Goodbye, Africa!

It's the last night of our safari trip as we make our way back to Cape Town tomorrow morning, where the MV Explorer is docked. I wish we could stay longer! I find myself loving every port we visit, and South Africa is no different. I can't wait to share my South African experiences with you! But for now, I leave you with this photo of me taking a stroll with my new pet :D

Taking Marula out for a walk :) | Trunk-in-Hand Experience
Tsitsikamma, South Africa

Tomorrow night, we prepare for an almost two-week sail to South America! We will be crossing the Atlantic Ocean and will be at sea for 13 days to get to our next port: Buenos Aires, Argentina! 

The Postcard

Just a backtrack:

The postcard that was sent to me from Wellesley (click here) was actually from one of my UWC-USA firsties!!! Charlotte, thank you so much!! And I swear I read Elizabeth hahaha. My bad! But really, I loved it, THANK YOU AGAIN! :)

Expect a postcard soon! I'll be sure to address it to Charlotte, and not Elizabeth :p

Love,
Laura

With Love From South Africa

I am currently at a cafe-slash-bar right next to the lodge we are staying at in Port Elizabeth, South Africa. We just flew in today from Cape Town earlier this morning for a 3-day safari trip. I just finished a game of pool with some locals along with my fellow SAS-ers, after an amazing dinner and a couple of drinks. I got to see Table Mountain yesterday, and some cool animals out in the wild today. Tomorrow, we bond with elephants. South Africa is SO beautiful! Stay tuned for my SA posts!!

With love from South Africa,
Laura

At the peak of Cignal Hill, overlooking the city of Cape Town

Portugal: Segway Saturday

FINALLY! A post on Portugal!

On our second day in Lisbon, I had the chance to ride a segway while touring some of the city's ancient historical quarters! I wanted to try something else other than a bike tour, and the segway was the perfect contender. I've seen a couple of those two-wheeled vehicle type things before, but I never really knew what exactly they were.

Our three experienced "segway-ists" walked us through how to properly ride and maneuver a segway. All we had to do was get both our feet up on the platform, hold the handle bars, and tilt the bars either right or left to switch sides. Sounds pretty simple, doesn't it? Only it isn't.

Leaning forward accelerates the segway, and leaning back will slow it down. Note that I wrote "slow it down" and not "brake". There is no brake on a segway. GASP! At least, not the kind you would find on a bike where you can just squeeze the handles and you immediately come to a stop. Nope, the movement of a segway fully depends on the rider's body movements.

You lean too far forward, you zoom away. You lean too far back, the segway will slow down, but will start heading backwards. So if you want to stay still or pause for a bit, you would have to strike a balance between leaning forward and leaning back to get your segway to be in a stationary position. That said, one of the most essential rules when riding a segway: YOU CAN'T FREAK OUT. If you do, your segway will freak out too trying to match your movements!

When I first hopped on my segway, I was so nervous!! I was gripping the handle bars so tight and froze for a bit trying to get a balance to stay still. My guide felt my tension, so he told me to relax and said that as long as I get my balance, I won't topple over because the segway is not built to be able to do so. Phew!

Of course, as luck would have it, it instantly poured rain as soon as we got to our starting point of the tour. And with rain came strong winds. And strong winds affect segway movements since like what I've said, there are no brakes. So the other challenge aside from trying to perfect a balance is battling those strong winds!

Ireland: Literary Pub Tour

So it's a day before we get to South Africa! We dock in the Port of Cape Town tomorrow morning :) But I'm gonna take this time to take you back to more of my European posts!

While in Dublin, I got the chance to join a Literary Pub Tour, which is a pub crawl with elements of theater thrown into the mix. A pub crawl is when you go from one pub to the next, spending a certain amount of time (and drinking a certain amount of drink) at each one. I signed up for this day program because it sounded so entertaining and unique!

The literary pub tour sign outside our first pub, Duke Pub

It is a guided tour by actors from Dublin, performing works by some of the city's best known writers. You get to go to different pubs, order a drink or something to eat, and relax and enjoy the theatrical bit the actors/guides perform for you! Then you all travel as a group and move on to the next pub, where the actors will then do another piece.

Drinking is a big part of the Irish culture, with Dublin having several thousands of pubs. Literally every corner has a pub! We started our Dublin Literary Pub Crawl at Duke Pub, where I was able to try Irish coffee. Let's just say I'd rather have my caffeine un-spiked. Lol. The whiskey was too strong for me, bleh. But hey, I can at least say I've actually had some legit Irish coffee!

With my Irish coffee (plus horrible lighting)

Kissing A Fish

Kissy kissy fish kiss!

Today, I am no longer a little Slimy Pollywog sailing on the ship. Let it be known that I, Laura Angeline Pastores, have been initiated and granted the official title of a Trusty Shellback!

Early this morning, her Royal Highness the MV Explorer crossed the Equator!! As tradition goes, our ship had a Line-Crossing Ceremony, also known as Neptune Day! This tradition goes back to the 1800s where ship vessels would initiate ship members (aka Slimy Pollywogs) into becoming seasoned sailors (aka Trusty Shellbacks) as they sail through the latitude and longitude lines both a 0 degrees!

Neptune Day is one of the biggest and most anticipated events on SAS voyages. I had no clue what it was when I first got here, but a lot of people did and seemed really excited for it. After today, I understand why!

