Fall 2000 SEAmester Journal
Sent weekly from sea by on-board SEAmester coordinator and professor Chris Hamilton ...
SEAmester Log, Part 1 October 16, 2000
At sea off New York
Our voyage began one week ago in Boston where the schooner Harvey Gamage was docked at Fan Pier. Students came aboard throughout the day with parents and friends while the crew and instructors made final preparations for the trip. The evening's social event was a hit with everyone. Delicious snacks from the galley and a rum punch calmed the stomachs and nerves of anxious students and families while John Tohanczyn (the captain), Dee O'Regan (the humanities professor) and myself (the science professor and program coordinator) shared welcoming words.The following morning we had a 0700 wakeup and started right into our daily routine of cleaning the deck before breakfast. After a basic safety and line handling orientation we pulled away from the pier, set sails and sailed off out of the harbor and north towards Gloucester. The students were thrown right into the thick of it, hauling on and coiling lines, standing bow watch and taking the helm (steering the ship). This first day's sail was ideal, a good wind out of the west pushed us right up the coast and afforded us the time to practice tacking, gybing and a man overboard drill before we tied up to the pier in Gloucester at 1900. After dinner we took turns introducing ourselves and discussing what we all hoped to get out of the trip. The brisk air and hard work of our first day at sea had us all pooped and we retired early, except for those lucky few who were woken up at odd hours for dock watch.
In the morning of Oct. 9th, Jeff Thomas, a local historian, visited the Gamage to speak to the students about the maritime history of Gloucester. After this he led the students to the monument honoring the Gloucester fishermen who lost their lives at sea. In the afternoon I took everyone on a field trip to the rocky intertidal zone at Bass Rocks. Despite the pouring rain (sometimes hail) and cold wind we studied the geology and ecology of the region and the students loved the trip. Morale was high under adverse conditions, a sign that we had a great group of students on this trip.
We set sail the next morning at 1030 with Paul Forestell, a marine mammal psycho-biologist from Southampton Graduate Campus, who was joining us to observe the whales at Stellwagen Bank. See the whales we did, several minkes and nearly 20 humpbacks flipper slapping, fluking, open mouth feeding and full spinning breaching, what a show! Go to the "water" section of adventuretv.com to watch video footage of these very same whales in action. Did I mention that this was also an incredible day of sailing with force 4 and 5 winds heeling the Gamage over, wetting the decks with seawater over the rail and through the scuppers? We even had a few minutes of snow out there!
