(Excerpts from Ship's Librarian, Rich Delbango)
Tuesday, August 3
We left St. John's last night in a hazy mist that turned into a dense fog by morning. The fog lingered most of the day. It started burning off above us, but a low fog clung to the ocean. It was weird. When you looked up there was sun and blue sky, but when you looked out, there was nothing but a gray mist. The air temperature in these Canadian waters has been rather cool, 65 -70°, a refreshing change from the hot Mediterranean. The ocean is fairly calm as we start to enter back into American waters off the coast of Maine. We're doing about 10 knots so we will get to NY in time. We'll be tracking by Cape Cod sometime later this week.
Today is the last day the library is open. I have to pack materials and supplies that are returning to shore and that is quite a bit. Even though most items remain on the ship, I still had over 40 boxes of stuff to go back last year. This year should be the same.
Monday, August 2
We sailed on in fog all day and finally reached St. John's about 17:00, right around dinner time. We maneuvered near the mouth of the harbor which was barely visible through the fog. Two peaks guard the narrow entrance to the harbor. While we waited for them to get the fast boat readied to take the cadet ashore, a whale swam around the ship to entertain us. The cadets were more excited by the fact they had cell phone service from shore than by the whale.
Finally, the patient made his appearance hobbling along with the aid of the two corpsmen. They got him into the boat and he, one of the corpsmen,two of the mates and two cadets were lowered into the water and headed to St. John's. We are still awaiting their return, and then we'll head south, past Nova Scotia and New England, to home.
Sunday, August 1
This morning we got the news that a cadet had broken his ankle... The doctor deemed it serious enough that it required getting him to a hospital ASAP. The injury was not so serious as to require an airlift, but serious enough to get him off the ship. There were two choices; turn around and go back to the Azores or proceed northwest of our track to the nearest port with medical facilities, St.John's, Newfoundland. The Captain decided that St John's would be our best bet for keeping on our timetable to get back home on the 7th. We made the turn and increased the ship's speed. We should arrive at St.John's late afternoon on Monday and anchor in the harbor. The two Navy medical corpsman on board will take the cadet ashore by launch and accompany him to the hospital. It is assumed that he will be staying there for treatment and then be flown home. We will then proceed home, hopefully arriving on-time. I'll keep you posted.
So, I'll get to see another part of this earth that I've never seen,Newfoundland. Newfoundland is Canada's eastern most province and its newest, having only joined Canada in 1949. It consists of the large island of Newfoundland and the mainland portion called Labrador. It is a huge, sparsely populated region with a rich maritime history. St. John's is the capital and most populous city. Strangely, off the coast of Newfoundland, are two tiny islands that are the last remains of France's North American colonial empire; St. Pierre and Miquelon. An odd thing about Newfoundland that will affect us tonight is that it is in its owntime zone that is 3 hours and 30 minutes less than Greenwich Mean Time. That means we set the clocks back 90 minutes tonight instead of the one hour we were supposed to. We'll have to make up the rest of the 30 minutes another night this week.
With all the excitement, our last Sunday at Sea continued as scheduled. It was a beautiful, sunny day. The barbecue that Chartwell's food service put on for us was as good as usual. Everyone enjoyed the food and the rest. Six days to go.
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