Commemorating Henk Wever

3 June 2013

Today at 5am we commemorated Henk Wever. Together with the other Dutch Tall Ships we took the time to say goodbye. Henk was the founder of the ‘Enkhuizer Zeevaartschool’ in 1978. Since then he prepared a few thousand sailors for a life on board a Tall Ship. Henk was also responsible for setting up a class bureau for sailing ships: Register Holland, and he was involved in establishing a union for commercial sailing vessels.
Last Friday when we were in Durban, we received the sad news that he had passed away, far to soon, at the age of 64. Today in Enkhuizen it was time for the last goodbye and at the same time ‘Oosterschelde’, ‘Tecla’ and ‘Europa’ took two minutes of silence with their flags half-mast. After the two minutes our captain threw a message-in-a-bottle in the water and the ‘Europa’ gave 3 blasts on her famous ships’ horn.
The last 24 hours we went on engine to get as far east as possible. We made a lot of headway and the forecast predicts the southern wind this evening. First 5 to 6 Bft and then later on 7 Bft. This will slow us down, but we hope to get some southeast wind this weekend. Yesterday evening we had a festive meal, first mate Maarten and captain Bernt caught two Mahi Mahi’s. One of 12kg and one of 16kg! Our cook Fennardie prepared a fabulous five-course dinner with a menu card and a glass of wine; it was great!