easter deployment

as described in the previous post, this 2 week event will be crammed into one post (hopefully). first, a little preamble bitching (my first b-word!). if you have read my super early posts, you would know that i am serving the royal navy “part-time” through the University Royal Naval Units. if not, you know now. anyway, the system operates on lectures on weekdays and sailing practice on weekends. each easter and summer holidays, there are a few extended sailing periods called deployments where we sail a “little bit” further than usual. now, i am theoretically bound not to reveal information which could lead to something nasty. if i abided the rules “to a T” (or letter if your english is half-past six), then you would not have the faintest idea what i’m talking cos then it should end here. thankfully, i have known greater secrets concerning national security, so to speak, and have worked previously in such environments. i know what to say, what not to say and whats really testing the system.

this deployment was a 13 day sailing trip covering the coasts of southern england and northwest france. this trip is the longest cruise for me, covering 8 ports. we left portsmouth on the first day. the familiar surroundings allowed me to “acclimatise” since i hadn’t been to sea in a while. first we re-fuelled then headed for nearby lymington. the whole vessel consisted of the CO, four permanentship crew, and us seven students; three males, four females. the females occupied two cabins while us males occupied the forward (front) accommodation. the forward accommodation is also divided into two.furthest  front consists of four bunks, two on each side, one upper, one lower. the nearer front had one upper and one lower bunk. the other side was the toilet and shower. throughout the whole deployment, i slept alone in the nearer front.

from lymington to caen was difficult. i knew it would be a very long and difficult journey since i wasnt used to being on the ship for long periods of time at sea. it was my first “virgin” crossing of the Channel. naturally, the hot sun and the monotonous droning of the ship moving forwards, combined with a little seasickness and exhaustion brought me to my knees. literally. i curled up in a corner clutching a sea sickness bag. i dozed off, awaking like every ten minutes or so. when i finally woke, i thought twenty minutes had pass. instead, i had been sleeping intermittently. it was the longest “twenty” minutes of my life. i did vomit but didnt produce much. i was then tasked to go above to keep lookout. and it was here that the bitching started.

i was sick, shivering, tired, eyelids feeling like bricks. apparently, my senior thought i was trying to skive and spoke a little too loudly. i was unimpressed. i thought someone was trying to show off since we had juniors on board. i just nodded to the questions and disregardedthem anyway. i admit i didn’t do a good job keeping watch but you cant expect must when a man is half incapacitated. i tried to cheer myself by looking for birds. it’s a known fact that sea birds stay close to the shore so seeing one in the Channel means land. therefore, my spirits rose tremendously when i spotted one about three quarters into the journey.

we reached caen around tea time but had to further sail in a canal to reach caen proper. we moored and rested for two days. during which i had an unforgettable lunch ashore. cherbourg was next, then st helier and st malo for two days. st malo is a real tourist town. the city is located in a fort and ALL the shops are meant for tourists. but there was one exceptional store. along the inside of the fort wall nearest the yacht berthing and carpark, stands a professional macaron shop. owner-chef sells macarons by weight not by pieces which is the real way of selling macarons.

i was better prepared for the return crossing of the Channel from st malo to dartmouth. more sea sickness bags and more food. being out at sea is a tremendously boring event. your entire 360 degree view is the sea and the sky. you have no landmarks to guide you, no hills, terraces and undulating features to break the monotomy of the landscape, no green grass, tall trees and beautiful flowers to admire. upon reaching dartmouth, everybody was ready to “go horizontal”, my term for hitting the sack. but everyone performed admirably helping to clean the ship. the CO, crew and students all went ashore afterwards for a well deserved get-together dinner. two days later, we gave the entire ship a good thorough clean before leaving for home.

everyone learnt a lot on this trip and so did i. in fact i think i learnt a lot more than everybody. during this trip, my view was reinforced that some people have poor leadership qualities to put it mildly. anyway, i’ve written enough.

format change

change is long overdue. all my previous posts were about day to day descriptions which i admit, can get very tedious reading and takes a disproportionatelylong time to write. i set up this blog cos i really wanted to talk about any interesting things daily. however, being boring myself will also mean nothing to blog anyway. and those minute by minute accounts of my holidays are just a dragggg. from here onwards, events large and small will be reflected only in one post. simply put, a summary. no more blah-ing about the nonsensical things like waking up, sleeping, taking a dump etc.

with regards to pictures, if you could leave a link in comment about a FREE picturehosting site AND does not pre-require me to have a yahoo or google or what-have-you account to sign up. then i would be able to upload more pics. by the way, dont forget to read “read this first”. previously i kept all my posts clean sans a few. clean meaning G-rated for kids. therefore, i’ve decided to spice things up and do away with those ridiculous pre-requisite warnings that make the post look like some porn flick. meaning, more “colourful” langauge, “infighting” and everybody’s favourite: gossip or in layman’s term; bitching.

readers, you have been warned…