Sim going aloft to hang the Christmas lights on tonight's sunset sail.

Clark Griswold would be proud! Gearing up for the lighted boat parade tomorrow night.

Busy sailing to Nantucket a few weeks ago. Now that I'm set up with mobile blogging y'all wont miss a second of my crazy life! You asked for it Hevver! :-)

Hustling bustling long wharf harbor!

Go away derigible devil!

aloha from Boston!

I'm working on the schooner liberty Clipper! Having a ball! More to come I promise!

Big News

Stay tuned...

Happy Day!

Not only does it finally feel like a chilly winter Key West morning, (which means that it should warm up to a cool 67 degrees in the "heat" of the day) but my new rigging knife came in the mail!!! WOOO HOOOOOOOOOOOOO! Isn't it cute? Leopard print bone handle... surgical steel... and it came with a leather sheath! Oh and did I mention we don't have to work till 12:30??? Gonna take a shower and walk back to the boat. :)

Uh oh!

Everyone is safe and the boat is fine. They look to repair her in a few days and continue north. This was copied from the Amistad facebook page...

-----As we reported earlier a rigging failure in heavy seas diverted the Schooner Amistad to Port Canveral in Florida! The Amistad experienced a rigging failure while sailing heavy seas on April 14th off the Florida Coast resulting in an emergency call to Port Canaveral. The ship commanded by Cpt. Sean Bercaw reached safel...y the harbor through the night and docked in the morning of April 15th in Port Canaveral.

The failure of a metal fitting holding two bobstays to the bowsprite was caught by Captain Bercaw while developing and a quick change of course and immediate stabilization of the compromised rigging have prevented the ship from any further damage to the rigging.

A very similar failure of a bowsprite rigging resulted in dismasting of another Baltimore Clipper - the Pride of Baltimore II while sailing in Bay of Biscay on September 5th in 2006.---


Horrifying! I personally spoke to a crew member and they said the rig did not come down and they caught the broken pieces early, no big dramatic event took place or anything like that and the crew was headed to dinner with the CEO of the company... On that note...

HERE is a link to a really good news story from when we were in Cuba.

In other news, I got paid from Quinnipiack! On the day I was told I would be, in the full amount I was promised, directly into my bank account! I LOVE THIS COMPANY!

Picture above: Me teaching Univ. of Mass. student Jaresiah Desrosiers how to clean a Mahi Mahi on board the Amistad in between Great Inagua, Bahamas and Matanzas, Cuba.

HELLO FROM SUNNY (but cold) NEW ENGLAND!

I apologize for abandoning my blog for so long but things have been crazy, hectic, emotional and wild in my world.

I guess I should pick up where I left off...

We left the Dominican Republic in beautiful weather and headed up around the eastern end of the island turned west and sailed along the coast of the D.R. and Haiti. We ended up not stopping in Cape Hatian as planned, instead we continued on towards Cuba. We passed Great Inagua island of the Bahamas about half way through the trip to the south, on the 15th of March. On the 16th we got word at about midday that we were to turn around and sail back to Great Inagua to pick up 5 students and a professor from University of Massachusetts Boston. Annoyed at sailing a whole day out of our way we turned back. We got to the harbor in the late afternoon, took a swim and headed to shore for some much needed R&R. We found a little bar that served cold beer and cocktails and made a good evening of it. The next morning our guests arrived and we shuttled them and their luggage to the boat. We really had no idea what to expect but as I shuttled one student, Raul and the professor out to Amistad, he leaned over and asked, "So, is there any booze on the boat?". I knew we would all get along famously.

Getting to know these students was one of the highlights of the trip for me. They were all super friendly and willing to learn (most of them) and we had a blast.
You can't even tell the difference between the crew and the students at this point... :) What a blast.

We arrived in Matanzas, Cuba on the 22nd I believe. We were greeted by local Afro-Cuban dancers and a welcoming ceremony. Every night we were in Cuba we were invited to a "cultural event" that usually consisted of drinking mojitos, dancing, and generally having the time of our lives.



That is me and Staci with the dancing girls.And that is me dancing with a local.

And me on deck with mad crazy roots! Gurl! Dye yo hair!!!
This was another cultural event in Matanzas...

We sailed, caught fish, laughed, joked, played guitars, danced and all in all, had an amazing trip.

At 4 am on the morning of March 25th, we left Matanzas and sailed to Havana with the U Mass kids on board, and 2 reporters from the Connecticut area.

Read Ted's article HERE.

We were met by reporters from all over the world and local officials. It's impossible to go into detail about how welcoming and friendly everyone was. We were treated like guests of honor. We were also greeted by our tour guide who would become like family to us, Jorge... "OH JORGE DON'T LEAVE US", became a popular song on the guitar... He would load us up in the bus and tell us interesting facts and show us amazing places like the Hemmingway home outside of Havana, various slave monuments and he even took us to a Cuban Baseball game!!! It was game 3 of the world series there and it cost us 3 dollars to get in!!! INDUSTRIALES CAMPEONES! Our team from Havana ended up winning the day we left Cuba.

