Germany - football game and chocolate bunnies

We made really good time on our sail to Germany.  Because of this, we had to anchor for a night before we went into the Keil Canal. The next day when we were scheduled to enter, there was too much wind for us to manoeuvre through the locks safely so we had to wait another day. The next morning the pilot came on board so that we could go through the locks and into the canal – however, there was too much fog so we were advised to wait until it lifted.

While we were waiting we got news of a collision in the canal. It was the worst accident that the canal has had in years and it was caused by the fog. Two people were killed. So it was a good thing that we didn’t try to enter in the fog! We had to wait for things to be cleaned up in the canal so it wasn’t until late in the afternoon that we got to go into the canal. We went from being a day early to a day late! It was so cool once we finally got in. It was kind of like sailing in the South Saskatchewan River; there was land fairly close on either side. So many big container ships went through the canal so there were times that they would pass by meters away from us. There were little towns on the shore and some bridges that we had to pass under. It was a really neat change to the ocean sailing that I’m used to.

We sailed into Lubeck the next evening. It’s a really beautiful city. The first thing that we all did was go for schnitzel!

The first full day in Germany we opened the ship for public tours in the morning. I stayed back to give tours; it was a lot of fun to show people our home. It was also quite interesting the people that showed up. I mostly had families however one boy gave a tour to an old man who had sailed on the Sorlandet fifteen years ago; and someone else had an old ship engineer who basically gave the student the tour! The people in Germany were really friendly and very interested in the ship and our program.

After the tours were over I went with my watch to Hamburg. It was about a 45 minute train ride there. When we got to Hamburg, most of the watch wanted to go to the football (soccer) game that was taking place later that day. It was Hamburg against Hanover - two rival teams - so it was expected to be a really good game. The 56 000 person stadium was sold out so we had to scalp our tickets on the street. Everyone that wanted a ticket ended up getting one so there was a lot of us that went to the game. It was a so much fun! The atmosphere was incredible. People were so into the game. The fans were crazy! There were two guys that got into a fight right in from of me! The game was really close. In the end the teams ended up tying 0-0. I was kind of hoping that someone would score but it was still lots of fun.

football stadium in Hamburg



Sarah NeuBURGER eating a snitzel BURGER in HamBURG

After the game we met up with the rest of my watch and went to the hostel that we would be staying at. Once we got checked in we went out for the night to a fair in town. It was a lot of fun. There were lots of rides and really good food. German fair food is so much better than Canadian! When we were at the fair we met a big group of exchange students that were staying at the same hostel as us. (I forget to mention this but the previous night we had also seen some of them in Lubeck and they came to see our ship) They were from Canada, Australia, New Zealand and the US. It was fun to hang out with people our age that weren’t on the ship. After the fair we went back to the hostel. In the morning we got to sleep in! I kind of forgot how and woke up at 8:30 but that was still about one and a half more hours sleep than normal. We had breakfast at the hostel and then caught a train back to Lubeck to meet with the rest of our crew. We all went on a port program to visit an old tea clipper called the Passat. She was twice the size of the Sorlandet! The Passat turns 100 this year. We got a tour and there was a museum down below that we got to see. Is it a surprise that I appreciate seeing ships so much more and find them a lot more interesting?!


the Passat - German tea clipper

The next day was full day shore leave. There was a man with Tourism Lubeck who offered to give free tours of the cathedral to us so I decided to do that in the morning. I’ve seen so many cathedrals in Europe that I thought that it would be the exact same but it wasn’t. The tour started out quite normal. We learnt that it was the oldest gothic brick cathedral in Europe and that it had been partially burnt down during WWII and then reconstructed. After that though the man took us up a spiral staircase that was closed off to the public. It took us all the way up to inside the roof. It wasn’t like being inside a normal church tower. We were actually inside the roof, like where the rafters are! It was so cool because you could see how they lay the bricks for the vaulting. We got to explore in there for awhile.

After the really cool cathedral tour I went to the grocery store. Holly and I had planned the Easter egg hunt, which we would do in Poland - so our shipboard director Bruce gave us money to go buy chocolate. We found lots of little eggs and gummy bunnies and such, and we were going to get one big chocolate bunny for every watch. We then noticed how cheap some of the chocolate bunnies were - we could get everyone a big bunny! Our cart was loaded up with 70 Easter chocolate bunnies! You should have seen the look on the face of the lady at the checkout! The best part though was that we managed to carry them all back to the ship without using a single plastic shopping bag. I had some reusable bags and other people in our group loaded up their backpacks.



