Day 8 – Command Day

Hi Everyone, Welcome to Day 8 of our voyage. Well following a pleasant morning where we let the Youth Crew loose on the picturesue town of Cowes I have now handed the ship over to Captain Ben and his faithful crew who I am sure will do an amazing job of running the ship over the next 24hrs. Besides sailing and safely navigating Young Endeavour they have many other challanging tasks to complete during the Command Day period and one of those tasks is to write tonight’s Captains Log so please enjoy tonight’s entry written by Captain Ben.

Until Tomorrow, take care.

Yours Aye

Captain Gav

Day 8 – Command Day!!!
Today was the beginning of the highly anticipated command day, where the youth crew takes over the STS Young Endeavour for a whole 24 hours, deciding where we go and when we get there. Although we didn’t take over until 1400 the excitement was palpable all day. This was all in conjunction with the equally anticipated Floral Friday, with the whole crew, youthies and staffies decking themselves out in a floral shirt for the day.
Accompanying a 0630 AM wake up was a light walk around the bridge in pyjamas and a game of knights, mounts and cavaliers, with bodies barely awake contorting into different positions as quickly as possible. This was all just a holding pattern as we waited for a breakfast of bacon and eggs sandwiches to be ready up on deck. As we finished eating, we dropped down the rubber dinghy and made our way into Cowes for the first bit of civilisation in a while. We explored the area for a few hours, taking in the sights, sending off some postcards and sneaking in a call or two at an ancient payphone (this may well have been the first time handling a payphone for some of us!). We managed to get a few more people onboard Floral Fridays with a bit of last minute shopping, and as captain designate, I picked up a captains hat to get in the spirit.
After yet another amazing lunch (thanks Zac), tuna bake and chicken wraps, the command team got a final chance to talk to their corresponding staff member for a few last minute questions and gems of wisdom for the challenge ahead. While we were at it, the rest of the crew got through an amazingly efficient happy hour, giving our living space a top down clean in no more than 20 minutes.
At 1400 hours it was finally time for the staffies to hand over command to the elected youthies. With a short ceremony involving the handing over the ‘telescope of challenge’ that was gifted with the ship and passed along with every change of command (so I will be handing it back to Captain Gav tomorrow), the staffies started their 24 hour holiday with a quick dive in the waters off the starboard bow. We were given a set of instructions with a list of tasks to complete on board during our 24 hours in command, and left to get it done as best we could. Up first while the navigators were plotting our course was a beach assault, where six of our most highly trained crew paddled their way to the beach at Cowes and belted out the national anthem in front of a rather large, undoubtedly confused crowd of people waiting for a ferry. We also managed to get twenty four of our crew members up onto the foremast, spread out across the three yards, for a quick photo before weighing anchor and setting sail.
Taking into account the wind available to us, we quickly set the forestaysail to have the wind turn the ship into the direction our navigators had set for us to get up and out of Western Port. After a little bit of favourable winds, and the setting of almost every sail on the ship, we lost the wind and were left with little choice but to turn to the engines, which Captain Gav was kind enough to give to us for an hour. An amazing sunset with little clouds was mostly lost as we worked our way around the ship getting all the right sails set and clewed away. As of right now, we have our last few minuted of the engine and are close to getting out of the relative protection of Western Port, and hopefully some easterlies will help us along the way to Port Philip. It has been a hectic few hours but we have started to settle into a routine and will hopefully see Port Philip tomorrow.
Ben