Open ship

10 July 2017

Open ship is part of most festivals. It sounds like a relaxing day. A bit of hanging around on deck talking to everyone who came on board to have a look around. And we really have nice conversations with interested people. 
Unfortunately most of the questions are the same and after answering them 100 times it starts to get tiring. Of course they don’t know that we get these questions more often and it is nice that they show interest in what we are doing, but still… And if you imagine that we have seen 2000 people per day on board… 
And of course everything that comes with the festival: snoring generators, at least two shanty choirs that compete in sound, crying kids (always a pleasure), helicopters that circle over our head, tourist boats that like their own ships’ horn best, jet ski’s racing around and speedboats (who prefer, just like me, their own music over shanty choirs)…
This all makes it quite tiring. But there are things that take your mind off it and are actually quite enjoyable like: every photo camera is the same: press the button. But everyone who asks to make a photo explains it anyway. And because everyone like to turn the wheel, we let them but once every few hours we have to put it back in the middle. What’s funny is that in Boston everyone seemed to turn starboard and here in Canada (in Charlottetown and Miramichi) everyone turns port side while we had in all three towns our starboard side to the quay. Can we conclude that Americans prefer to steer to shore and Canadians from shore? 
And the many, many people who show their gratitude that we came to their town; that feels great. But after a few days open ship it always feels good to go back to sea again. Especially now, as we can set all our sails and sail!