70 Easter chocolate bunnies!



When we got back to the ship Bruce was out so we decided that it would be funny if we hid all seventy bunnies in his small cabin! It was probably the funniest thing that I’ve ever seen :D  After the bunnies, I just spent the afternoon in Lubeck. I bought a ton of chocolate to take home. Germans have really good chocolate! Lubeck is also known for its marzipan so I bought tons of that as well. I now have no room in my locker because of all the chocolate!

Oostende, Belgium - waffles anyone?

I ate so much great food in Belgium! My first few days in Oostende were spent exploring the city; there’s a really nice beach. I ate tons of waffles and chocolate. There’s also really good mussels in Oostende.

On our second full day in Belgium there was a full day port program. We took a bus to Gent, a really beautiful old city. We had the best tour guide. He was this little old man who had retired from his job and did tours for fun. We saw some amazing cathedrals, some beautiful canals, and it was even better because the sun was out and there wasn’t a cloud in the sky. At the end of the tour we visited an old castle that used to be the home of the count of Flanders, but now it’s a museum. There was lots of cool medieval weaponry. After lunch we got back onto the bus and went to Brugge. This was probably the nicest city that I’ve seen all year! There are tons of canals running through the city and so many old buildings. We saw a lot of cool churches as well. We were allowed to stay the evening in Brugge and take a train back to Oostende later that night.



Canal in Gent



My friend Holly and I



Our third day in Belgium was another port program. We went to Brussels. I have to say that I preferred Brugge to Brussels. Brussels was a lot more like a big city, and therefore not as charming. There were a lot of historical buildings though, and we visited the royal palace and more churches. We went by a really sketchy flea market. I feel bad talking about food so much but I had the best falafel of my life in Brussels and also my favourite waffle. We saw the famous statue of the boy peeing. It was kind of like the Mona Lisa: the statue is super famous but it’s really small and over-rated. There were chocolate replicas that were bigger! I was a little disappointed. When I got back to Oostende I went out for a Sarah supper with the other three Sarahs on the ship. It was a lot of fun!



Waffles everywhere!



Peeing boy statue

The next day we had full day shore leave. A group of my friends and I decided that it would be fun to bike to Brugge, about 25 km from Oostende. We rented bikes (they were free if you gave a passport number!) and we picked up a picnic lunch at the grocery store. The weather was amazing! It was really hot out and we could ride in t-shirts. There wasn’t a single cloud. You could follow a canal all the way from Oostende to Brugge - it was a really nice path and there were lots of bikers and walkers that we saw on our way. We passed a few small towns. We stopped a lot to rest along the canal and we had a really nice lunch in a field where all the buttercups and daisies were blooming. When we got to Brugge we locked up our bikes and walked around the city because cobblestone biking wasn’t very comfortable! I went on a canal tour in a little boat which was really nice. We took the train back to Oostende because we were running late and the bikes needed to be returned by 7 pm. You had to pay extra to take the bikes on the train. While we were riding the train the conductor got really mad at us because we didn’t put the bikes in the right compartment! We were never told that there was a special compartment so it was a little frustrating. All in all though it was probably one of my favourite days all year!

Biking along the canal from Oostende to Brugge




Cool recycling station in Belgium

 We got shore leave on our last day until 3pm because we had to wait for high tide so I just went for internet and shopped a bit. I also consumed way to much chocolate :) That seemed to be a bit of the theme for this port!

La Coruna, España

We’re back in Europe! It’s really good to be back in the more civilised world. When we arrived at La Coruna, Spain, we were docked right next to the Christian Radich, another Norwegian tall ship. She’s kind of like the Sorlandet’s sister ship. She is also fully-rigged just like us however a little bigger. Our captain used to be the captain of the Radich. The Christian Radich is also a school ship used to train the Norwegian navy. It was a real sight to see the two ships docked side by side. 

bell of the Christian Radich, Norwegian tall ship

 The day that we arrived into port we got a bit of shore leave in the evening so we just went out for supper and walked around town a bit. I got a hot chocolate at a cafe, and instead of getting the beverage that I expected I was brought hot chocolate pudding! 

