Sailing, Science, and Sisterhood on board with eXXpedition, Day 2

Sailing, Science, and Sisterhood
on board with eXXpedition, Day 2

Read about Pre-Sailing and Day 1 First!

Sally woke me up at, I swear, the crack of dawn. Maybe 7 am. It took ages to shake off the Bonine fog, as I was heavily medicated in an attempt to stabilize my stomach AND stop crawling around the boat like a dog in a car.

I barely scraped a bowl of Cheerios down my throat before climbing onto deck to start The Science! 

Jeanne hoists up the sediment grabber

First, we deployed a sediment grabber, which is more or less the claw from an arcade game that weighs a ton when its empty, more when it’s full of silt and sand, the weight of the ocean pulling down on it. Chantal, Jeanne, Sally and I lowered the grabber about 30 feet, grabbing a healthy sediment sample. The thing was so heavy, we pulled it up in teams. Then, we scooped little samples of sediment into carefully labelled cups, to be sealed, frozen, and sent back to a fancy lab for examination under powerful microscopes. The labs are looking for- and will undoubtedly find- miniscule pieces of plastic (microplastics) that are not visible to the naked eye.

Bringing up the sediment

These microplastics are consumed by algae, corals, fish, etc., and move up through the food chain, landing, eventually, on our plates…if they don’t kill the marine life first. With a belly full of plastic, an animal cannot eat or digest actual food.

After taking five sediment samples and setting sail, me and my aching biceps moved up the deck to deploy three Niskin bottles, giant fancy bottles that drop to about 20-30m and snap shut when hit by a weight, collecting a true sample. They’re heavy duty, real science equipment, but there’s a little luck to it too. If the weight isn’t deployed right, the bottle won’t close, meaning we have to do it all over again. The trick, swears Sophie and Maggie, is to whisper “Find the Niskin” to the weight before flinging it down the line. Lisa is the official weight flinger.

Maggie, telling Lisa the proper incantations for Niskin success

The bottles are brought below decks, where it is positively sweltering. I can’t even stand down there for a minute without wanting to hurl, even with all the hatches up. I catch glimpses of the water being pumped through a series of filters; the smallest, thinnest ones preserved for lab examination. There’s even a filter sitting on the table as a control, lest any of us shed microplastics nearby.

Finally, we deploy my favorite piece of equipment: The Manta Trawl. This hand-build metal thing looks like a pile of scrap on deck, but in the water, resembles a manta ray. It trawls the water’s surface, alongside the boat for one nautical mile. Then, it gets pulled on deck and the contents of its net washed and collected for examination. I have the best job: retrieval line. After three people throw in the trawler, I lay on the deck, watching the yellow line, carefully tied off, for about 30 minutes, then pull it in. I also catch a wickedly painful, hilarious sunburn, thanks to my shorts and t-shirt. And yes, I sun-screened. Twice, for your information.

Did I mention that all of this takes an incredible amount of teamwork? Literally everyone on the boat had at least one task to do- all of them required a lot of physical effort! It's pretty cool that we're actually doing The Science. It's not as challenging as I imagined- that's all in the lab work, analysis, and writing. It all needs doing, and it turns out, science is a team sport. 

After the science it was time for Green Island!  

People had told us we wouldn’t find much on Green Island. Only members of a fancy-schmancy yacht club could go.

Hrmph. We'll see. 

We piled into a dingy and cruised to the beach, armed with gloves, giant (reusable) bags, and citizen science marine trash apps. Breaking into watch teams, we scoured the beach, noting what was found before tossing it into the bag.

A fluorescent light and an uncoiled pile of nylon rope

We found piles and piles of boat rope and plastic bottle buoys, some with teeth marks in them, a laundry basket, piles of water bottles, children’s toys, fishing net, plastic bits and bobs, an entire unraveled roll of that nylon-ish packing rope, and I personally fished enough glass out of the surf to make a six pack.

Over six bags in total. A few pieces came back with us to Do Science on.

After cleaning up all the plastic, we swam in the warm, shallow, brilliantly blue water. Some shared snorkel gear to look for reefs while others just sat and relaxed, the water lapping at our exhausted bodies as we pondered the interconnectedness of our oceans.

Not even all the trash found on a "private" beach

Kirsten and Jeanne got bit by sand fleas.

Two of our number had sneakily swam back and were eating fancy cheese, freshly showered, in the common space. I should’ve followed suit! I really have a thing about showering after people, especially when the shower, toilet, and sink are all in the same…coffin.

A boat shower, if you don’t know, involves carefully pulling out the sink nozzle and angling it down your whole body, as if taking a contorted selfie, away from the toilet and toilet paper and spraying. It is not warm, but after two days of swimming in the ocean, the fresh water is a gift. Once wet, you flick the nozzle off and soap up your whole body and shampoo your hair, flick the water back on, and rinse off. I did a quick conditioner round too, as I’ve got a load of hair, but didn’t bother trying to shave. My legs are downright shrubby. A glance in the mirror tells me my eyebrows probably match.

14 people. Two showers.

It’s not my turn to cook or clean, so I lay my sunburned body on the deck with a bowl of food. Everything is communal, so I have to remember that what’s in front of me has to feed 14 humans. I’m a bit of a grazer, and starving after a hard day’s work, so it’s a challenge not to put everything in my face. Anna and Maggie have made a curry, and it’s fantastic.

I am grateful to not be on clean up that night, peeking in through the kitchen hatch to see that a small tornado has gone through the galley. But the watch team tackles it with humor and grace and a magic lightheartedness. I hear them singing loudly from up on deck and feel almost left out. I am in the middle of a deep and beautiful conversation and it strikes me that there’s no one on this boat that I’d avoid. As a sort of shy, anxious person that doesn’t get on with most people, there’s not one single person on this yacht that I do not genuinely enjoy.

And that’s magical. And powerful.

Read about Day 3 and Day 4!
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This is my reflection on Leg 3 of the eXXpedition around the world voyage. All views are my own, not the views of my fellow sailors, Sally Earthrowl, or eXXpedition. For more about eXXpedition, visit https://exxpedition.com/expedition/round-the-world/.