My SEA Semester Voyage, Part 1: USS Constitution and the Shore Component
Welcome one, welcome all to the first post of my SEA Semester adventures!
For those of you who don't know or only have a vague idea of what this entails, I shall explain briefly. SEA Semester is an oceanography exchange program based in Woods Hole. During the school year it runs for 12 weeks, one in the fall, one in the spring. Six weeks are spent on Cape Cod in Massachusetts, where the shore component takes place. The other six weeks are spent sailing a research sailing vessel in either the Atlantic or the Pacific Ocean, where each student does an extended independent project either alone or working in pairs.
About me, for those of you wandering in from MandCread, or somewhere I just don't know about-welcome! You may know me as The Nautical Explainy Chick. I have a lifelong obsession with boats and the ocean, I was in Sea Scouts all through high school, and I've been a Patrick O'Brian fan since I was fifteen. I am now twenty (twenty-one in October!) and am a biology major at a tiny liberal arts college in Portland, Oregon. I'm something of a lurker on the reading community, but I've been in it since the beginning and am totally going to stick it through to the end. I'm also a huge Sherlock Holmes fan, and love nerdy science fiction TV shows and movies. Spaceships and tall ships hit many of the same happy buttons for me!
But what about the boats, I hear you cry? Well! You need wait no longer! I am currently in the shore component of SEA, and while on the ship I will have no Internet access, in November, when I reach shore, I will be typing up a full disclosure of the voyage I shall be taking from San Diego to about 10º N to Honolulu! With pictures! (here's hoping my camera survives the experience...)
Please feel free to ask any questions that you like, I could rave about this program forever, and I'd love to hear from you guys.
My story actually begins a little before school started. About two weeks ago, I landed in Boston, two days before the shore component of SEA began. Being as I had some time to wander around, my father and I went to visit the USS Constitution, the US Navy's oldest commissioned warship. She is not a replica; she still has her original keel, and the officers aboard her are actively enlisted in the US Navy. Not bad for a ship commissioned in 1797.
Those of you who've read the Master and Commander series know that our very own Captain Aubrey once ran across Constitution when aboard HMS Java, having been rescued from a shipwreck. It did not turn out terribly well for poor Java; she was defeated, and Aubrey and his men were taken as prisoners to Boston. I remember being very conflicted during that scene; as much as I love Aubrey, the Constitution was undefeated as long as she was in service, and her record continues today; according to my tour guide on the ship, she is occasionally known as "Boston's only undefeated team."
The USS Constitution is a wooden-hulled, three-masted frigate who probably would have made splinters out of our dear Surprise, as little as we M&C fans would like to admit it. -sigh- A large part of this is due to the fact that she has a much heavier gunnery; 44 to our Surprise's 28. Another factor is because she is built from a wood called live oak, which is five times denser than any oak used in British ships, and grows only in America. Constitution's nickname is "Old Ironsides", because cannonballs would sometimes bounce off her sides, not even leaving a dent.
There's a story that our tour guide told us about a hurricane that hit Boston some decades ago. Constitution broke free of her moorings and collided with a steel warship which I've forgotten the name of. The warship suffered major damage and, if I recall correctly, had to be hauled out to repair her hull. Constitution, meanwhile, suffered only minor scratches.
This is Constitution, who resides in Boston Harbor. She looks a little stubby in this picture because her topmasts have been taken down. She is also undergoing some restoration work on her officers' and captain's quarters, so our tour was slightly abbreviated. Still fascinating, though!
Here is the ship's bell.
This is one of Constitution's guns. While officially rated as a 44, she would carry as many as 50; the US Navy was a little less formal than the British one when it came to ship's armaments.
As you may remember from the Master and Commander movie, the gun crews liked to name their guns! This is the same cannon pictured above; I didn't read every name, but this one was my favorite. In case you can't see it (the light was kind of bad; sorry about that), this gun is called Victory or Death.
Here's a small part of the gun deck. As you can see, the guns are frickin' enormous. It would take 6-8 men to use each one, minimum, and every cannon weighs over a ton.
Here's where the men slept...
And here are the officer's quarters. They were closed off when I was there, but I was able to get a picture.
This is the Captain's cabin. Also closed off, but that's where he and his officers would dine.
This is the capstan!
Here is Constitution's starboard bow; the cannons have some odd little red plugs in them, I think to preserve their insides. The guns are not original, though the names are accurate.
Here are her masts, which aren't at their full height; as I mentioned, her topmasts are down for some reason at present.
And here is her stern, Constitution's one vulnerable point, "As we all are," to quote Captain Aubrey on more than one occasion.
Let's have a brief sojourn to the gutter, shall we? :P It'll be a nice break between now and the beginning of the shore component pictures! I suppose it's somewhat impractical, as this is all one LJ entry, but feel free to go fetch yourself some coffee and toasted cheese, or the tea cakes of your choice...I certainly could use some tea!
And welcome back, if you ever left! I'm now going to talk about SEA Semester. As I mentioned, I'll be sailing from San Diego to Honolulu. My vessel is the Robert C. Seamans, a 134-foot, brig-rigged, two-masted, fully equipped science boat. It's going to be awesome. Unfortunately, I don't have pictures of her yet, as she's in San Diego and I am on Cape Cod. I do, however, have this.
This is the Corwith Cramer, SEA Semester's other boat. She is a tiny bit smaller and several years older than the Seamans, and works in the Atlantic and the Caribbean. However, she looks quite similar to the Seamans, and is very, very pretty!
This is a model of the Seamans. She has a draft of 12 feet, a small poop deck (which the Cramer does not) and, very importantly, a dishwasher! YAY!
You can also see my reflection in the glass on the right, if you look closely...
This is the building in which I take my classes. I have three at this time; Oceanography, Nautical Science, and Maritime History.
Oceanography is, well, exactly what it says on the tin. We've been learning about currents and atmosphere (very interesting what with Hurricane Earl), and have been designing our research projects. I am working with a partner on Halobates, which is the only ocean-dwelling insect. We will be looking at species distribution in the Pacific Ocean along several parts of the ocean, among them the California Bight, the North Equatorial Current, and the North Pacific Gyre. Good times!
Nautical Science is the class I call "How to Sail a Boat and Not Die". We're learning navigation and knots at present; we'll also be learning how to handle a sailboat, first under the tutelage of our captain and officers, and eventually by ourselves.
Maritime History is...basically Nautical Humanities. We're learning about the history of colonization and exploration, and the impacts on other cultures around the world. Captain Cook is a major player in our reading. We're also having a film festival of the different versions of Mutiny on the Bounty, and our class will finish with a viewing of Master and Commander: The Far Side of the World, complete with toasted cheese! And grog, if by 'grog' you mean 'soda' and I do.
This is the house I'm living in, with 7 of my shipmates. There are 17 of us total. The other 9 live in another house. Tomorrow there will be 23 people arriving for the Cramer and they'll be starting their shore component this week. We got here before them, and will ship out before them. However, where they get to drive 10 minutes to leave on the Cramer, we have to fly to San Diego...
Here is a chart! I am learning how to navigate with them. Later I will advance to celestial navigation, which is what we'll be using on the high seas.
Finally, here is the table I was working at a few days ago. The triangles and dividers are my charting equipment. At the time, I was working on running fixes, which are devilish little things, I find...also, at the top left corner of my table, you can see Letter of Marque, which I had just finished before class.
This concludes the first installment! Questions and comments absolutely welcomed!