We are Anne, Linda, Karen, Sharon, Shirley, Eleanor, Tigger (otherwise known as Lindsey), Katy and Denise (watch leader).
We are having a fantastic time, all of us have been up the mast, what an experience! We had to tell Tigger not to bounce too much, she was liable to get herself tangled up in the rigging. There is no holding her down!
The trip from Whitehaven to Belfast was great, sadly the weather changed quite dramatically towards the end of our watch (20:00 to 23:59) we were sailing on 255 degree heading when a gust of wind took hold and we promptly did a 180 degree turn, quite exciting at the time as we then all had to rush away to help trim the sails before we could go to bed.
We tied up in Belfast where we spent two nights; we did the mid-night to 04:00 hours watch. We were tied up opposite the W5 night club (who, what, where, when, why) this will forever have a different meaning for us and we have renamed our watch as the X rated watch. We had so much entertainment however, the nightclub goers were totally oblivious to the fact that there was a ship tied up alongside and had a duty watch crew up on the Bridge observing everything that was going on from forays into the hedge, Police raids and arrests, lost boots (one thrown over the ship into the sea) and things that we really cannot disclose on a blog site (use your imagination and you won’t go far wrong!).
On our day off we all went to visit Lorne, it entailed a magical mystery tour. We went off in three taxis having given all drivers the address and correct postcodes, however, all three chose not to listen to the satnav believing that they were lying and decided to go there own way taking us to Larne instead! We did eventually rolled up at Lorne some time later where we had a tour of the house and grounds as it was open to the public this being a ‘heritage’ weekend. We again chanced a taxi ride back to Belfast city centre where we had planned to do an open top bus tour of the city. Needless to say we never saw each other again until we got back to the ship in the evening! Those of us that managed the bus tour promptly got caught up in the middle of the marching bands parade, we also got slightly wet as it rained, but in true Scottish tradition we stayed put as we had paid for upstairs seats and that was where we were staying!
We did eventually find the rest of the watch and made it back to the city for tea. The other watches have complained that their watches have been too tame.
We set sail again this morning and the weather is really good though Captain Barbara has told us to make the most of it as rain is forecast (again).
Forgot to mention that one of Senior Section girls working at Lorne who had completed a previous GG leg gave us the thumbs up on the award they presented to Marco !!! Are we now into blackmail you ask, well maybe!
Tigger not been so well today so she has been tasked with thinking up ideas for our SODs opera (the Ship’s Operatic and Dramatic society), we have some good ideas and are working on it.
Sorry can’t write any more as we are now off to play in the rigging, yeah.