After a short visit to Tahiti, Raiatea, Taha’a and finally Bora Bora, Europa departed from the Society Islands, and heart of the Polynesian triangle, on July 10th, traveling west with the trade winds towards the kingdom of Tonga. We have now been at sea for ten days and still have a couple more days to go until we see land and the island of Vava’u, our next destination. Apart from one lonely fishing vessel on the far horizon spotted on the second night of our crossing, we have been mostly alone in this vast ocean. We know we are making good way to the west as the sunset and sunrise occur later every day.
The routine has settled on board and each day tends to fade into the next one. It is at times difficult to keep track of the date, or remember how long we have been at sea. To further complicate things, we are about to cross the international dateline which will make us travel instantly one day into the future. That means we will never experience next Sunday. Or will it be next Monday? I suppose it all depends on the wind from now on and the exact time Europa will actually cross this imaginary line. Here, offshore with very limited communications to land, the names of the days don’t really matter. Monday morning very much looks like Sunday morning. Instead, we name days by what they were made of.
The day we spotted a couple of whales surfacing as we were enjoying our morning coffee (not quite sure of the species, potentially fin whales).
The day we reached our maximum speed under sail so far (9.5 knots).
The day the wind suddenly dropped, giving us a great opportunity to pause and swim by 5,500m of depth in the bluest ocean (highly energizing for the crew).
The day our talented chefs prepared a sublime chocolate and coffee fondant to celebrate the birthdays from a couple of our voyage crew members (actually every day, some sort of magic is coming up from the galley).
The day the permanent crew organized a pin rail race for us to learn and remember the gazillion lines making up Europa’s rig (under simulated category 5 storm).
The day our captain and a couple of crew members improvised a concert on the main deck (our voyage was gifted with two violinists and one guitarist).
The day our plastic sampling trawl accidentally caught a juvenile sword/needle fish (note from the scientist on board: there was never a trawl deployed since our departure that did not retrieve a piece of plastic, even in this pristine-looking ocean).
The day we were hit by several squalls (free showers for everyone handling sails on deck)
The day we projected a movie at night onto one of our sails (with complementary popcorn).
The day, a brown booby landed on top of our mizzen mast to accompany us for a part of our voyage (still perched up there at the time of writing).
I look forward to tomorrow and to discovering what the new day has to offer.
Never a dull day on Europa.