Land Ahoy! November 27, 2023

Well, really it was just another day at sea. The Land Ahoy! part will come bright and early tomorrow at 5 AM when we approach Recife, Brazil and I probably won’t be up by then. So I’m calling it now.

We had an albatross follow us all day a couple of days ago when we were farther out. I kept wondering if it was getting tired, but I looked it up and an albatross can travel about 10,000 miles over the sea before returning to land. They actually sleep while they are flying. Pretty amazing birds. Albatrosses are supposed to bring good luck, but the expression, having an albatross around your neck, has negative connotations. The phrase alludes to Samuel Taylor Coleridge’s poem, The Rime of the Ancient Mariner,” in which a sailor who shoots a friendly albatross is forced to wear its carcass around his neck as punishment. I guess you knew I was going to cite that poem at least once more.

Yesterday on the ship they had a ceremony called “Order of the Shellback.” A shellback is a sailor who has crossed the equator, and a pollywog is a sailor who has not crossed the equator. In general, a shellback is an experienced sailor and a pollywog is a newbie. When I was a kid, we called tadpoles pollywogs, so that kind of makes sense.

A ritual of the Shellback ceremony is baptism on the line, also called an equatorial baptism. The ceremony is supposed to be an initiation into the court of King Neptune. What this meant for our ship was a bunch of people lined up and jumped in the pool. Then they got out on the other side and kissed a huge (real) swordfish on ice with a tomato on its bill. The jump in the pool was the “baptism” and the swordfish apparently represented King Neptune. I think the tomato was there for safety reasons. There was also an ice sculpture that must have been a representation of Neptune, but by the time I saw it, it had melted and lost some of its shape. While this ceremony was going on, there was kitschy live music, like “Brandy, You’re a Fine Girl,” “The Girl From Ipanema,” “Copa Cabana,” etc. So, all in good fun. And just in case you are wondering, we did not participate in the baptism.

According to the captain, we crossed the equator last night at 9 PM. I actually thought we crossed it a couple of days ago, but guess I was confused. The captain said that when we crossed they would blow the ship’s horn, but I didn’t hear it. Doug said he thought he would go outside at 9 PM and see if there is really dotted line out there. Haha.

We keep seeing a guy who never says a word, but is always whistling in a weird, tuneless way. I don’t think he knows that it’s considered bad luck to whistle on a ship. Other things that are bad luck are bananas on board, redheads, wishing someone good luck, flat-footed people and setting sail on a Friday. There are several theories as to why bananas are bad luck, but the one that makes the most sense to me is that when bananas were in the cargo hold of ancient ships, other fruits spoiled more quickly because of the ethylene gas they released. So, bananas taint stuff.