Day 8 – Command Day
Ahoy Mates!
Today the youthies rose with excitement and eagerness. Its command day! After a lovely wakeup call of “If I had a Hammer” by Sam Cook, everyone mustered on the bridge for the final brief before the handover of the ship. At 1000, Declan, our elected captain was gifted the keys to the ship, whilst the staff performed a lovely version of “We’re going on a summer holiday”. And thus, command day commenced!
The day started off with riddles to find the navigation waypoints, with the cryptic clues leading the youthies to climb both of the masts, paddle to the nearest beach and hunt for an X that marked the spot. A task sheet was issued, with over 25 tasked to be completed by the end of the 24 hours. This list included various tasks ranging in difficulty, and consisted of tasks such as the following;
• [Spoilers deleted by the actual Captain! They’ll tell you about them later 😉 ]
This command day was also commemorated by achieving the milestone of all the youthies laying aloft across the foremast yards and having a photograph taken. A Mexican themed dinner was prepared by the wonderful chefs and was a hit with all. After a few minor hiccups, we were finally on our way, ready to begin a long night of watches, navigating and setting/furling sails in order to reach our destination.
We are now in full command of the ship, and not going to lie, we are all a little bit nervous. Nevertheless, we trust in our newfound abilities and each other too successfully to sail the ship back into Sydney harbor.
Hope everyone back home isn’t missing us too much, we don’t really want to come home yet.
Special shoutout to our family’s, the Boundy’s, the Sutherland’s and the Searle’s, because their amazing kids wrote this.
Latitude/Longitude:
Conditions:
Weather: Wet. Wind: 180 @ 5-10.
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Thank you Tarvi, Kaeden and Matt for your narrative of today's events. Intentions are to remain at anchor in Hunters Bay, just off HMAS Penguin, home of the RAN Diving School, a place close to my heart, having spent many a day there under training as a young Officer! The plan is to weigh anchor and proceed to HMAS Waterhen, in Waverton, to pick up our Community Day Sailors from the Windgap Foundation and take them for a sail around the harbour for 3 hours. The Youth Crew will help us host our visitors and give them an experience of Young Endeavour. We will drop them back to Waverton and then proceed to anchor in the harbour where we will have a good view of the Bridge and the Opera House for the Youth Crew's last night onboard. Until tomorrow. Yours Aye, Captain Mike