The captain of our ship, Captain Jeremy, dressed up as King Neptune, while our Academic Dean, Dean Eddie, took the role of Queen Menerva. It was pretty funny seeing both of them all dressed up like that, especially Dean Eddie who rocked a long blonde wig and heavy makeup! The rest of the faculty dressed up as members of the King's Court.

Neptune Day started with the ship's crew members dressed up in some sort of tribal gear drumming and chanting across the halls to wake everyone up. After breakfast, we were instructed to go up to the pool deck where the ceremony was to take place.

Music blasted from the speakers as we all chilled by the pool waiting for the official opening of the ceremony. It was a beautiful day out! Everyone had their cameras ready, their swimsuits on, and their excitement unparalleled.

Greetings From Ghana!

Yes, I survived this past school week at sea, despite going through exams and papers that were seriously out to get me and my insanity. 8 days just at sea can do things to you...

Anyway--

We arrived in Ghana this morning, at the Port of Takoradi! It's only our first day and I've already had such an incredible experience after an afternoon of drumming and dancing with Ghanaian locals! Omg it was awesome, but more on that later!

I wanted to post an entry tonight for two reasons: (1) We've arrived in a new destination and (2) I RECEIVED A POSTCARD TODAY!! :)

I was walking back to my room earlier this evening, and found a lovely postcard waiting for me by my door. At first I thought it was for my roommate, but when I flipped the card, I saw my name on it!! 

So to Elizabeth Charlotte who sent the postcard from Wellesley College-- THANK YOU SO MUCH!! :) Your postcard made my day!! Hopefully I read your name right and that it is Elizabeth! Lol (Apparently, I did not!! Haha) Like you, I absolutely love getting "real mail", as what you've written, so receiving yours today was incredibly wonderful. The image on the postcard was lovely, but your message was lovelier :) I am psyched you are a happy reader of my blog! Hopefully you get to read this! I would love to send you a personal email (and a postcard!) as well, so if you're reading this, email me your mailing address if you don't mind :)

Yup, definitely a great first day in Ghana!

Ship Crush

You know what I hate?
I hate having crushes.

I turn into an awkward turtle when I try to interact with someone I find cute. Some girls get all cute and charming when they're around boys they like. Not me. I get all quiet and shy and ugh.

Awkward Laura is awkward.

Attention, attention:

Read more about our Gaelic Games experience on the official SAS blog!! Our photographer, Bryan Koop, explained the basic logistics of the game way better than I did and managed to capture photos of me in action!! Now I have evidence I actually did play!! Hehe

Click here: http://www.semesteratsea.org/2013/10/01/irelands-gaelic-games/

There's also a student photo gallery where one of my photos from Ireland was used! It didn't crop the way it was supposed to look, but eh, still pretty cool! Keep scrolling til you see the photo of a red door :)

Check it out: http://www.semesteratsea.org/2013/10/04/student-photo-gallery-ireland/

This and That

Hi everyone!

As I've mentioned before, keeping this blog updated per port is becoming a bit of a challenge as my load of school work has become heavier since we are approaching mid terms.

As I am writing this, I have two papers waiting to be written, three chapters + five articles waiting to be read, visual journal pages to create, and a set of photos waiting to be edited for a class portfolio. No matter how much fun I have when I go out and adventure in the different countries we go to, I have to face the reality that I am still a student, and as a student, my top priority is still my academics. Le sigh.

Don't get me wrong, though--I will still keep writing about my experiences in every port, but posting them might take a while. I still have pending posts from Ireland, Portugal, Spain, and now Morocco as we leave tonight and sail for Ghana next. Hopefully I can get caught up once we cross the Atlantic Ocean from South Africa to Argentina at the end of this month. We have almost 2 weeks just at sea during that time (I know, yikes!!), so I really hope that will give me enough time to cover all bases on my Europe and Africa posts!

I hope y'all understand! Thanks for reading!

Feel free to email me whatever and whenever :)

Love,
Laura

P.S. Have you guys seen the movie "The Impossible"? If you haven't, you really should. I watched it for the first time last night, and found myself in tears in a lot of the scenes. The film is based on a family's real life experience during the devastating 2004 South Asia tsunami. I didn't expect to cry at all! Maybe a part of it was the fact that I'm currently not with my family right now and that my emotions were probably a bit more fragile seeing a very touching and heart tugging family centered movie haha. But yeah, it's definitely worth watching!

Morocco!

We're in Casablanca!!

Breakfast out on the deck today felt a bit surreal as we looked out the view and allowed the reality of being in Africa sink in. I can't wait for what this exotic continent has in store for me!

Spain, Photos, Etc.

 Hola from Spain!

I can't believe the European leg of our trip is now coming to an end. Tomorrow, we set sail for Africa!!! I am so excited because it will be a completely different scene, meaning a whole lot of new adventures!

Our travels are going by so fast that I could hardly keep up with updating this blog, so I apologize :( I haven't even written about Portugal yet, and we're already in another port! We arrived in Spain yesterday morning, but two days from now, we will be in Morocco! Talk about a crazy itinerary!

In the meantime, I am taking advantage of this free wifi at another cafe to put up some pics from Portugal and Spain. I don't know how much internet access I will be getting once we get to Africa!

Saint Jeronimo's Monastery
Lisbon, Portugal

Picture Perfect Portugal! Breathtaking

Praca do Comercio (biggest city square in Europe)
Lisbon, Portugal

The view of Seville from the top of the Giralda Tower!
Seville, Spain

Sherry Winery
Jerez, Spain

Alcazar Gardens
Seville, Spain