Seamanship 2018 - Winner's Log

To the readers,

First of all, thank you for having the nerve and resilience to click onto this report. I hope it quenches your thirst for the knowledge of what happened in this year’s Seamanship competition.

Second of all I want to thank everyone who took part in helping and supporting this amazing and fun-filled competition. Whether you helped with transport, gave advice, or even thought about all of us as we were out on the water, it is greatly appreciated.

A special thank you to Meagan for organizing and running said competition, Meagan this may only be my second Seamanship, but it was by far the best and I am sure both teams will agree with me on that, and of course to Wayne who led us to a victory, even though we grew to despise the constant speed rigging practices and the tactics that never seemed to end, it obviously paid off and for that we cannot thank you enough.

Finally, to the Seamanship teams that participated this year both A and B team you all did brilliantly, and I cannot wait for next year! Oh! I almost forgot, thank you to the other teams because without you, we wouldn’t have had the opportunity to emerge as the winners.

Nevertheless, enough rambling let’s get started. Pull in your main sheets everyone and don’t forget to pinch into the wind… this is going to be a stormy ride.

Day 1

Oh buoy, here we go If you have not figured it out already we came

first in A LOT of categories and of course came first over all, no big deal just another competition for the 1st Muizenberg scouts. Anyhow sorry, I have a habit of getting distracted, let’s set the scene for day one.

There was a light drizzle so the 1st Muizenberg teams stood outside in the rain. Checking out the competitor's boats of course, we really wanted to win. To say that it was cold was an understatement, people were shivering uncontrollably but, there is always that one guy/girl who is there, who doesn’t feel the cold, who doesn’t seem to care about said weather, as long as the barrels for extra buoyancy were tied under the thwarts. This year that guy was drum roll please… Mika Wessels. Yup there he sat tying on those barrels in a t-shirt in the freezing cold!!! Honestly how do you not have hypothermia?

We all headed inside for the afternoon and after setting up our huge STA kit (thanks to Connor who brought this and the giant First Aid kit). We all sat down and had a delicious supper Nathan chomping down on pizza, Gabby cleaning hers off and Mika, Ash and Connor seemed too stressed to eat anything. To those who lead anything in the future, just remember this quote “I am too blessed to be stressed,” written by Mia Ehlers the person sitting at her kitchen counter and trying to ignore the smell of food as she finishes this sentence.

The B and A teams of 1st Muizenberg all chilled together. Until IT happened, we all knew it was coming, the horror, the unimaginable monstrosity that would take our lives, the… NAVIGATION TEST!!! Yup, we were terrified, so everyone voted for who was going to be sacrificed to this demon of a test. The Sacrifices for A team were: Mika and Nathan and the Brave warriors for B team were: Ash and Ed. I never truly found out how the navigation test went, so it was a huge surprise for everyone who weren’t sacrifices to find out that Muizenberg A team had come first for the navigation. Well done team!!!

Speaking of the non-Sacrifices, we were having loads of fun making our

way through Simonstown, blasting out music, running in circles and basically playing a ginormous wide game. Gabby decided to injure herself at the second base by running into a pole and bumping her knee. Liam and Richard were the ones trying to keep everyone together, Connor was deciding on which way we should go, and Rebekah lead us straight and true all the way to the final base. This is where we dropped Gabby off to get her weird knee problem fixed up and to trek back to home base.

Day 2

I have to say that was one of the best sleeps I have had in a long time. We all woke up to find that the STAs (spare time activities) had been released into the wild, also known as the many Seamanship teams that attended. We all hunkered down and got to work. Richard and Rebekah and I working on the soap boat. Mika, Gabby and Ash worked on nail art and Nathan, Connor, Liam and Ed working on spaghetti knots (which were deliciously hard to make).

Now, I know what you are thinking, this is Seamanship! Why hasn’t there been sailing yet! I know, I know this is getting rather frustrating but, be patient young Padawan. The fun will soon arrive.

We launched our boats and shipped our oars before setting off for the first race. To say it was a brilliant start would be a dead lie. All boats started to race at the 5-minute whistle, completely ignoring Gilly’s cries of frustration, as no matter how many times we restarted, we just couldn’t seem to get it. Eventually after many, many, MANY tries we eventually gave up and moved onto sailing. Which we all know is what Muizenberg is best at. We sang songs and came first in almost every race, thanks to the Majestic Sea Flap Flap (also known as Mika).

It was a dark and windy night when the 1st Muizenberg teams sat together and finished their final STAs. We worked long and hard, with only a short break to have one of the best suppers I have ever tasted, (made by our head chef Delne).

Song list:

* We are the Champions * Hakuna Matata * Bruno Mars: Lazy Song Parody (speak to Delne and Gabby for lyrics) * Let it GOOOOOO * The Jungle Book bear song * There was a moose named Fred!! * Other random songs that I can’t remember.

Day 3

Here it is, the day we have all been waiting for, THE FINAL DAY! Dun Dun Duuuuuunnnnnn.

We started it off nice and easy with handing in our brilliantly made STAs and eating a delicious breakfast provided once again by our head chef Delne. We rigged the boats and rowed down to the beach where we rushed around to be the first team to fall in. After a few races of rowing around the buoy we were exhausted and had never felt so relieved to hear that we could rig for sailing. First time for everything I guess.

A team and B team sailed ferociously. A team managed to stay in our glorious 1st place (thanks to Plumstead for ripping their sails and allowing us to take their 1st). B team even managed a 3rd place thanks to Ed and Ash and their extremely organized B team.

As the end of Seamanship approached, we packed away the boats in the pouring rain. The prize giving drew closer like a giant’s shadow looming over you and we felt the dread of what was to come bubbling within us.