"It was so interesting seeing the whales up close after learning so much about them!" - Whitney
Today was filled from morning until night with what we all came to see -- whales!
We started the morning headed south towards Cape Cod, and since the crew was tired from sailing through the night, the cadets took charge of the deck: steering, serving as lookouts, and checking the ship. The waves from yesterday had calmed a little but now we were headed straight into the wind. The captain explained that we have to sail regardless of the wind direction, so with the wind at our bow we had to zigzag back and forth through the night, making the trip much longer than it would have been had the wind been behind us or to the side. Nonetheless, the cadets kept on with smiles, and we spent the morning manning the ship and reviewing what we've learned so far about whales.
As it so happened, we were crossing over a bank that attracts a lot of whales due to the shallower water levels, and just as we had hoped, we spotted whales just off our course to Provincetown. The cadets identified the whales as humpbacks, the largest population of whales in this area, and though they didn't get too close to the ship, it was still very exciting to see them breach and fluke in the distance, especially because for many of us this was our first encounter with whales!
A few hours later, we arrived in Provincetown and everyone worked together to pull the Lady Maryland up to the dock and get tied up. The first thing we noticed at the dock was another large sailboat, which the crew explained is a replica of a typical Dutch sailboat used in the 1600s. The cadets, with their newly acquired knowledge of sailing, analyzed the shape of the boat and the strange square sails. After we disembarked, the crew of the other ship offered to give us a tour, and we all noted the differences between that ship and ours and gained a better understanding of how sailboats have evolved over the years. We all appreciated our small bunks much more after we were told that the crew used to have to sleep on the deck with all of the lines!
In Provincetown (or "PTown", as they call it here), we poked around shops and enjoyed some well-deserved ice cream before heading for the final activity of the day – whale watching on a professional boat with the first whale watching company in the world! Though the weather was gray and overcast, we were assured that the whales would make-up for the dreary skies – apparently they like to play in the waves as much as we do! After a long ride around the Cape, we sure enough found ourselves right in the heart of what seemed to be a whale playground. Humpback whales were blowing through their blow-holes, breaching, slapping their flukes on the water, and just generally swimming around on all sides of our boat. At one point a particularly playful whale came right up to our boat, breached close enough to spray us all on the deck, and then swam under the boat, only to pop up and continue the show on the other side! Needless to say, it was a truly awesome experience, and we found ourselves running from side to side on the deck for over an hour as we watched the whales in their natural waters.
Back at the Lady Maryland (which after only a few days is beginning to feel like home), a few of the cadets wrote some reflective haikus about the day:
Bustling with life;/PTown on a cloudy day./I want seafood. -- Harry
Black flukes in the air/Come crashing down with a splash./Very majestic. -- Harry
Whale did breach, did breach/Whale breach splash splashed me, yes splashed/Now I am wet: darn. -- Max
Gray and overcast./Perfect day for watching whales/All around the Cape. -- Anonymous
Humpback whales at play./Sails full of wind and sunshine./Lady Maryland. -- Anonymous
Another awesome day!
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