Holiday Season Recap 2023

Hi all! If you’re reading this, I want to send a little reminder that I also posted two book reviews today as well, so check those out if you feel so inclined. If not, just stick to this post and I’ll catch you up on the happening for me and myself this holiday season 2023. Alright, well, now that we’re all here, I want to say I’m going to be talking about my winter break up until today, December 28th, 2023, because I wanted to get this post out even if it isn’t the New Year yet. Therefore, I’ll be catching y’all up primarily on what my December has looked like, not what my New Year’s has been like cause that hasn’t happened yet. I feel like I’m repeating myself and I’m braindead from writing three posts in one day, but let’s keep moving along!

From the beginning of December, I was still in school until about the 15th or so. But, lots were still happening around that was in preparation for the holidays, so I feel like we should start there. This time of year is when applications for summer camps have usually happened for everyone, but this year was a bit different for me. Instead of summer camp this summer, I’ve been trying to figure out internships and job opportunities that I could do. I want to get that kind of experience, both in a regular summer job and in a psychology-related internship because I’m so interested in psychology. The process has been tough and is still ongoing because I haven’t applied for anything fully yet, but wish me luck for this summer!

In addition to summer applications, I’ve been applying to various semester schools for next year’s fall semester. For those that don’t know, semester programs are similar to a study abroad for high school students, but mainly centered in the US. I applied to three, getting all of them out of the way before the 15th, which was a stress overload. I’ll be hearing back at the end of January about the ones I got into and then I’m hopefully off next year’s fall semester for a high school experience in the US with lots of outdoor activities. Wish me luck with that too!

So, yeah, I’ve been overloaded with intense applications for the months leading up to the New Year and I’ll be continuing my hunt for summer applications even now. Aside from that, I continued with school during the worst three weeks in the school year and finally got off on break on the 18th. We had been making our way up the island chain over the past month, going from Martinique to Dominica to Guadeloupe to St. Croix. We finally got there in time for everyone to arrive for the holidays! My middle sister arrived on the 17th, and then my other sister arrived on the 20th. Then my grandparents and uncle arrived on the 22nd and we packed our few days all together with lots of activities and Christmas fun.

It was awesome to get to see all my family and have this time with them, but these past few months have been super tough and trying for me. I’ve been pushing myself more than usual academically, molding my future super rapidly, and was just exhausted at the end of it all on the 18th. Adding to that, I was immediately expected to partake in a million social and familial activities, which are usually fine, but were excruciating when I was so tired and worn out from the past few months. So, I did end up having lots of fun, but I think it’s super important for us to notice our teenagers and student family members have been through a rough semester and need space and time to rest and recuperate before doing it all again.

Well, after that spiel, I think I’m all finished with my December happenings and can talk about the future. As y’all can tell by how I’m posting a lot right now, this break is the time I get to finally catch up with you guys and I’ll be underwater in a few weeks again. So, please be patient with me when I get back to school on the 7th; I’ll try to keep posting as much as I can, but my rest is priority numero uno. We just sailed to Culebrita, which is a tiny island off of Culebra, which is next to Puerto Rico, and I think we’re staying here until the New Year. My eldest sister leaves for school again, but my middle sister is staying for a while and has a friend coming for a bit into January.

Oh, a quick update on movies/TV shows since I last talked about those: I’ve been watching the new Percy Jackson series with my family, and, guys, 10/10, they hit the bulls-eye. So good! I also watched My Life With The Walter Boys, which, if you’ve seen my bookography, you know I read that book. I have some mixed feelings about the series (way too long, too many added plotlines and characters, hit the spot with the actor who plays Cole, liked the Erin expansion on her character) but overall it had good vibes. My family and I also watched The Eras Tour cause it started streaming on Tay’s birthday; I was mad at first because I wanted to watch it as soon as possible but my parents made me wait until my sister got there. Also, I wanted the vibes to be right and no one to complain about anything, so I almost watched it by myself without my family, but they convinced me not to. It’s okay, I watched it by myself the next day. Loved it, 10/10, that girl never misses but I want all the songs she left out, and I want to be featured in it because I know it was partly filmed at my night. Come on, Tay, give me some recognition!

Autumn (aka Gilmore Girls season) 2023 Summary

Hi, y’all! Wow, it’s been literally for-ev-er! I think the last post I wrote was at the end of the summer in September, and I feel like a lot has happened and nothing much has happened at the same time. I’m back on the boat and have just about finished my first semester of 10th grade. And, I’m currently prepping for the holiday season and for lots of family time—yay :I

I mean, I love the holidays, especially the weeks leading up to Christmas when I get to start decorating, planning presents, giving my wishlist to people, and most of all, listening to Christmas music!!! Love that whole aesthetic. But, it’s also a super stressful time. I’ve taken on some tough classes this year and they’re quite demanding of me, so while I would love to be preparing for the holidays and having fun, I’m stuck doing school for 9 hours a day—so. much. fun. No, I do love my classes, but it’s not a lot of fun to watch the holidays creeping up and be stuck still in school; I’m sure many of you can relate.

