On the 24^th of March (20 days after my Birthday) I arrived at Portsmouth docks where I met the cool Tall Ships team: Matt, Charles, Sue and Martin. It was a tall ship but I thought it be taller and more cruise size, however when I got on it was actually really nice and cozy, although I feel quite tight in the space of the ship, but I got used to it quickly and it bought us more together I feel like. After we introduced ourselves, we got to work with excitement and enthusiasm. Sue shown us how the ship operates on the deck, and I learnt what a mate was (I knew what it was, but it didn’t click before as I’ve always heard “first Mate”, instead of “Mate” which makes sense as it is a small frigate of a boat. Then Matt, the Skipper gave us a tour downstairs which was interesting, I found the toilets had ceiling windows, which was a unique design. You never see that in a normal house in England, huh? However, I loved the tour and learnt so much within my first house and we haven’t even got to work fully yet. Although, that was about to change.

We started on opening a ceiling hatch (no not the one in the bathroom) in the storage room. 3 of the crewmates bought the sails up and the rest of us put it together, a bit like Lego, but heavy like the boat itself. 45minutes later we got them all ready and set up, they said it was going to take 2hrs, but they underestimated us haha. I got to know Charles, one of the team leaders very well and that he served in the Army. I come from a Military background myself so it was nice to talk about his past. We also, I say worked pretty well as a team (us Military personal are like this). Everything was set up and we cruised out from the spiral white tower to the foggy ocean. Then out of no where a Hovercraft came out from the left, fast thing it was but it was really cool to see as well. I wished we transformed into one, then we could go fast and race the other boats, like ours

Later in the trip, after manifesting the beautiful view around the boat, in the middle of the ocean. We started to work on putting the sails up and down. I thought if Blackbeard can do this easily, so can I. With that attitude I can do anything… but this isn’t 1700’s… With some good teamwork and communication, we did it as a team, quite fast again, fast enough for them to time us… well not me but some of the other team that wanted a competition, I didn’t want to get crushed or go flying in the sails, even thought I really want to swim… but I kept that temptation at (Portsmouth) Bay.

We then Docked up, which was nice and easy, packed up and ate dinner. Oh, I got told off by Martin for taking the Ladder through the Boat and not through the hatch, sorry Martin, but the food was great and thank you for cooking for us on the first day. And that is Day 1 of Tall Ships. An eventful day indeed, thanks for having me so far.

Jay

We left isle of white and reached to Poole where we got the boat ready to dock up and had some chill time before kaaj and others made food, after food we had a debrief of the day and a bit of time to chill out before lights out.​