Personal blog

Blog #1 – Boats and cheese

Hello everybody, welcome at the really first blogpost! First a short introduction. Our team exists of Gregory (stationleader), Yohann (logistics engineer) and me, Fieke (observatory engineer). At the moment we are in our quarantine hotel nearby the airport of Oslo and luckily, we have little fridges in our rooms. Gregory brought along 4 kilograms of Saint Nectaire (French cheese), Yohann 8 kilograms of Comté (also French cheese). I should have brought 5 kilograms of Gouda to brag along and to make the image complete, but I did not. Too bad.

Cheese. From left to right: the fridge of Greg, the fridge of Yohann, my fridge.

Gregory and I are being recruited by AWI, Yohann by IPEV. Before coming to Oslo, we had a preparation phase of about three months. A highlight of the preparation was definitely our last week at IPEV in Brest, France, where we did the boat training all together. Let me present you:  

BOATING TRAINING IN 20 STEPS

  1. Yohann driving the trailer with the boat in the water.
  2. Gregory getting into a survival suit and guiding the boat in the water.
  3. Everybody getting into the boat.
  4. Yohann, Gregory and Fieke practising knots, navigating and manoeuvres.
  5. Navigating towards an island for lunch.
  6. Anchoring the boat.
  7. Leaving the boat.
  8. Someone forgetting something on the boat.
  9. Gregory returning to the boat to get the forgotten stuff because he was still wearing his survival suit.
  10.  Eating lunch on a very idyllic Breton island.
  11.  Helping Dominique (our boat trainer and IPEV responsible) to look for bigorneaux, so that he has something to eat in the evening.
  12.  Looking for a big rock to pee behind.
  13.  Returning to the boat and sailing away.
  14. Gregory, Yohann and Fieke getting all dressed in survival suits, ready to jump off the boat, Dominique giving instructions on what to do.
  15.  Jumping off the boat, posing for the picture and experiencing the feeling of wearing a survival suit when you’re overboard.
  16. Discovering your survival suit was coincidently permeable and you are being soaked up to your underpants (Fieke).
  17. Climbing back on board.
  18.  Fieke receiving a dry, but sweaty T-shirt from Yohann (team building aspect).
  19.  Navigating back.
  20.  Leaving the boat and getting the boat on shore again.

Try it, but it is at your own risk 😉 You will hear from us soon again!

Step 1: Driving the trailor with the boat into the water.
Step 13: Getting back to the anchored boat. Picture by Yohann Dulong.
Step 15: Swimming in our survival suits :). Picture by Dominique Fleury.

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