This pic is the Havana pilot coming aboard, and my back.
There are lots of other pictures on my computer but I can't get it hooked up to the internet right now so those will come later.

Our students left in Havana and we stayed till the 31st. We sailed overnight to Key West where the coast guard boarded us at the sea bouy. Things went smoothly with the search of the vessel and the questioning of the crew. We docked at the Coast Guard station and scattered as soon as the coasties let us. A few crew members left that day and others in the days to follow. I stayed for a week to see my friends and show the remaining crew around. I had a great time and I think the crew did too.

On the 8th I left the Amistad at 4:15am and didn't look back. I had some amazing times aboard. Lived, laughed, loved and cried. I wouldn't change anything.

I flew from Key West to Miami to New York City. Took a shuttle to Grand Central Station, walked 4 blocks to Times Square and sat down. It was overwhelming and I gave myself 10 minutes to take it all in before heading back to Grand Central. Ten minutes because if I gave myself eleven I wouldn't have hopped on the train. I would have tried NYC out for a while...

But I didn't! I made a commitment to spend the summer in New Haven, CT aboard the Schooner Quinnipiack and that's what I am doing. We have a pretty exciting summer planned with school groups and educational sails and volunteer programs. We are meeting up with 4 other Schooners in a couple of weeks in Greenwich, CT for a fundraiser which should be nice. My friend Dane is working on the Schooner Argia and they will meet us there so it will be fun to see him again.

Will is moving back to Provincetown, Mass for the summer so look for that visit to be a wild one sometime later this summer.

Lilly is sailing a boat north from St Thomas to Maine and will be there for the summer so look for those adventures too...

As far as the Amistad goes, the are leaving Key West in the morning and headed north to Wilmington, NC then onwards to Mystic, CT. When they get there I will go meet the boat and get all my belongings. I only brought my giant backpack with me because I had too much stuff and couldn't find my suitcase that got stowed somewhere, no one seems to remember where. So I will go for a quick visit and a real goodbye to my remaining crew and friends.

I feel like I have lost my train of thought and am now rambling so I will end it here.

Hope you enjoyed the cliff's notes version of my past 2 months.

Thanks for not giving up on me.


I will leave you with this... It's me on the bus in Havana, with a bottle of Havana Club. NO, it's not a sexy pose, it's me checking to see how bad I smell because we had no showers on the boat... :)



All Photo Credits go to Jaresiah Desrosiers of U Mass Boston - Thanks Love.

What else could go wrong???

Ok, I haven't been completely honest with my blogging lately and as y'all know, that's not really my style...

Things have been rough here. The company has been having financial "issues" and we haven't been paid. We are all broke and quite honestly over it. It's hard enough work as it is but top it off with being broke and not knowing when or if you will be paid makes it harder to stay positive.

This morning our second and third mates quit.

The second mate was my watch leader and a huge inspiration for me and I am really having a hard time with it.

These two mates are so amazing, they really know their shit and made me feel really safe and completely confident in our ability to sail the boat safely and now I am nervous.

I just want to get to Key West.

It's hard to be excited about Cuba when you have no money to spend on seeing the sights and getting out and about.

We are supposed to leave today but who knows. We aren't allowed to go to Cuba till the 22nd so basically we will just be out there sailing around for the next 12 days. That sucks. That's a long time to be at sea with no fresh water showers or time away from the boat or time to yourself.

Thank god for the crew we have left. It's going to be interesting to see how we deal with the loss of 2 very important crew members. I feel sorry for the first mate, now he has even more on his shoulders to deal with. Everyone does.

Oh well.

See ya in Cuba, or somewhere, or the Bahamas, or Key West if everything falls through.

Short and Sweet

Things have been crazy. Truthfully it's kind of been a shit show but at least the crew are having fun together. I'm amazed how well we all get along.

The sail from St. Thomas to the Dominican Republic was a fast 2 days and pretty nice. When we got here we were joined by 2 D.R. law students and 4 Hatian law students as well as one translator. We took them out sailing for 2 nights, rigged up a rope swing from the yard during a swim call and taught them as much as we could about sailing in 2 days with limited communication. I guess hard work is hard work in any language. They all had a good time. When we arrived back in Santo Domingo there was a reception with drinks and tapas and a video that Rueben put together was shown to the community members that were a part of setting this whole thing up. Then the students sat down and had a round table discussion about their time on the boat and what they gained from the experience. It was the first time we (the crew) actually felt like we were doing what we had set out to do. The mission was finally being put into action.