Our first full day in port was full day shore leave. It rained most of the day. I had gangway duty in the morning, so I didn’t get off the ship till around lunch time. I went to visit the Radich. We got a tour of the ship from one of the mates. It was really interesting to tour the ship and see the similarities and differences between our ship and theirs. I guess I’m a bit of a sailing geek now ;) 

Afterwards I went to an amazing seafood restaurant for lunch and then walked around the old town. There were lots of really nice churches and parks. Later we took the bus to the Hercules tower. It’s the oldest working lighthouse in the world. It was built in the first century. Luckily, the sun finally came out and the rain stopped when we got to the lighthouse. We climbed to the top and got an incredible view of the city and the ocean. There were some amazing walking paths along the cliffs and around the lighthouse so we walked around for about two hours, enjoying the scenery and the sea air. 

the Hercules tower - world's oldest working lighthouse

view from the bottom of the tower

We decided to walk back into town to look for a place to eat and took the scenic route along the beach. When we finally got to a restaurant my feet hurt so bad from all the walking! None of the people in my group could read Spanish, and there were about twenty different plates.  We decided to just order all of the tapas that were on the menu, and when we told the waiter his eyes went really big. We watched him tell the cook who slapped a hand to his forehead in amazement. It was actually quite funny. The food came and we had no idea what anything was. We tasted it all though. Some was delicious but some was absolutely disgusting. It was quite an exciting supper. I limped back to the ship after that. 

Our second and third days were port program days involving an overnight stay at a hostel. We took a train to Santiago where we stayed at the coolest hostel that I’ve ever seen! If Ghandi, John Lennon and Bob Marley all contributed to interior decorating, this hostel would be it. There were tons of candles and dream catchers; the walls were all covered in psychedelic murals; Indian sarongs covered the ceiling; and weed leaves decorated everything. It was amazing! 

The man at the hostel recommended we have lunch at this Spanish restaurant.  The man who served us at the restaurant was extremely friendly. He basically just brought out food for us. I have never eaten so much! There was a whole platter of meat, and a massive pot of soup, salad, vegetables and dessert. It was amazing. After that we tried to work off our lunch by exploring the old town, and to visit Santiago de Compostela, the cathedral that Santiago is famous for. It’s the main pilgrimage site in Spain because of the tomb of Saint James that is at the cathedral. The cathedral was really impressive and massive. We stayed there for awhile admiring the architecture. Afterwards we drank hot chocolates (the usual kind!) at the hotel next door and then went back to the hostel for an early night.

Satiago de Compostela - it's massive!

In the morning we got to sleep in a bit (this is a real treat). We went out for a watch breakfast in the old town, and wandered around some more until it was time to catch the train back to La Coruna.  Next stop Belgium!

Horta Azores

It’s been awhile since my last blog - I didn’t have good internet connection in Horta, Azores.

Bermuda was really nice, and the residents here are very well to do and the streets are lined with high-end shops.  Bermuda was one of the parent ports, but my parents didn’t come to see me, so I hung out with the other “orphans” and enjoyed few days of freedom. As you heard, I hurt my back part way through this port, so I don’t have much to report other than that it was a really nice island!

The Atlantic crossing went really well. I was on the 6:00-9:00a.m. watch, so I got to see some amazing sunrises every morning. The sail across started off really calm; the water was just like glass on some days. It wasn’t good weather for sailing, but it was really beautiful. It got really rough about halfway through the sail - we reached a force 7, and  we were heeling over and pitching so much that the main deck was closed and we had to stay below. There were some fun events during the sail once again.  We had themed dinners, Crepes Afloat, and a dance. The dance was such a blast! We used headlamps as strobe lights, and everyone kept falling over when the ship rocked.

We also had a snow day on March 12^th!  We were allowed to sleep in, while the teachers covered our watch shifts in the morning. In the afternoon we had watch group challenges. First we had to make an ice sculpture - my watch carved a whale tail and we won! Next, there was an egg drop - if our egg survived, we were able to use it as one of the ingredients to make cookies next. The watch that won the ice contest (us!) got the largest amount of ingredients to choose from. That meant that since we had the egg, and we won the ice contest, we had six ingredients to work with!  Needless to say, our cookies were picked by our Cook as her favourite, and so we won this contest as well! I’ve got the best watch group this semester – we are having so much fun together :) 

We saw a sea monster during this sail. I call it that because no one could quite figure out what it was. We’ve got it narrowed down to a sail fish or a basking shark. My money’s on the basking shark. 

