An ordinary Sunday on the Atlantic

We are now halfway across the Atlantic! But since we’re in the middle we don’t see very much except sea. A bird and some flying fish here and there is all sign of life other than us. Some might think that’s kind of boring, but during our night watches, when we don’t have any work on the boat to do, we sometimes tell each other stories and sing songs. And then at least I actually enjoy being in the middle of the Atlantic.

The day started as any other day at sea. We in midships were woken up at 3:30 am to take over the watch at 4 am. It was a pretty calm watch and not much happened. We practiced to furl the main sail on the main mast. The first time we furled it took 50 minutes, but now we are down on 32 minutes. Because we did so good we got 5 minutes longer coffee break, where they served banana cake. Delicious!

After we got off the watch some of us ate breakfast. Then we got some rest until around 14:30 when it was time for a safety drill like every Sunday. When the alarm went off we got up on deck and lined up in our watches like we always do. But as soon as the safety drill started we were sent back to our cabins to ”go to sleep”. Then the alarm went off again and they turned off all the lights and closed the hydrogen doors. We had to get out through the emergency exits. Everyone did great and was out on deck in under three minutes. We got credit by the Captain because we stayed so calm during the whole drill. And so the safety drill was over.

After the general meeting on half deck we in midships had another four hours of watch where we scraped rust of the bollards and some other maintenance work before we were allowed to finally go to bed for the day.

Hilda Brun, midships