Leaving the Faroes, Thursday Sept. 13
I’ve had some email question asking about the ship, requesting some pictures of the interior and some more about the daily routine.
Port side of the galley and dining area
You need to know that we are not on watch when moored but only when at sea. Breakfast is usually around 7 so that the 8am watch can eat before their watch. The 4am to 8am watch also eats then with a couple of permanent crew standing watch in their place and then switching before the 8am watch comes on. Breakfast is done by 8 and if you’re not on watch and sleep in, you lose. Same rules apply when moored, sleep in and go hungry. Breakfast is Dutch cheese and salami, hot porridge, freshly baked bread that has risen overnight, fruit and something hot, pancakes or french toast. There’s always a jug of tea and of coffee and cookies and fruit available all day and all night when at sea.
Lunch is at 1pm and is leftovers from a previous dinner reconfigured into something hot and/or hot soup. Cheese, salami and bread also feature, as they do at every meal. The 12pm watch switches with permanent crew for their lunch and then switches back so that the permanent crew can eat.
Dinner is 7:30 and is a stew with rice or mashed potatoes, or pasta; two pot meals plus a salad.
There is no alcohol served when at sea but when moored there is beer or wine available for dinner; interestingly very little is consumed, a beer or glass of wine with dinner being the norm. The usual switching occurs so that the watch on duty can eat when at sea.
Food is good but institutional and runs to Dutch comfort food, no bad thing when you’re cold and wet. Since we have four vegetarians on this trip, every meal has an option available for them.
Starboard side of the galley. It’s amazing to think that in this relatively small space food for 15 people is prepared and served.
My cabin. Much darker in reality, I had to bump the ISO to 8000 to get these shots.
The cabins are small, about 2.5 metres by 3 metres and are designed for 2 people in an upper and lower bunk. I’m extremely fortunate that since we are one person short on the voyage, I have a cabin to myself. I’m infinitely grateful that things worked out this way, can’t imagine how two people could navigate the space and store their kit.
Each cabin has its own bathroom, the bathroom a small room, about the size of a shower stall, is in fact a shower stall with a built-in toilet. There is a drain in the floor of the little booth. All required bodily needs fulfilled in 1.5 square metres!
Some one asked why I don’t post every day. Easy, there is no internet on board. I have a very good roaming plan with Bell and I use my phone in Hotspot mode as my link to the internet so when we’re in reach of phone coverage, I have internet and can use my laptop to edit pictures and post to the blog. Because there is such good phone coverage in Iceland and the Faroes, even 25k offshore I can still get a couple of bars on my phone, I’m able to post. However just because I have internet access doesn’t necessarily mean that I can post the blog. The second critical requirement is a relatively stable table or desk to work on without fear that with the next roll of the ship, the laptop won’t be thrown across the room. Neither of these requirements was met on our passage from Reykjavik to Torshavn and since we casting off for the Shetlands tomorrow morning I won’t be able to post again until we reach Lerwick in the next couple of days. Winds are supposed to be favourable, but who knows?
Did some laundry in a bucket in my shower stall this morning, I brought some camping laundry liquid with me, and because its been raining all morning I draped clothing on various deck fittings so that the rain would wash the soap out. Going out now to squeeze everything dry and wait for the sun and wind on tomorrow’s passage to dry everything out.
I’ll catch up on the other side.