We sailed into Horta, Azores  on March 16th. Horta is a beautiful port!  Although it rained the entire time that we were there, it remains one of my favourite ports so far because of the beautiful scenery. Every ship that docks there is supposed to leave a mural; it’s really interesting to look at all the murals that have been done in the past. I found the one done by the Concordia last year, and the one by Class Afloat when it was on the Frededrick Chopin! 

The Sorlandet in Horta

The first thing we did when we docked was to find some land food after so many days at sea – I sure missed land food!  We found a Chinese restaurant where we stuffed our faces – then found some yummy chocolate cake at Peter’s Cafe. Peter’s Cafe was really cool - ships that come into port can leave a flag from their ship, so the restaurant is really nautical and decorated with lots of flags. Upstairs we found the Scrimshaw Museum filled with scrimshaw art (like painting on whale teeth); there was a massive collection, and it was amazing how much detail can be painted onto such small objects. I found scrimshaw of a tall ship, lines and all that was carved out of a whale bone!

Our second day in the Azores was a port program day.  We mainly walked around the island exploring: we went along the beach and along the coast, and the scenery is so beautiful! The island is volcanic and there are some incredible cliffs and plants. We also visited the whaling museum, all about the sperm whale hunting that used to be a major industry in the Azores. It wasn’t banned either until the 80s, so there are some really recent video footage. I found it to be horrible and did not enjoy this museum at all – did you know that they only killed the whales to extract oil? I didn’t like watching movies of innocent whales getting brutally murdered. 

Beautiful view of the island

That evening I went for supper at this really neat restaurant. We were served a plate of an assortment of fish and meat (steak, pork, chicken, prawns, octopus, squid, swordfish, tuna and trigger fish) and dipping sauces. They then brought each person a burning hot lava rock! We were supposed to cook the food on the lava rock - it was a lot of fun!

Our third day in the Azores was another port program; we took a bus to the volcano that exploded only just over 50 years ago. We visited an interpretive centre all about volcanoes.  We climbed up a lighthouse that had been hit by the volcano and partially demolished. From the top of the lighthouse all that you could see for miles was ash from the volcano - it was an impressive sight. In the afternoon, the bus toured us around the island and we stopped at a few places such as a national park, a natural swimming pool, and a few incredible lookout points.

Lighthouse by the volcano

Fields of volcanic ash behind me

A nice lookout - a rainy day

On the day that we left port I went scuba diving. I only did one tank and it was cold! I was in a full wet suit with booties and a hood - and yet I was still freezing! It appears that the Atlantic is NOT warm in the spring! We saw a ton of fish, really cool sea slugs, an eel and a few massive octopuses which was really neat.  The dive was really good and so was the rest of the port. It was definitely one of my favourite ports and I would love to go back.

Dominican Republic post - finally!!

on the bus on the way to Las Terrenas

the beach by my homestay

me and my pick axe :)

The Dominican Republic was one of the ports in which we did a service project so as soon as we got into port we all loaded up onto buses to drive to Las Terrenas, the city where we would be doing the project.  Well they weren’t exactly buses. They were more like riding in trucks. The whole back was open and we sat on benches. It was a lot of fun. We arrived a few hours later in Las Terrenas, very wind-swept. We ate supper on the beach and the meal was provided by the community organisation that we would be working with throughout our time in Las Terrenas. The major showed up and talked about the city and thanked us for what we would be doing. When the meal was over we were sent off to our home stays. I was with three of my friends and we stayed with a Canadian couple. They lived outside of the city and 30 second walk from the beach! We had real beds, showers and peanut butter! It was pretty amazing.

The next morning we met at a local elementary school and were split into groups to work on projects. My group worked at building a compost garden at the elementary school. Other groups built a playground or painted. I got to use a pick axe! We worked hard for the whole day so I was really quite sore by the time that we were done. We had a few hours to shower and rest up at our home stays and then we all met at the beach for a pig roast, a dance party and a bonfire.

The next day we had to say goodbye to our home stay parents :( It was sad. They were so nice and we had had a really good time. We finished worked on our projects the whole day and then returned back to the ship.

