Swimcall with 2000 meters of water below

Geographic Position: 19.24°N 81.50°W
Ship: Pelican of London
Date: 3rd of March 2024
Total: 7303nm
Etmal: 20nm

Drifting in the Caribbean

After the decision from yesterday to not stay at anchor and go to sea to empty out our grey water tanks, we stared drifting with the wind and swell, to not burn diesel unnecessarily.

During the night, we had watches the way we do when we’re at anchor, but the captain decided that we only needed two people at the bridge for two hours each, to keep a lookout. It was my turn from 00:00 to 02:00 with Gonzo and Samuel and it was very relaxing.

Science Pathway Project

Today, the Science Pathway met up at 13:00 to make some measurements of the phytoplankton in the ocean. For that, we dropped a plate in the water, watched as it disappeared and measured the depth of the visibility in the water. This tells us how much phytoplankton there is in the ocean. The data is going to be put in the Secchi app for someone else to use.

Swimcall!!!!

In the morning meeting at 08:45 today, our first mate Ali told us that we can have a swim at 15:00. Everybody got excited because we were in the middle of the ocean and at least 30 miles around here is nothing but water. The water here is very deep, around 2000 meters. So it was kind of a mid-Atlantic swim, but just in the Caribbean.

Opinions about today’s swim:

Karl: The swim was very, very cool. It was a bit of a weird feeling because under you was 2000 metres of nothingness, but it was great.

Anna L.: The swim was absolutely amazing. It’s crazy to be in water this clear and if you wear goggles you only see blue. I would have expected to see black, but it was all blue! In the end, I was just sitting on the capping rails because it’s the only opportunity to do that. Overall it was an amazing hour of swimming.

Erik: As I was swimming I was a bit scared because there’s 2000 metres of blue nothingness beneath you. But it was super fun and the water was so clear you could basically see 20 metres far. The only bad thing was that the current made you need to swim constantly.

Sophie: It was amazing. Normally I would worry about what could be under me but weirdly I didn’t. When I looked under me I just saw blue. It was crazy. I would always do it again.

Julius: It was great. You only could see the ship underwater and just blue, blue, and blue water. I enjoyed it so much.

P.S.: Hallöchen alle zusammen! Ich hoffe euch geht es gut im kalten Deutschland (wir ham 27 Grad Wassertemperatur) und ihr erfriert nicht. Ich hab‘ ein bisschen Schiss, dass ich erfriere, wenn ich wiederkomme…. 😉 Liebe Grüße an meine Familie, ~Julius