Heading Home

(Excerpts from Ship's Librarian, Rich Delbango)

Saturday, July 31st
This time next Saturday we will all be home. It'll only been 6 weeks for me, but some on board have been away for 3 months. The crossing home so far has been spectacular. Warm weather, light seas, you couldn't ask for better conditions. The clouds broke last night and millions of stars were visible in the sky above the dark ocean. The Milky Way stretched across the sky. Today is equally as beautiful. You can't get too complacent at sea though, it will kill you. The ocean can turn into a roaring nightmare at the drop of a hat.
By the end of this cruise, I will have spent 6 months of my life at sea. That seems like a lot to me, but nothing to some of the "old timers" onboard who have spent years on water. Even Vinnie, the guy who runs the Ship's Store and hardly a professional mariner, has done 30 of these cruises. That's almost 5 years at sea. It's a hard life that these cadets are choosing. Being away from home and loved ones takes its toll. Some will never go to sea again, some will do a few cruises and drop out for shore jobs, but some will do this their whole lives sacrificing a "normal"life to do what they love.

Friday, July 30th
I had two treats this morning. The first, when I headed down to breakfast was the sight of LAND! Capt. Smith had taken us on a track between the two westernmost islands of the Azores, Flores and Corvo. I thought the sight of the cliffs of Brest would be the last land I would see until Montauk Point. It was nice to see the peaks of these volcanoes sticking up through the blue ocean. There is something reassuring about seeing terra firma while at sea, even if you don't land there.

The next treat was, when I opened the library, it was downright COOL. The temperature had dropped 10° from closing last night to a chilly 68°.

Thursday, July 29th
Everyone on the ship has settled back into their routine. The classes are in review mode getting prepared for finals. The last painting will start soon with a fresh new coat of green on the decks. The ship will look mighty spiffy when we arrive back at the fort.

The seas have been calm. No storms ahead in the foreseeable forecast. The weather is warm and cloudy most days, much to the chagrin of those cadets that still have to "shoot some stars" for their celestial navigation assignments. People are still checking out books even though they only have a week to read them. I myself have gone through 6 books including the 1,000 page tome"Dreadnaught" that I have been putting off reading. It's nice not to have the distractions of TV and the internet for a while.

Tuesday, July 27th
The coast of France is behind us and only the open sea is ahead. We left Brest at 10:30 Monday morning. The weather was cool and drizzly.

Now we're back on the Atlantic heading home. As soon as we got to the open ocean we hit a thick fog that lasted most of the day. Thank God the radar's working. The drone of the ship's fog horn cut eerily through the "soup" for hours. By evening it began to clear, but the afternoon's planned lifeboat drill was cancelled. I knew that they'd probably have it in the morning, so I prepared for such. I was right. At 08:30 the alarm rang.

One nice thing was that we crossed into another time zone last night. That means we gained an extra hour's sleep. I'm getting back all of the hours Joe lost sailing over here. We're only 5 hours ahead now and will probably gain and hour every other night.

The cadets are scrambling to finish their work. Teachers are preparing their finals for next week. 11 days to go and counting.