I am so tired I can't even think. Let alone write coherent paragraphs. Whew.

I am really enjoying my time here in the D.R. and I think I might have to come back here for a month or so in the winter. It's so cheap. You can rent a nice apartment for about 200 USD a month. The people are friendly and the rum is tasty.

Again, I tried to put some pictures up but I forgot my camera on the boat so this candid one from carnival will have to do for now.

Oh, we are supposedly leaving today headed towards Cuba. Not sure when or where we will end up actually but the arrival date for Havana is the 25th and Key West arrival on the first of April.

IN Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic!

I promise to post pics asap. I promise to write a blog someday. We leave tomorrow to sail to Cuba. Should be about a week. We look to be there on the 22nd then in Key West on the first of April.

The Dom Rep is sooooo awesome!!!! So cheap. I think I might have to spend the winter here next year! :)

We had a blast at Carnival....

IN ST THOMAS!!!

whew!!! I have so much to tell you guys but no time to do it. We got in last night and cleared customs at 11am, I went to provision with Hanifa and just got back to the boat. We only have 18 hours here so it's tough. The crew is tired and in need of a break. News to come as soon as I get a moment. xo

Ok, we are really leaving tomorrow!

Delayed due to fuel delivery and customs, leaving in the morning. Headed to St. Thomas!!! Our plans change all the time! I will update ya when we get to STT!!! YAY!

In sad news, the Schooner Concordia went down off the coast of Brazil yesterday. Our crew has friends aboard and the good news is, everyone was rescued. Click HERE for the story. Terrifying.

Exhausted!

Whew! Finally off work after a long day of stowing for sea. We spent an hour dangling from the top yard reefing the topsail and putting a storm gasket on it. In the rain. Damn I feel like a badass sometimes. I am starting to put a lot of faith in the rig and the tools we are given to make this job work. I am not as nervous aloft anymore because I am confident that our boat is well rigged and safe which allows me to do things I never thought I would ever do in a million years... like hang by one leg while half straddling the top yard using both hands to furl a flogging sail 100 feet above the deck like I did today. I wasn't scared at all.

Our new Captain is really cool. He seems confident and knowledgeable and very adamant about safety procedures. A few of the crew have worked with him before and seem to like him a lot. He is super easy to talk to and very approachable. I like that.

The weather here still sucks. It's cold and rainy and WINDY! We hope to get a weather window tomorrow and get the hell out of here. We have to clear customs and get fuel in St. Georges before we head out and I hope that goes smoothly. Then it's southbound! Our plans change seriously every day, at this point we are headed toward Dominica but depending on how long it takes us the first few days we may divert to the BVI, or Culebra or just go on ahead to the Dominican Republic. Our new Captain and the Director of the company seem hell bent on giving us some R&R before we hit the Dom. Rep. which is awesome! Fingers crossed for Culebra because I have never been there, seen it from my home in ST. Thomas but never been. None of us are holding our breath for Dominica.

We were briefed by the Director of the company night before last, he flew in to have a meeting with all of us. And I can't talk about a few of the things I had been earlier in this adventure due to security and stuff. Sorry. As soon as we get where we are going and things start happening I will spill the beans but till then I have to shut my big mouth.

In other news, I not only have a job for the summer but I am SECOND MATE! WOOO HOOO!!! lol Moving on up! I am really looking forward to spending the summer up north. Turns out I am only an hour and a half train ride to New York City!!! Stay tuned for that adventure!

Above is me and Deon when we were offshore somewhere between Norfolk and Bermuda... I call that my Oompa Loompa outfit!

This is my bunk. I call it the cuddle cabin. It's the only one that you have to crawl through a trapezoid to get into. I love it. It's very secluded and private. My head goes on the left side behind that little slanted wall.


And this is when I need my privacy. lol
This is Deon wearing my hat. Kinda. We were having a hat wearing cocktail party in the fo'c'sle.
This is Hanifa the chef, Isaac a deckhand and D on deck one night that it was actually warm enough to hang out there. I wish you could hear the sound that goes along with this movement... LOL
And here is Isaac again with another deckhand Sawyer... Look at those flowing native american locks... whew!!! :)
Ok that's all I have for now, probably wont get internet again till we get wherever we are going. It may be 8 days or so so be prepared!

Catch y'all on the flip side. Hopefully it's warm there!

Good News!!!

As you guys know, my contract with Amistad only lasts till the end of this tour which is sometime around the Beginning of April. After that I am basically a bum. At the beginning of our trip we had a special guest 3rd mate named Tommy who was just filling in till our full time mate arrived. Turns out that Tommy runs the company that runs the Schooner Quinnipiack out of New Haven, Connecticut. He mentioned needing deckhands for the summer and I expressed my interest. He left when we got here to Bermuda and I sent over my resume. Today I got the good news! I have been offered the position! YAY! I accepted and will join the boat when we get to Key West. I will have some down time there then fly or take the train up to New York. Woo HOOOOOOOOO!

