From climbing the masts to sailing into Sydney Harbour, it was an experience and opportunity of a lifetime.
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I started my journey to Brisbane with a 6am flight to Melbourne, then the connecting flight to Brisbane, where I met up with a few people who were joining me on the voyage - Henry, Ace and Cameron. We toured around the city until we made our way to the Young Endeavour ship. We all joined along the wharf before boarding the boat. We made our way onto the ship, got our name tags with our watch on them, and went along under the ship, found our beds and rooms where we’d be sleeping for the next 11 days.
Day One was a bit nerve-racking, to say the least. Not knowing everyone on the ship and having to learn a whole new skill was pretty challenging. Once we left the harbour, we split off into our watch groups and the team you were going to spend the most time with. We were called the 'Youthies', and we were split into three watch groups: Red Watch, White Watch and Blue Watch. I was in Blue Watch with our watch leader, Mick.
Once everyone got settled in for the night, we had a debrief about the journey ahead and what everyone’s expectations were for the voyage. Days 2–7 were very full, jam-packed days, learning everything about the ship, learning the sails, learning about each individual rope, pins and cleats, learning to make sure that everyone had a job or being a cheer squad. During those days, we had watches during the night and early mornings when we were at sea. They were for four hours, from 20:00–00:00, 00:00–04:00, and 04:00–08:00 the next morning. During our watch, we were looking for any sort of light and would report to whoever was on watch with us at the time, as well as entertaining ourselves with conversation or a few riddles.
During the days of our voyage, we’d learn about how to set and furl in sails, faking out lines and making them back up. One very challenging thing I had to overcome was my fear of heights, as we were climbing up the mast. I was very scared the first day and did not know if I could do it, but I had so much support throughout that I was able to climb to the very top of both masts on the ship.
We did have a few adventures on shore during our time on the ship to regain our land legs. The first stop was Trial Bay, where we walked around the jail, learning the history, and watched the sunset on the beach. After a few days at sea, we made our next anchor spot, which was Patonga, where we climbed the Patonga to Pearl Beach track to have a view of the ship in the bay. Then we walked back down to start our command day.
Command day was a challenge, to say the least, and probably the night we got the least amount of sleep. We were busy setting and furling all night long and making sure we got to Sydney on time. We had nearly every single sail out, tacking and tacking some more. At some points, I wasn’t sure how we did it, but we did, and at the end we enjoyed an ice cream from the ice cream boat.
On our last day on the voyage, I woke up for my anchor watch, and we climbed to the topgallant sail with watch leaders Mick and Chris. I had Miranda by my side, and we watched the sunrise over the middle of Sydney Harbour. Everyone on our voyage went from being strangers in the beginning to becoming like a family. I enjoyed every minute of my time on the Young Endeavour program.
Thank you for the opportunity of a lifetime.
