Hello from our last stop before England – Morocco!
I will blog soon about the trip itself, but I thought I’d share some cute family photos taken over the last few days before we head out this evening for our last stretch at sea. There is even one with me in it.
As I write this we are stopped for 8 hours in the Spanish Canary Islands to refuel. We are looking at a very pretty island, but we are not allowed to disembark. After about 10 days at sea already, with two more to go to Morocco, this is making everyone a tad bit crazy. The kids are bored and restless, which rubs off on the adults. The routine is becoming, well, routine. Alas, we will miss it as soon as it’s over, which is sooner than I would like.
As I mentioned, two days until Morocco. The academics on board are at a fever pitch. The students are all completing projects and preparing for finals, and the faculty are frantically trying to grade all these assignments that seemed like a good idea to assign back last fall… Personally, how I thought I could grade 31 final papers, and 91 final exams in the (very few) days between Morocco and England I will never understand… students are not the only ones losing sleep.
All in all, as this voyage draws to a close and we prepare for our family time in Europe, I am wistful. This was an incredible experience, and honestly, I can’t wait to do it again. Perhaps when one of the kids is a college student on board?
As we haven’t left the ship in awhile, I thought I’d post some crazy pictures from the Sea Olympics. Here are Jack and I in our star turns during the lip synch contest. Jack is grooving to “I like to move it, move it” and I am channeling Iggy Azalea with “Fancy”. It was a blast! The Faculty and Staff team won that contest, so we did something right!
We travelled this week up and down the western coast of Namibia. It’s a odd place, and one of the few in the world where the desert (here, the Namib) actually reaches straight to the ocean. There isn’t a border of mountains, or forest, between desert and ocean. As a result, it’s bleak, but also beautiful.
From our port town of Walvis Bay (where there is a beautiful flamingo colony you can see here) we took a trip into the massive sand dunes that lay right behind the town. The picture here is of Joe and the rest of our friends climbing Dune 7, which is popular to hike (and then run down screaming) but isn’t even the largest one around.
We also visited Swokpmund, which is a town built by German colonists and Namibia slaves in the early 1900’s. We learned on the ship about the genocide of the Hereo people here, which many historians consider almost the model for the concentration camps and the Holocaust of World War 2. Germans set up camps here, and slave labor, and about 65% of the local population was killed. It’s a history most of us don’t learn, and it’s a major issue here, with local people divided over issues such as reparations. And yet, if you didn’t know this history, you wouldn’t realize it in the town, which is now a cute tourist beach town…
Most of our time here was spent in Skeleton Coast National Park. It’s a very desolate landscape, with lots of wrecks in the sand. But it’s not only shipwrecks, although there are plenty of those. There are also wrecks of failed human attempts to do something in this barren place, such as abandoned diamond mines, and abandoned oil rigs, just rusting into the desert. Quite eerie.
The area is also home to the seal colony at Cape Cross. How to describe the smell of somewhere between 100,000 and 500,000 Cape Fur Seals in a colony? Astringent, harsh, awful… impossible I think. Even with the smell, this was really a highlight for all of us. We were here during the time when the new babies are still drinking milk from mum, and the experience of seeing them up close was just incredible. In Joe’s words: maximum cuteness! Unfortunately, our lodge (the only dwelling for miles around) was a kilometer away. Why unfortunately, you may ask? Well, the smell doesn’t travel that long, but the dead baby seals do. Sometime has gone wrong with the plankton this year, and more of the babies are dying out. They wash up on the beach, and at times there were 10-20 in view of our balcony. Well, they are there until the jackals and hyenas and gulls come to eat them. I realize nature keeps everything in balance, but it was a little difficult to watch…
We are now at sea for 12 long days. The mood on the ship is a little down, because there is a lot of work for the students, but also because it’s clear now the voyage is ending soon, with only Morocco and a final stop in England coming up. For our family, that simply means transitioning into our “Europe” phase, but we will also really miss the community here. We’ve all made new friends, as a total living immersion will do, and we will miss them!
Just arrived in port of Walvis Bay, Namibia. Looking forward to five great days here. Meanwhile, sharing some more random South Africa pictures.
No time for a blog – just sharing some pictures from safari!
We had a wonderful visit to South Africa. After a day in Capetown, we took a trip clear across the south, from the Western to the Eastern Cape. The route is called the Garden Route, and we stopped along the way, in Botlieskop Nature Reserve, Tsikamma National Park, and finally in Port Elizabeth, where we visited Addo National Park. Our final day in Capetown we spent in the Boulder’s Beach area, where African penguins were abundant, and nesting.
The Garden Route trip was simply spectacular. We encountered elephants, both in the wild (where we kept our distance), and in a rescue sanctuary (where we were able to feed them, touch them, and walk “hand in truck” with them). From the protection of a jeep, we got close to wild lions, rhinos, warthogs, giraffes, cape buffalo, and more types of antelopes than I can list here. And, of course, the penguins. We also had some of the best food of the voyage so far, and stayed in glorious places, including luxury “tents” that were fancier than many hotels in which we typically stay.
