36 Days at Sea

We have now been at sea for 36 days, and we are still steaming around in circles.  We were supposed to have a 3 day port visit last week but as the embassy messed up our DipClear we ended up just going to anchor.  After the first day there was a limited boat routine during the working day but needless to say with everything else going on I didn’t manage to get ashore.

 

It has been a long time since I spent so long at sea without a port visit and it will be another three weeks until we are programmed to get back in. It is not so bad though as everyone has settled into a nice routine and it can be quite peaceful at times.  As we are now getting later in the year the temperatures are starting to warm up quiet nicely. It was about thirty degrees the other day so it gets quite toasty on the exercise bike in the hangar.  With the warmer weather there is less wind and so the sea is like a mill pond. Glassy smooth as far as the eye can see.  We are still seeing quite a few flying fish, and the other day we passed through a school of them and about thirty or forty all took of at once, it was stunning but unfortunately I was to late with my camera so didn’t get any shots.

 

We have had some engineers out to mend the phone system and although it still has many faults it is now working of a fashion. I actually managed to have a clear call home the other day which was nice. Although I am looking forward to getting in, in the middle of next month so that I can use skype.

 

There is still lots happening onboard so I am being kept very busy, it seems every day I have a plan at 0600 of what I will get done but come 0800 when everyone else is up it all changes. I do prefer to be kept busy though as it makes the time go by so much quicker and all the days just merge into one.

 

I have managed to get some reasonable phots over the past few weeks which I had hoped I could put in the blog when I email it, unfortunately this doesn’t seem to work so I will just have to upload them next time I get on the internet proper.

 

Well I think this will be an interesting week, which is a good thing as we will hopefully get more direction. Also mid week I have an interview for a shore post with the battle staff, which I really hope goes well as it is based in Plymouth so I should be able to commute.