After a long, chilly night complete with lots of seasickness, A Watch was up at 6:20 for breakfast, with watch starting at 7.  Almost immediately, we ran into a large patch of fog that hung around until noon.  As we approached Sambro Harbor, we had to strike all the sails and prepare the anchor.

Once the deck was cleaned up and the anchor was set, we had a little time for lunch, clean-up and a short class.  We’re staying anchored here until tomorrow, so A Watch has the deck from 2300-0300 (today’s been a long day). I’m on watch with Paul 2300-0100, and Saphra is on with Tim from 0100-0300.  Paul has started pointing out some of the major stars used in celestial navigation- the sky is much darker here than I’m used to so I could see stars here that I can’t usually and I can see the Milky Way pretty clearly too.
 
“Only days to go” were some of the last words my parents said to me during our final phone call for the next month. It will be my longest time away from home at one given period and it was a strange and emotional end to being on land. Even though we had the time on the ship going from New Haven to Halifax, this journey seemed to be THE journey. All that preparation and our time at Mystic Seaport seemed a lifetime away. The first day back at sea, just like the very first, was hard or impossible to predict but of course it ended up being pretty tough. Just as many expected, a huge rush of seasickness came over many of the crew, me included. Focus your mind on something for a split second and everything’s ok, thinking you’ve been playing cruel mind games with yourself but then your stomach turns and you cannot wait for everything to end. Many, many, many people have experienced seasickness so this is nothing new or different, but it definitely feels like it when going through it. What I constantly end of asking myself is how, how HOW could the Amistad captives possibly have been able to have survived through it?! We’re here with ginger ale on a spacious breezy deck with the comforting hand on our back, still feeling the worst we have ever felt. Being on board experiencing things like this really makes you reflect. 

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