The first one

Well, hello world. This moment has been a long time coming and it is finally here, the beginning of my journal. Is it a travel journal or is it just a platform to satisfy the desire I have always had to write what’s on my mind? A bit of both, maybe neither.. who cares? The point is that it is here and I’m doing it, all the better if you enjoy reading it, whoever you may be.

I was hoping to have the site up and running on the 2nd of November, which was when I left my position of Captain on Alamea and joined Destination as Engineer for the trip of a lifetime. The days leading up to my departure of Alamea were mad enough to warrant the excuse you know is coming..

After flying into Valencia on the eve of the 2nd, I took a taxi to Marina Real where Destination was lying in wait. We cast our lines off as soon as I arrived, everyone still asleep but Mike (Captain). Rich sleepwalked upstairs to help out with the lines and we were off. The first night was a roller, but everything quickly calmed as we cruised down the coast of Spain. Yesterday was a good initiation, the engine room is now my domain but I’m mucking in everywhere I can, that’s how it works on these long trips.

We caught a White Marlin this morning, we have a couple of pro fishermen on board and they keep a catch and release policy (unless its delicious and big enough.. ahem Tuna). My GoPro came out to capture the action, I clearly have a lot of learning to do. We are going through the Gibraltar straits as I write this. The straits always made me think about Europe’s relationship with Africa in our time and time immemorial. What a confusing and messy relationship, one fraught with pain and anger, one that most of us cannot even fathom, even if we try to keep up with media and literature. For some reason here, where these two worlds come so close to touching each other, I am met with a sense of serenity and peace, something other-worldly. Conflict requires distance which brings cultural difference and leads to judgement.. here at the mouth of our Mediterranean melting pot, nature doesn’t care, she brings two loggerheads to clash and there is little anyone can do about it. Well, into the atlantic we go!

Our internet connection is going to be practically non-existent while at sea, I will try to update the blog as much as possible while we have network but most of my writing and media creation will be done offline and uploaded once we reach a port with wifi.

Though it has taken this amount of time for the realisation of the epic nature of this trip to truly sink in, I can now safely say that I am bloody excited.