Tropical Oasis

The dawn of our final day brought a lot of sadness to the crew of the Lascaris as we roused ourselves from sleep punctuated by periodic lightning and thunder. While the rest of the crew prepared breakfast, I was called away to the Tonic III with Margaux for a meeting with the rest of the student skippers for the day. Our fearless leader Mike explained how we could win fame and fortune on the high seas in a massive final race between all nine of the boats in our fleet! Coming back to our faithful crew, I explained the details while our boat worked its way into position in the racing lineup. After a tense countdown, we were off! Pierce, Justin, and Charlie hauled in on the port side jib sheet with all their strength as Tiki and Skyler stood by to adjust the mainsail to meet the whipping wind. Neck and neck, our boats flew over the waters of the Sir Francis Drake Channel towards Road Town. I stood at the wheel, trying to control the vessel as the wind filled her sails. Upon reaching Road Town’s harbor, we performed a swift tack with Savannah taking station at our wheel. Maddy, Annie, Ella, and Grace quickly reoriented our sails, with Jess on the main sheet to get all the speed we could out of the wind. Our next and final waypoint took us to Peter Island, which we, unfortunately, reached in last place. However, what mattered is that we all had fun getting our ship to speeds we had never seen before, and Sabrina also proved to have a steady hand on the helm.
What followed was a slow motor voyage to West End, tinged with sadness as we began to pack up our things in what has been our home for the past three weeks. After getting a nice dinner from shore, we had one final squeeze at dinner, where we confessed some of our mistakes and mishaps over the voyage. We then retired to sign pieces of the AQ flag we had carried with us. Writing this blog as the day winds down, I think we’re all both excited to see friends and family again but sad that we’ll be leaving this family behind.
-Destry S.