Schuchardt Family At Sea: 12 days to cross the Atlantic ocean from Cape Town to Buenos Aires

The MV Explorer departed Cape Town at 6pm on October 30th, and we spent a long 12 days to cross the Atlantic Ocean traveling at roughly 14 knots (ideal speed for minimal fuel consumption, even though the ship can go over twice that fast). This was, to me, one of the most fascinating, enjoyable, and educational moments of the entire voyage. I taught my classes, and students complained that it was long, boring, and mostly each day filled with the same sights as before. But you get two perspectives that you can't "read about" or perceive any other way (in my experience, anyways), and they are these: 1.) you discover just how big the world is and just how much ocean is out there, and you realize, wow, there's an awful lot of water out here -- traveling nearly two weeks and still no land in sight. We also saw whales breaching, some interesting buoys and floating objects, and some magnificent sunsets and sunrises. Then, just when you are going a bit stir-crazy, you arrive in sight of land on the morning of November 12th and you get hit with the second equally strong impression which is precisely the opposite, 2.) "Aha! So that's how finite the world is!" You can almost feel the earth's curvature underneath you as you realize you just traversed it in twelve days, and then you get the itch, the bug, the wish to, you know, keep going all the way around…

Vivi and Dad dressed up again (same outfits) for the real Halloween on October 31st.

Adler is a boy...

who is really a shy monkey...

but if you're patient, he'll make monkey faces and gestures at you.

Shhhh! Don't tell anyone that Genevieve snuck into the Faculty Lounge when no one else was around!

Probably the most exciting part of the whole trans-Atlantic crossing was the completion of the ping-pong tournament. Pictured here is the moment when Mercer, age 18, congratulates Oliver, age 8, on his victory (with a 14-year old partner) in the doubles tournament against every other team on the ship (including students and faculty).