On our last day in the DR we had a full day shore leave so I went with some of my friends to see a waterfall. First however we had to get to town which was a 30 minute bus ride from the ship. Buses here are just vans with more seats added so that as many people as possible can fit. We were waiting at the ship with the group of teachers when one of the buses came however there was only enough room for the teachers to squish in so we had to wait for the next one. A few minutes later a huge, fancy tour bus drove by. We flagged it down and asked if they would take us into town. They agreed so the seven of us had the entire, luxury air-conditioned bus to ourselves. At one point we passed the teacher’s bus while they were stopped picking someone up so we all ran to the back of the bus and waved. The look on their faces when they saw us in our huge bus was priceless. In Samana, the town that we were going to, we stopped at the grocery store and bought a huge, picnic lunch. We then caught one of the bus-vans to the waterfall. We had to hike into the waterfall and it was about 45 minutes through jungle. We had a guide who stopped to point out coffee beans, cacao pods and the seeds that used to be used for war paint. We finally got to the waterfall and were in luck because a huge group of tourists was just leaving so we had the entire waterfall all to ourselves! We went swimming in the pool and swam behind the waterfall which I’ve always wanted to do. We ate a picnic lunch on some rocks and the hiked back out. It was an amazing day!

Crossing the Atlantic again

Hello everyone!  Sarah had intended to post her stories of Dominican Republic when she got to Bermuda - but her back went out on her while she was there! She was in lots of pain and spent most of the time looking for a chiropractor (where was Kevin when she needed him!)! Hopefully, she'll find somewhere to connect when she arrives in Azores sometime around March 15th.  The ship left Bermudas on February 28th to cross the Atlantic ocean, once again.  They will stop in Azores (Portugal) to stock up before continuing on the second leg of their crossing.  They will be aiming for La Coruna, Spain from there onwards - arriving there around March 28th.  Here's wishing Solandet and its crew a smooth sail across the ocean :-)

There's music everywhere in Cuba!

The day we got in I went out in the evening for supper and to explore. Most of the restaurants in Havana had their own live band at night! The restaurant we went to had a Latin band that was amazing. Havana looked a lot like the European countries that we had visited in terms of architecture. We walked a lot that night exploring the streets and squares. There were a lot of nice parks hidden in the city. There was another tall ship docked right next to us. It was a Swedish school ship! There were about 45 students our age who were sailing on the ship for two months. They did school by correspondence while being a part of the program. We talked with the students on gangway for a long time. They were really great and we wanted to tour their ship and they wanted to tour ours. The only problem was that Cuban immigration laws are really strict and since technically our ship is Norwegian soil and the Swedish one is Swedish soil the Cuban authorities wouldn’t let us see each other’s ships. It was really too bad.

The next day I went out for another day exploring the city. It was a relaxing day spent walking, going to a market and restaurant hopping. We went to so many cafes and restaurants! We would go have coffee then
walk around, and then we’d want to sit down so we’d go for a snack then we’d walk around more and this continued past our second supper. It was a good day though. The next day was very similar to the one before. More walking and food. The only problem was that I got my wallet stolen! It must have been while I was in the market because I bought something there and then ten minutes later when I was trying to buy cigars I realised that I had no wallet. Everything’s fine though. My passport (which we had to carry around to get into the port) was hidden somewhere else. I’m getting a new Visa and debit sent to Bermuda. My parents were so quick at cancelling cards and getting new ones ordered. Thanks mom and dad :)

That night we had a port program that went past midnight. We all thought that it was supposed to be a Cuban dance show but it turned out to be a Cuban themed Parisian cabaret! We still had fun even though it wasn’t what we expected. The next day we got up really early for a port program. We took a two hour bus ride to Veradero Beach. We spent the whole day at the beach. It was a great day! The sand was white, the water was turquoise and there wasn’t a single cloud in the sky. We swam a lot. I also rented kayaks with a friend and we went sea kayaking. It was so hard to get into the kayak! I was trying to jump in while the waves kept throwing me out and washing me up on shore. I finally got in and paddled away from where the waves were breaking, slightly sandier and saltier than before. We rode the waves back in like we were surfing. The next day we left Cuba. We got shore leave in the morning though. My watch went for a  breakfast. We bought about a million pastries and ate them in the park. We then went for final internet.

coco taxi!

there were lots of old 50s cars on the streets

view of the square

kayaking