Click HERE for the website!

Bombarded in Bermuda

The weather here is terrible!!! It's cold and windy and rainy! We can't leave till our "relief" captain gets here and the weather window opens up. So far we have deleted Trinidad, Antigua and Dominica and Jamaica from our plans. That leaves the Dominican Republic/Haiti and Cuba, onward to Key West for R & R then up the east coast to Mystic.

Morale is decreasing with each island we delete but we are still having fun together. Everyone is getting along and becoming more and more knowledgeable about the boat. We have gone out sailing quite a bit this past week and I am much more comfortable aloft. If we could raise all the sails, climb aloft, furl the sails, drop the anchor and raise the anchor every day we would all be solid muscle and lookin' hawt!!! I always feel really good after we go sailing and get the blood pumping. We spend a lot of time doing maintenance on the boat and not moving around so at the end of the day it's more of a mental tired than a physical tired.

I prefer physical tired.

We went sailing alongside the Spirit of Bermuda the other day to reenact the arrival of the slave ship Enterprise here 175 years ago. Upon arrival the slaves were eventually set free because slavery had already been abolished in Bermuda. Read more HERE and see a picture of us. We are getting so much media coverage and are on the front page like every day.

We have been put on night watch because of the weather and the fact that we are tied up in downtown Hamilton. We are on for 2 hours each at night from 11pm to 7am. It's pretty miserable. It's hard to get to sleep and then its hard to get back to sleep after your watch if it's some ungodly time like the 3 to 5. The upside is that we have gone to port and starbord watches, which means half the crew is on and half the crew is off every day. Today is port watch's day off, that is Me, Ruben, Cassie, Carlos, Sayzie and Sawyer.

Tonight we have been invited to the town hall for an award's dinner for the Spirit of Bermuda. Even though it's our day off we have to show up... ugh I know it's nice but damn I just need a full 12 hours away from it. So, I will soon run off to the yacht club to shower and do laundry then it will be time for dinner. Tomorrow night on the other hand, the Governor has invited us to his house for cocktails!!! That's my kind of party. I will let you know how it goes.

I am all over the place with this blog. I apologize. I am tired and cold and a bit bummed out about all the islands getting knocked off the list. But I am so so so excited about Cuba!!!! Not to mention Key West! I can't wait to see my boys and show my crew what fun really means!

I will update you guys when I can!

Above is Amistad rafted up to the Spirit of Bermuda the other day.

AWESOME!!!!

WE HAD A GREAT TRIP! The crossing was just ideal. No bad weather to speak of, no really really heavy seas. We were at about 5 to 8 ft seas the entire time with your random rouge wave thrown in. I didn't get seasick, only about 3 of us who cared to admit it did. My watch is cool, we are split into 2 watches. A, B and C. I am on B(est) watch with Janet, Isaac and Sam. They don't talk much which cramps my style because I am pretty social but we are safe and Janet and Isaac are so knowledgeable that I feel like I constantly learn new things...

Speaking of... I made it aloft finally! And I do it every day! I still hate it but I can do it. I have furled the topsail twice and every day we do "up and over's" on both masts so we all get comfortable aloft. Come to find out I am not the only one who doesn't like it.

We are such a huge attraction here. People are so excited to see new faces here and they are sooooooooooo friendly!!! Thank you to the West End Mini Yacht Club for taking such good care of us while we were in St. Georges. Also Thanks again To Dave at Livinglikeapirate.com for the shirts and stickers. Everyone loves them! We plan to fly the flag in Hamilton when we dock there downtown tomorrow.

I am paying for the interwebs right now so I gotta go. The net is free in Hamilton so I promise to blog a big intense blog when i get it for free. .... here is a pic to hold you over...


Yeah it's up top. Thats me on the right. My first time aloft when we got to Bermuda. I was screaming from the top yard, "SOMEBODY BETTER TAKE A FUCKING PICTURE!!!" Thank goodness Sayzie was on deck. It's getting easier or better I think, but I can honestly say that the first thing I think of in the morning and the last thing I think of at night is, I have to go aloft. I hate it. The boat I have applied with for the summer is the Quinipiack. They are out of New Haven, Conneticut. They don't have a topsail. I wouldn't have to go aloft every day....:)

Leaving!

Short and sweet, I left TX yesterday, had a great time, flights got diverted, had to spend the night in snowy Chicago. Ate REAL Chicago style deep dish pizza, leaving for the airport now.

WE ARE LEAVING THE DOCK AS SOON AS I GET TO NORFOLK!

See yall in Bermuda in 5 days!

xoxo