DeBunkering in Las Palmas

Hi All,

I guess 1st off I should explain debunkering. It means getting a fill up . Since you don't just pull a 590' craft up to the pump they bring it to you. The term bunkering is mostly a maritime one meaning fuel or energy holding . the term debunkering simply mean the bunkering ship is off loading it's cargo. In our case the MV-Explorer holds 1190 metric tons of diesel , we took on 650 metric tons.

It was pretty wild to wake up a few miles off shore of Las Palmas. I was up before the sun so I just saw building lights and headlights from autos in what seemed like the sea.

Yesterday was a very good day and eventful . Any day the mini clan of three behave, do their work and are kind to each other make for a good day in my eye's. The days on ship are broken down into A days and B days because at sea there are always classes. Accordingly we have certain students tutoring on A days and another group on B days. Anna has finally started to get comfortable w/ the students that spend time w/ her on school work. Layne has as well in a kindergarten kind of way. Traci and I keep Layne w/ us more often so she get's the real creative play along w/ the ABC's and quantum physics. :)

In the afternoon Traci was asked to lecture in a class about her nursing experience and her matenity / health related work in the Peace Corp. The professor took me aside and said how impressed he was w/ her presentation. Many students became interested and they make build a panel including Traci just to answer questions and such.

I on the other hand gave a "lecture " to the kids, some staff and parents during "Enrichment Hour" . I made a drawing of a ship on huge piece of paper and wrote down and pointed out all the parts of a boat/ship I could think of. I also did the same w/ naming the different shapes of clouds and what they can mean related to weather. Then a little about the stars and how to find basic direction from them. I threw in fishing and broke out some of the tackle I brought along, shark hooks and wire leaders, huge squid for Tuna and the like. I also talked and gave survival stories which besides the nautical terms peaked their attention ... the story of a 25 yr old merchant mariner in 1942 named Poon Lim who survived 133 days at sea ALONE after the ship he was on was torpedoed between CapeTown and the South American coast.

Anyway today is another day at sea, it will take us about 4 more days to arrive in Ghana, looking forward to the pre-port discussion and speaker on that.

Latitude 28' .07N

Longitude 015' . 24W

Course - 182' almost due south

we have travelled 528 NM since Casablanca.

We are following sea as the wind is out of the NW at 13 knots smooth sailing.

Take care

Best

JD

T