A day full of changes

Date: 10th October 2023
Position: Vigo, Port
Geographical position: 42°14.6 N 008°43.5 W
Etmal: 0 sm
Total: 778.9 sm
Ship: Pelican of London

The new watch system

Today was our first day in our new watch system. Although we are still in the port in Vigo where everything is different than at sea, we got split into three Watches, named after the three masts of the Pelican: Fore, Main, and Mizzen. Every watch consists of 10 up to 11 people, that are once again separated into A and B groups which have school together. In the new watch system, we will have four hours of watch a day and four hours of school. A big difference is also that now the rotation of watch duty changes every week and no longer every day, so we have the same watchtimes for a week.

A morning of food:

In the galley

For me (Klara), the day started at 06:40 where I was woken up to go to galley duty. It started as usual with setting breakfast but soon after, the 3.5t food delivery arrived, because of this Margot (our cook) left Noé, Rosalie, and myself alone to prepare lunch all by ourselves for 47 people. Luckily Rosalie and Noé are great cooks and I did my best to contribute by doing all the dishes and keeping everything tidy. But we quickly realized how much work it was, so Leah joined in to help us. Rosalie and Noé proved themselves, and the tomato sauce turned out perfectly, even the noodles were al dente and all this in a short amount of time. Everyone loved it so we were very motivated and did a deep clean in the kitchen afterwards…

In the dry store

Meanwhile, I (Lena) started this lovely, rainy day with Heads and Showers because it was my watch‘s duty to keep the toilets and bathrooms nice and tidy. To maintain the daily routine, we gathered in the Messroom for our morning meeting and because of the crew exchange, we got to know Captain Ben, the 1st Mate Ally, the Bosun‘s Mate Hanna, and Medic Steffan. After the delivery of this huge amount of food, we tried to stow everything away in the dry store which was quite a challenge because it was so much food for such a tiny space. When everything was in place, we were allowed to leave the Pelican and take a stroll ashore. We got the chance to try the traditional churros which were definitely worth waiting for in the rain.

Free shore leave:

In the afternoon and evening, we were allowed to go onshore in groups of three, so we could also eat dinner in Vigo… we had to be back at 19:45

Klaras view:

Sadly the weather was really bad but me and my group bought snacks, delicious baked goods and went to the post office. Later on we searched for a nice restaurant to eat, but we underestimated the Spanish eating traditions (no restaurant opened before 8 o’clock) and our Spanish speaking skills. In the end, we ended up in a cute little Taperia. Because we couldn’t really communicate with the waiter, we just asked for something Vegetarian and when he suggested a Toast we just said si si. In the end, we got a toast with caramelized onions, perks, and cheese. We were a little surprised, but it tasted very well. It was a great evening…

Greetings:

Klara: Helloo an alle zu Hause, ich hoffe, es geht euch gut. Hab‘ euch lieb❤️

Lena: Alles Gute Papa nachträglich zum Geburtstag, hab‘ euch alle lieb