How to tack and wear - Ocean College

Ship: Johnny
Date: 07.01.2025
Position: Porvenir, San Blas Islands
Nautical Position: 09 Grad 33,0’N / 078 Grad 41,2’W
Etmal: 16 nm

Today started really chill. Some of us slept outside on deck under the stars, but this time without getting wet. After breakfast, we all had to go on deck for all hands because we wanted to get moving.

Sail Training

Now we get to the part that took us the whole day: Tack and wear. But what is a tack? A tack is when you turn into the wind to change direction. A wear, on the other hand, is when you turn away from the wind.

You use both tactics to sail in the direction of the wind. The captain wanted us to practice it the entire morning until everybody had been at every station on his watch and everything went perfectly. Our watchleaders guided their groups the whole time.

After lunch, four of us got the chance to take on the position of the captain and give commands to everybody. Finally, the entire ship was sailed by students.

After all of this, we were finally where we wanted to be and could anchor next to a small island next to the Thor Heyerdahl. It didn’t take long before the first little boats came to us with locals, who showed us pretty bracelets, shirts, kitchen towels and other stuff.

It turned into a real flea market on the foredeck. They were all really nice and considerate. Some of the people from the Thor Heyerdahl also swam over to see the market.

After a long day of tacking and wearing, it was finally time for dinner. But because it was so hot in the mess room, we were allowed to eat on deck for the first time.

From our place, we had the perfect view to see some dolphins hunting flying fish. Both of them were really fast and jumped out of the water to catch the fleeing fish from each other.

After we watched the dolphins, we were allowed to watch a movie, so we decided on Pirates of the Caribbean. Special thanks to Litti and Nele, who made popcorn and smoothies for everyone.

Greetings

Jana: An Papa, ich bin gestern endlich den Mast ganz hoch geklettert, war sehr anstrengend, aber hat sich so gelohnt. Dachte, das interessiert Dich. Hab‘ euch alle ganz doll lieb, Kuss Kuss!