Teacher Aboard

For those of you who have been following my logs, you probably feel like you already know Sinker. As I have been shooting pictures to tell the story of our days at sea, Sinker seems to be featured in lots of them. This is Sinker. For the most part, he is quiet but actively involved in most everything! As if you couldn't tell by my logs, he enjoys the great outdoors. At home in Florida, he goes fishing on his family's boat.

Sinker has taken the leading role in our fishing efforts on our trip to Hawaii which produced a nine foot sailfish for our dining pleasure. We hooked another one of equal size, but ended up with nothing more than a picture. When the creatures of the deep gobbled up too many of our lures, Sinker cleverly arranged a lure contest among the crew to restock his supply. Yesterday the lure entries were displayed. No doubt some of the lures may do the trick, but others are a sorry state of affairs. Among the contenders there is a Santa Claus, a hula girl, a frilly suntan lotion bottle and a flying rat. For the sake of our dinner, let's hope the fish are really hungry. Sinker is also a SCUBA diver, and has spent a good deal of time off the east coast of Florida diving for lobsters. This upcoming layover in Hawaii may give him a chance to use his SCUBA diving to explore the reefs of the Pacific Ocean.

Sinker has put all this knowledge of the marine world to good use in his summer job for the Living Classrooms Foundation in Baltimore. In addition to serving as a deckhand for their tall ship, Lady Maryland, he also works as an instructor for school groups that join the ship for day cruises. He especially enjoyed a group of students from the Johns Hopkins' Center for Academic Achievers who sailed aboard from Maryland to Gloucester, Massachusetts. These northern waters were familiar territory for Sinker who started sailing tall ships aboard Angelique, a windjammer schooner which sails out of Camden, Maine. Since those days in Maine, Sinker has acquired his captain's license qualifying him to pilot 100 ton vessels on inland waters. Like other crew members aboard Pride II, he is enjoying this opportunity to sail to Asia as a means of adding to his knowledge and experience for the next level of his captain's license. I should also mention the quiet, intellectual side of Sinker. He can often be found in the galley discussing books and world issues with Andy, or on the foredeck playing his guitar. This quiet side of Sinker reveals the gentle side of his personality and complements his love of the natural world.

SAMANTHA HEYMAN (Sam), Deckhand

Sam is quite "the character." She's fun, full of energy, and always enthusiastically involved in the task at hand. As a deckhand, she is up to her elbows in projects. One day she will be climbing the rig to grease the mast, and the next she can be found sanding and oiling the bright work (wood). Her most recent interest, however, has been helping John with the engine room. During our layover in Panama City, she could usually be found wedged under one of the engines checking some gizmo, or on deck surrounded by parts of John's latest maintenance project. When she was explaining to me how to read the engine room instruments, I was thoroughly impressed with her knowledge of this new domain. Sam is a nineties kind of gal - feminine, but crazy about diesel engines and generators.

Another new interest for Samantha is celestial navigation. As soon as the stars are out, she's on deck with her sextant recording the angle to a selected star from the horizon. During her off watch, she camps out at the galley table with her books, pencils, and paper to make all the calculations needed to determine our location based on that star angle. Who needs the GPS (Global Positioning Satellite) when you have Sam?

For her 26 years of age, Samantha has acquired a great deal of off shore (ocean) sailing experience. It started with a call from her brother in New Orleans who had arranged a crew position for her on a square rigger named Gazella. The ship had been in port for the filming of the movie, Interview With the Vampire, with Brad Pitt. Sam has not yet forgiven her brother for timing her arrival to occur just after Brad left town! Since that time, Sam has done two windjammer schooner deliveries from Maine to the Caribbean, and has served as first mate on Clearwater, a 100 foot tall ship moored on the Hudson River. Although her college degree from Lehigh University is in political science, according to Sam, "it is sailing tall ships that teaches you the meaning of leadership."

Samantha also has a fascinating history of traveling. Although she now calls Boston home, as a kid she lived in Israel for two years. Later she lived in the French Alps for six months as part of a Swarthmore College program. While in France, she became proficient (good) in French, and had the opportunity to visit Paris, Venice, Greece, Spain, and Florence. Her favorite memories of this study abroad include her exposure to the art of French impressionists, and the art and architecture of the Renaissance Period in Florence. In 1996, she had an opportunity to visit Europe again as part of Pride II's crew on its European Tour. For Sam, the highlight of that tour was the ship's visit to the Brittany coast of France. Sam can't say enough good things about the people, the food, and the culture. Now she is off to Asia and one can only guess what new travel experiences lie ahead.

In my next log we will tackle the skills of a deckhand. We will be slushing, tarring, seizing, and coiling down. We will also meet Andy, the cook extraordinaire!

Al -"lure"-ingly yours,
Leslie Bridgett

YOUR THOUGHTS

1. Define the following 1812 sailing terms:
   • fo'c'sl
   • freshening the nip
   • two-six.... two-six...
   • sweating the line
   • "That's well. Make it fast."
   • coil down
2. What part of being a deckhand would you enjoy? What would you dislike? Why?
3. List the sounds, smells, and feelings associated with the deckhand story.
4. Why are orders repeated on ships?
5. Choose a job, such as police officer, doctor, cowboy, airline pilot, fashion model, etc. Write a short description of a day in the life of one of these people.
6. In Hawaii, Captain Miles asked Deckhand Sinker to "outfit" (buy) fishing gear for the trip to China. With a hundred dollars, what would you purchase to fish in the ocean? (FYI - we don't use fishing rods.)
7. According to Samantha, "Sailing tall ships teaches you the real meaning of leadership." Explain what you think she meant by this statement.

Return to the first part of the January 21, 1998 log.

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