If by any chance you have read the forum on this journal you might have realized that I got a lot of questions from sixth grade students from California. There were a few recurring themes. One of them is 'Life aboard the Palmer', so we begin our series with a visit to my cabin.
Cabins come in all sizes and shapes. The most important people on the ship, such as the captain and principal researchers, have suits with sofas and everything, although this might be just a gossip; I have never been in one.
Less 'important individuals', but still important, like non-chief scientists, have a single cabin that they call home. It must be boring to be by yourself in your room. We keep going down the pecking order and find most of the science party sharing a double room with bunk bed. That is better, someone to talk with. The problem is that people in the same cabin tend to belong to a different watch; one is asleep as the other one is working. I should say that all rooms are nice and as clean as its inhabitants want them to be, except during announced captain inspections, when the criterion for 'clean' is re-calibrated.
Further down in the cast system we find graduate students and teachers sharing the four bed palace, where there is always someone to talk to. Welcome to my abode.
Welcome to our cabin, we receive you with our doors open
The pictures of our room could have been taken any day along the cruise, but I would not subject you to that view. I chose, of course, the day in which the captain inspected our cabins exactly a month after we left port (hint, hint, would we have to clean them again on April 20?). Here is the view of the four bunks. Eric sleeps on the one on the upper left and Sam sleeps below that one. They are both on the noon to midnight watch. Stuart, on the midnight to noon watch, sleeps on the lower right. You now know where I sleep, and I have a floating watch, overlapping here and there with both watches.
Comfortable cabin for four. We can see the local channels on the TV: Bow view, stern view, portside, starboard, baltic room and all the navigation screens, all addd free!
You can see that each bunk has its own curtains, very useful when someone want to read while someone else is sleeping.
Night view of the cabin, assuming we all needed our lights, at which point why don't we just turn the real light? Oh, yes, so we can each decide when to go to sleep.
There is one window in the cabin, and I am the lucky one with it on his bunk. Alright, not everything is due to luck, I was the second one to find the cabin after Sam. The little curtain lets lots of light go through, so that would not be a good bunk for Stuart who sleeps during the day.
I would say there is a huge benefit for the lower bunks, specially in days of heavy seas. I am amazed I have not yet broken my neck in one of my gracious exits when Poseidon decides to help.
Every morning I look out through the window and take a 10 seconds video with my cellphone. I started about ten days ago, so you will be able to see what I saw for about five weeks. I was looking at them the other day there is even a penguin in one of them! I started taking them when we left the ice field though.
View to the world
I will upload the video of the morning view here when we get back on land:
Since we are four in our palace we get to have our own bathroom, although I hear every other room does as well. The shower, as you can see, is done in a nice post-modern industrial design that matches the rest of the fixings. I like the all steel walls with plastic grid flooring, but it seems the maintenance is too complicated and needs to be repainted very frequently to avoid rust. I was going to ask my wife to think about redoing our bathroom, but I do not want to be painting it that often, so we will skip the idea.
Nice post-modern industrial design in our bathroom.
Next chapter on the 'Living aboard' series a topic no one has asked about yet. 'How to do Laundry'. The sink on the bathroom seems very small, don't you think?
Important note: By no means I am complaining about my sleeping quarters. I know I am extremely lucky just to be here and would have taken any type of space as my residence. I have enjoyed sharing the room with three fantastic guys that are very clean and considerate. The rest is to have fun.