We are going to the Caribbean!!

1 April 2014

Update by Rob:
“We are going to the Caribbean!! A few days ago we had to change our course, the wind made us. There is nothing we can do about it, but we will let you know how we are doing there through YouTube. We have reservations for kite flying and riding big yellow bananas behind a speedboat together with beautiful hot young ladies.
How are we going to get there, you wonder? Well, that is easy. We are on a sailing boat, so we use the wind and the cold stream, no diesel needed. We are low on that anyway. When you depend on the wind you have to make the most of it with what you have, so we use as little as possible.
On the night of Earth Hour I walked around the ship and looked around. We had talked about Earth Hour earlier and we concluded that there was very little we could do. But it doesn’t hurt to check whether we thought right or not. On deck, I can tell you it’s almost dark. A small light marks the doorway to the salon and the topsail light, well we need that for sailing. If I had not been on this ship for six weeks now, I would not know where I was going. And even that does not guarantee I make it without walking into anything on the way. The two weeks with enough moonlight we get every month are a blessing. Below deck there are some lights burning. In the salon we need light to get to the cabins and those lights also guide us on deck through the prisms.
So the lights that are burning at night are needed for safety on and steering of the boat. Isn’t there anything we can do? Well, of course we can. As we were talking about Earth Hour the generator schedule came up. Are we using the generator to its full potential for the hours that it is running? Is it provided at the times we need it (you know, with all the laptops, cameras, e-readers, phones and iPods that need to be charged)? And while typing this, lights are burning in the salon and that did not seem to be necessary since there is enough daylight. So I went looking for the switches and turned off the lights. More improvements can be made, but those cost money (donations!!). Thinking and talking about Earth Hour creates awareness and brings new ideas to make it better. And isn’t that what it is about? And how are we going to get back to Rotterdam, you think? Well, who cares when you are in the Caribbean!
PS We gave away our Yellow Brick, to save energy. No worries, there is another ship going to the Azores with it.