And, a huge leap forward for Joe: he finally went zip lining! He had a blast, as we knew he would. We zipped through the upper canopy of 600 year old trees, some as high as 30 meters up. It was so much fun, for all of us.
I haven’t read the boys’ blogs yet, but I am sure they will talk a lot about the animals, so instead of posting animal pictures here, I thought I’d post some nice family shots we got here in South Africa. Many of the beaches were spectacular, so I’ve combined some scenery in with some nice shots of everyone.
I took more than 500 pictures in South Africa (well, I actually took about 700, but kept 500 in the end). So I may just have to make another blog post with scenery shots. South Africa was one of the highlights so far, for sure. Our plans in Namibia also center around animals and beaches, so we are already getting excited about that. Speaking of Namibia, one of the founders of the Republic (and the man who named the country Namibia, actually) joined our voyage in South Africa and will be travelling with us until we arrive. His talk last night was really informative, as many of us (myself included) do not know much at all about the country. We are really interested to experience it when we arrive…
Okay, let me try this again. When I blog via email, the pictures occasionally get blocked.
Well, as you may surmise from the boys’ blogs, the trip to Mauritius was a little… odd.
The ship really just docked there for a fuel stop, so we had about 8 hours off the ship. Our sightseeing trip included a racist guide from Germany, a broken AC system on the bus, and numerous other aspects that made it a less than ideal day. In retrospect, it was so bad it is becoming a very funny story. However, the island is gorgeous, and we saw some truly beautiful places in a very short time. I’ve included some pictures here so you can see it too!
How to describe this? Sea Olympics is a ship-wide event. The students are in colour houses based on where their cabins are. And the “Sea-Celebrities” team was made up of Ship Kids, Faculty and their spouses, Staff, and Lifelong Learners. As a result, our team age ranged from 3 to about 80 or so. Events included sports such as volleyball (my event) and dodgeball (Dan’s event), but also mental events like Concentration (Jack seen here with his partner) and Jeopardy, artististic events such as the team Banner competition and a short film contest (we won this, but of course we have the ship videographer, and a documentary filmmaker on our team), and also just plain odd events, such as the Frozen t-shirt contest, where teams had to use body heat to melt a frozen shirt. (Jack hugging his teammate in the picture, with the t-shirt between them). For some teams, this took up to an hour, a really painful hour. Although we don’t have pictures, Joe and his partner Summer did well in Battleship, which is not the board game, but two people on each side, one a captain and one a blindfolded “ship” (that was Joe). The captain yells out commands, and the idea is to hit the other team’s blindfolded ship with a ball that you throw. It was hilarious to watch! Joe was also on the winning “Minute to Win It” team.
And the final event, which we actually won, was the team lip synch. We did a mash-up of the evolution of music, and some of us did solos in front of back-up dancers. Jack was a huge hit with his solo, “I like to move it, move it”, as you can see in these pictures.
The Sea-lebrities came in 4th of 8, which is not bad for a bunch of old farts. It helps that we had a very flexible 4 year old competing in the limbo!
Dan and I are now the parents of a teenager…
Jack celebrated his 13th birthday abroad the MX Explorer. It was a unique setting, but we still followed the normal birthday “script” as much as we could. We were able to order a special ice-cream birthday cake from the kitchen, and he shared that with all the “ship kids” during their afternoon enrichment session. We bought him SAS-opoly, a Semester at Sea version of Monopoly that is really popular among the kids on board. We also got him a SAS bandana, which he nows wears constantly. Not sure how I feel about that….
Homemade cards, and a family dining experience in the more intimate “special dining” on the ship, rounded out the day.
Not much of a blog, really, but I wanted to share some pictures, as a continued celebration of Jack!
We spent our last few days in India continuing to explore the state of Kerala, which is in the south-west of India. Ahead of our trip, I did know that Kerala has both a very diverse religious population, as well as a strong history of communism and socialism. But I was still really struck by the number (and sheer size) of the Christian churches throughout the area. It was remarkable to see such small villages supporting such large churches. Our driver began our trip pointing some of them out, but then gradually stop mentioning them (I think he was afraid of boring us!). And the kids were struck by the presence of hammer and sickle-themed graffiti, plus advertisements featuring Che and other revolutionaries and/or communist figures. We all enjoyed the fact that many signs for the Communist Party of India Marxist (CPIM) looked a lot like CRIM, especially from a distance. As these signs seemed to be everywhere, sprayed onto town walls and fences, the boys joked about the graffiti welcome they had to each town.
The pictures here are from our houseboat trip in the Allepey backwaters area, and our stay in a beautiful beach resort on Marari Beach (that is our cottage in the background of one of the pictures). The Indian Ocean was warm to swim in, and offered excellent waves in the early morning. Strong undertow though, and we ended our beach trip with one less pair of sunglasses (washed away) and one black and blue toe (goofy story of clumsiness in the strong surf, so of course it was me).
This port was a relaxing and wonderful family event. This is the first port we explored entirely on our own, as a family. Also the first port where we stayed primarily in less urban areas. As exciting as the cities in Asia have been so far, it was very nice to have some calm, serene time with bird sounds, gorgeous views, and quiet. Oh, and some of the best food I have ever eaten…
June, Dan, and Joe go travelling 