger on our voyage who is a retired history professor and an expert on Columbus) 4:00 lecture on the voyages of Christopher Columbus. I know, it sounds pretty boring, but was fascinating enough to get there half an hour early each day in order to get a good seat. There was not one day of the twelve lectures that didn’t have a full house. The lectures were really very interesting and the fact that we were sailing pretty much the same route that Columbus sailed added to the intrigue.

After the lecture Tom was off to sun and read and I usually found a quiet spot to do yoga.

6:00 –Some evenings the timing is right to catch the sunset. As the sun sinks into the ocean, a peace settles over the ship – breath takingly beautiful. 

Time to get cleaned up so that we can go again to eat and commune with our friends – another 1 to 1 ½ hour session of eating and conversation. A great way to learn about the world we share with such a variety of people.

After dinner there are usually evening activities, but they start at 10:00 and since our mornings start around 6:00AM we usually head up to the bridge to sit, rock and watch the star filled sky for a bit before calling it a day. Sleep comes quickly with the dark cabin, the sound of the ocean outside our porthole, and the rocking of the ship.

Good night,

Charli