Alright, Here we go everyone. Time for a full fledged update on everything in my life! So Day One my mom and I show up at the SEA campus after having lunch in Woods Hole and head up to the main building, the Madden Center, and got all checked in. The campus is essentially a driveway which leads up a small hill to the Madden Center, on the left of the drive way when you're driving in are five little cottages all named after stars. After getting checked in I went down to my house, Bellatrix, and found out that my room was upstairs. Upstairs there are three rooms. One with three girls, and one with two and my room with four girls total. Downstairs there is one room with three boys. In the other house, C House, there are twelve kids, three boys and nine girls. Unfortunately one girl had to leave after a week and a half because things weren't working out. :( We were all really sad to see her go and it felt like we were loosing a family member which was really too bad. But anyway, day one was a whirl wind of introductions to 22 new people, who we were told multiple times to refer to as shipmates, because friends, peers, housemates, and roommates weren't strong enough descriptors for what these people would be to us. Then we met the president of SEA, our teachers for the first six weeks, one of which is to be our captain, and we met other people from the staff who are here to help us through this intensely trying time. Debbie is like our RA if we were in dorms. She lives to the right of the Madden Center in an adorable little stone house and is here to make sure we're adjusting to the lifestyles at SEA and to keep us under control when we get too noisy at night. Apparently Cape Cod has a noise curfew, so SEAs campus sometimes gets reported for being a bit loud. Whoops! Anyway after an extremely long day of explanations of life here and meeting people and being nervous/excited, we had to say goodbye to our parents. I was in a great mood, a bit giddy to be honest, and so saying goodbye to my mom wasn't as hard as it usually is, but by that night I was pretty sad she was gone. :( Here's some shots of campus:
The Madden Center!
Here you can see the edge of Debbie's house on the right and more of the Madden Center on the left.
The Driveway
Here's where we will soon learn to handle sails.
Campus!
B house!
The kitchen we have to cook for twelve people in! There's Shelley!
On the second day of classes we had a tour of Woods Hole and receieved library cards to the MBL/WHOI libraries, which stand for Marine Biological Laboratory and Woods Hole Oceanographic Institute. Woods Hole is essentially a one road town with a few restaurants, a tiny market and a couple kitschy stores. The rest of the town is made up of labs and scientific research facilities. There are a few docks, most of which house research vessels. There is also a large NOAA (National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration) contingency here so we see a lot of government issued cars parked around. Its a cute little town.
The Inception Bridge!
Little Marina
This is the ferry to Martha's Vineyard... or one of them. There are two that leave from Woods Hole and multiple others from the cape.
So everyday the schedule is essentially the same. We have three classes, Oceanography, Nautical Science and Maritime Studies. Class starts at 8:30 and goes till 9:30, then we have a 15 minute break, and the second class starts 9:45-10:45 and then we get thirty minutes and have class from 11:15-12:15. Then we get a little over and hour for lunch and afternoon class starts at 1330 (or 1:30). I've been slowly training myself in military time because its what we use on the boat and its how all nautical science navigational things are done! Anyway every day we have a different order to our classes so it stays pretty mixed up usually, and afternoon class can go until anytime really, usually until 4, but sometimes a bit longer.
The first week got rolling quickly and by week two we already had to have a paper proposal ready and begin studying for our first round of tests. We learned about the currents and wind patterns and the energy that drives them, we learned about nautical navigation with compasses and protractors and other charting fun, and we learned all about life at sea. Everything is amazingly interesting and cool to think about, and its amazing because I haven't ever really learned about these things before. Nautical science is definitely my favorite but that might just be because I think our captain is really cool and interesting to listen to. He tells us the most amazing stories about sailing and I can't wait to get to know him even better!
Our first weekend was a nice long one with Labor Day off so we all explored Woods Hole and Falmouth and started to get to know each other better. SEA owns a small beach down the road about a 10 minute walk and I think I've been there almost every day I've been here! Its small and usually pretty calm. It's called Racing Beach. Here are some cool sunset pictures:
This is one of the kids from the Pacific Class.
In two of the other houses on campus there are 17 kids who are doing the Pacific Cruise track this fall. They will sail from San Diego to Hawaii. They're nice to have around but I dont know them nearly as well as my class!
The next week went by quickly and we had our first test that friday. The weekend seemed to go by even more quickly, probably because it was full of LOTS of charting, and then monday brought the navigation test.
SO MUCH CHARTING.
That week, on thursday, there was a crazy storm. At about 3 or 4 in the morning there was a HUGE boom of thunder that shook our house and woke EVERYBODY up. Then to top it all off around 7:45 or 8 there was another crash, but this crash was much more distinct and immediately afterwards we all knew there had been a car crash. It was probably only a few yards from our kitchen window and it was pretty bad. Then to top it all off two of our housemates were running in the morning and the crash happened ACTUALLY 10 feet behind them. Apparently a guy driving a huge truck came barreling down a driveway towards the main street by us and didn't even think of stopping. The worst part was that we thought one of our housemates got hit by the one of the cars because the other runner was running to the wreck to help and we thought that she was running to save him! Luckily no one was seriously injured but it was a crazy morning and it kept us on our toes!!
The hardest things so far have been learning how to doing grocery shopping for a week for 12 people with only $480. Then cooking dinner in proportions for 12 people, many of whom LOVE TO EAT is definitely hard. We do a great thing at dinner though which is to ask the questions about each other. We'll do a question like, what is your family like? Whats an irrational fear? Whens the last time you were really scared? Scar stories? What were you like in high school? First kiss, Etc. Its been amazing so far and we've learned so much about each other! I can't believe I'm already half way through the shore component of the program!!! More updates soon!
Here are some cool pictures of a model of our ship, the SSV Corwith Cramer in the main part of the Madden Center.
Love love!
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