May 2006 Archives

So I'm sitting at the Seaway Terminal Dock in Port Huron, a place I've driven by hundreds if not thousands of times, but looking at it from the other side. I just got done with watch. I'm on the 12-4 watch which means I work from 12AM to 4AM and 12PM to 4PM. I've adapted pretty well to the watch schedule, which is basically one short nap and one long nap.

We've had a good trip so far. We've been remarkably lucky on Superior, for several days it was calm like a pond. However, the trip down from the Sault to Port Huron was pretty rocky. Our training ship doesn't handle seas particularly well, so the 8-10 ft. waves produced 15-20 degree rolling on the ship, with plenty of pitching for good measure. But we survived, and now I get to make the historic trip down the St. Clair and Detroit rivers getting to wave to my hometown and flip off the Ren Cen all at the same time. (Flipping off the RenCen in joyful defiance, not anger for any of my dear readers who happen to still work there.)

Anyway, its been a good trip and I've learned quite a bit. Now I'm looking forward to getting off of the Training Ship and getting onto a commercial vessel.

So the Chief correctly predicted that changing the lockset in my door would get me volunteered to be in charge of changing any more that came up. Today when I went to get my daywork assignment it was a number of odd jobs throughout the ship from plumbing to electrical to locksets. It was fun to get into so many different systems across the whole boat.

One of my myriad tasks was fixing the heat in the Cook's room. That's one of the first rules of sailing I've learned: Keep the cook happy. Apparently the heating unit in the room he is staying in was changed out when the boat went to the shipyard, but hadn't been used since its been back. So it was staying around 63 degrees in his room. All in all it was a good day, and I got to mess with and learn some new things. I like that part of engineering, with pretty frequently new challenges and lots of different disciplines. Marine Engineering is very much a "make it work" trade. The solution doesn't have to be elegant or perfect, so long as it gets us down the line to the next port (preferably on schedule).

Towards the end I took a break to watch the ship transit through the locks. While we went through the McArthur Lock we saw the Speer and the Gott come by the other way through the Poe lock, which is as big a ship as can fit through, so it was cool to see that as well. I'm heading to bed right as we're passing Whitefish Point, and I'll sleep as we cross Superior on our way to Marquette tomorrow. Maybe I'll find some WiFi there so I can post these entries even.

Log for May 13th T/S State of Michigan

And so we're off. Its great to finally be moving after a year of waiting. While classes have been fine, I hung up my spurs as an Automotive Engineer to get out sailing, and its been too long in coming. Now when I walk out back to the fantail and step out onto the deck I actually see something *different* when I look over the port side. We're making way and that's a great feeling.

So I've gotten most of my stuff sqaured away for the summer. Haven't accomplished nearly as much as I've wanted with the album or website and such, but then I've had a lot of computer issues which have made it more difficult and it was already difficult enough.

Anyway, Saturday morning I'll start sailing and I'll be out on the water more than not for the next 3 months, getting back ashore for awhile sometime around the middle of August. The first part will be aboard our school Training Ship (T/S State of Michigan), which will go on a two week Great Lakes mini-cruise. Heres the schedule.

13MAY Depart GLMA 0600
14MAY Arrive Sault (Lock Through upbd 1300)
15MAY Arrive Marquette 0900 depart 1900 (cinder pond marina dock)
16MAY arrive Houghton 0900 depart 1800 (West municpal dock)
17MAY Arrive Duluth/Superior 1600 (Dee CC Dock)
18May Depart Duluth 1800
20May Arrive Sault 1300 (lock thru dbd)
22May Arrive Port Huron (just passing thru) Saint Clair River, Lake St. Clair, Detroit River, anchorage in Lake Erie
23MAY Arrive Port Huron 1630 (Seaway Terminal)
24May Depart Port Huron 1200
26MAY Arrive Traverse City GLMA

So its a pretty cool trip since I get to see a lot of my favorite haunts on the Lakes. After that I'll be sailing for Interlake, hopefully on the Lee Tregurtha. I requested the Lee because she's been completely repowered over the layup from a steam plant to medium speed heavy fuel Bergen Diesels. I like this for several reasons:

1) Heavy fuel boats generally have a lot more work to do, as Bunker fuel (a tarry substance much less refined than the No. 2 Diesel you get out of the pumps at a gas station) eats up filters and everything else, and requires lots of heating, purifying and filtering. This means that I'll learn a lot more.

2) This is a brand new engine in the boat, which means its operation will be new to everyone on board, and so there will be lots of "start-up" issues to work through. This means I'll learn a lot more.

3) These new engines represent where a lot of the technology is going, so it will be good to have experience with them.

4) The Lee itself is quite an old boat, so i'll get exposure to both brand new as well as much older technology.

So time will tell if this was a smart or foolish choice, but its done now. There is some debate as to whether they will be out of layup in time, but I'm going to talk to Interlake tomorrow, so here's hoping.