Today was one of the most exciting days of the trip. At this point we made it all the way to Cape Cod and nearing the final destination of our trip, Woods Hole. And being in this part of the North Atlantic means there is a very high chance to see whales! The best way to be woken up in the morning is to somebody shouting “Whales!”. I have never made my way to the deck as fast as today. Everybody was crowded at the bow, looking and pointing in the distance. And then I saw a whale blow above the surface of the water and then a black back of a humpback whale followed it. Everybody was absolutely mesmerized by it. There were definitely several whales in the area and several times we could even see them showing their pectoral flippers (it looked like they were waving at us) as well as their flukes. I learned that all humpbacks have black and white pattern on their fluke which is unique to each individual. Later after we got back on shore, we contacted a local oceanographic institution and sent them the pictures of flukes that we managed to take and they helped us identify individual whales and even let us know their names, how old they were and where they have been seen last.
The flukes of two humpback whales we saw.
Later the same day, after taking a long nap, I was ready for the evening watch starting at 7pm. Today I was a Junior Watch Officer on deck. At the beginning of the watch I had a quick chat with the captain and she told me that our aim for tonight is to just stay within the green box that was outlined on the chart, because in the morning we would need to collect water samples in this area. Although it seems that just staying within an outlined area should be an easy task, it was not.
Sail handling on Corwith Cramer. “Main sheet haul away!”
There were so many different ways I could approach my task that I felt lost at first. I ended up deciding that we would sail on a beam reach (when wind is perpendicular to the movement of the ship) and gybe (turn) every time we would reach the boundary of the outlined box. It was taking us about an hour to get from one side of the box to another, so we had to turn quite often. But it was a great practice for me with calling the sails and directing my team during sailing maneuvers. At one point our watch officer, who was always around to make sure we were safe even towards the end of our trip when we were doing most things on our own, saw on a radar a lot of fishing pods in front of us. Usually in daylight it is possible to sail between them by carefully tracking where they are, but at nighttime with limited visibility it’s impossible.
Running over a pod can lead to it getting entangled to the ship which would cause unnecessary problems. So after I was told that we are quickly approaching area with fishing pods, as a Junior Watch Officer I needed to make a fast decision on how to avoid them. We ended up gybing and had to ask people working at the lab to help out with sail handling, to make sure it happens fast enough. For the rest of the night we had to keep a close track of radar to make sure we don’t approach fishing pods again.
Watching whales from the bow.
It was a stressful but also very interesting watch for me and I learned a lot about how important fast decision making is sometimes.
We are almost done with our cruise at this point, and the days have become bitter-sweet. It is hard to think about going back to normal life after such an incredible experience, but at the same time I want to make sure I get the most out of few days we have left on Cramer. I have learned so much about sailing, science, leadership, people around me and about myself. I am much better at tying knots now, as well as micro pipetting while trying to hold on to something to not fall when the ship hits another swell. And the ocean as well as wonderful people I got to know and live through this experience with, will always hold a special place in my heart.