Also, I said I liked the weeks leading up to Christmas, not Christmas. Yeah, the one downside of the December holidays in my opinion is that it’s mega-family time, and I avoid all social interactions in my life as I can. It’s always super stressful and emotional to be with my family, out doing holiday gatherings and activities all the time, even though I love the holidays and getting a break from school.

Well, after that rant on my feelings toward the holidays, here’s a quick rundown of what the past few months have been for me~

September 6th: Back to the boat! We’re in Grenada and my school has started. Lots of stress and social activities going on that I do not want to go to, but what’s new?

September 7th-October 12th: my life is meaningless.\

October 13th: OMG The Eras Tour Movie omg Tay’s dress omg BEYONCE omg I’m deceased omg 1989 TV is coming I’m so ready omgomgomg

Oct. 14th-26th: School school school Mom goes back to the US for a hot minute school school school wtf is my life

Oct. 27th: Ladies and Gentlemen & Others. The moment you have all been waiting for. It’s time to PARTAY!!!

Oct. 31st: Nothing super happened for Halloween. Dad and I had pulled the boat out of the water for repairs a few weeks ago and decided to stay in tonight and watch a scary movie. It was awesome (& super scary).

Nov. 1st-17th: Still on the hard, but hauled Dafne back in the water on Mom’s B-day. We’re planning to say “bye loser” to Grenada!

Nov. 18th-23rd: Sailed to Martinique and got lots of food for the holidays. Thanksgiving was da bomb dot com—love Thanksgiving food and I finally get a break from school! *happy tears*

Nov. 24th-Dec. 14th: (the longest three weeks of my entire life) (aka near my death bed, Siri, remind me to order a coffin) (oh, look, it’s Blondie’s b-day; Happy Birthday, sweetie!) (also, sailed to Dominica, which was heaven on earth, and then to St. Croix, which freaking gorgeous)

Alright, now, thanks to that enlightening diary of the past two and a half months, y’all are caught up on what’s been happening. Yeah, there was a lot of stress and anxiety over my classes, lots of happenings with the boat in October, and then making our way up to St. Croix for Christmas & New Year’s over the past two weeks.

My sisters are arriving over the next few days and then my maternal grandparents and my uncle are arriving a bit later than that. We still haven’t decorated our tree (I know, sacrilege), but we’ve been waiting for my sisters to get here. I’ve been cleaning, finishing school work, and submitting applications for semester schools (surprises!) and summer internships. I finally go on full break on the 17th, but my classes have been petering out over the past few days, so that’s why I’ve found time to write this post.

I hope y’all have the most amazing holidays, try not to let the stress of family members get to you, and I hope you get all that’s on your wishlist. Don’t forget to stream TET and the reputation Stadium Tour to celebrate Tay as always!! Love ya!

Summer 2023 (6/25-9/1)

Alrighty, here’s my annual summer post detailing all the shenanigans I got up to this summer! You’re in for a ride, as I was traveling the whole summer and had a lot of excitement. Also, this is going to be a long post, so get comfortable—you know what that means: extra fluffy socks, a hot drink, something sweet, and T. Swizzle blasting. I mean, that’s my idea of being comfortable, but you do you.

I finished school during the first two weeks of June and then had about a week or so to relax and hang out with the family in the Caribbean. Stella flew in and stayed on the boat with us, then Cleo left to work in LA, and then, drama started happening.

So, hurricane season in the Caribbean was starting, and around the 20th of June, a tropical storm began to brew kind of near where we were at the time, which was St. Vincent. We were worried because we weren’t covered by insurance in St. Vincent, or anywhere other than Grenada. So, we made some quick plans and I packed extra speedily, then went to a hotel with Stella’s friend who had been visiting to wait out the storm on St. Vincent, while my parents and Stella sailed up to Grenada.

We had about two days to wait out the storm and then, thankfully, our flights were still on. It was a long tough haul, but we made it to our final destinations. I swear, after spending a night camping in an airport and then landing in LAX (aka the worst destination on the planet), I wasn’t in the best mood. But, I sucked it up and luckily had a day to relax before I headed over to camp at UCLA.

A few months before, I had been applying to camps and decided I wanted to apply to the UCLA Theater Summer Institute, which would give me college credit over three weeks of camp on the UCLA campus. For three weeks, we spent about nine hours a day in classes (two of which were college credit, and the rest were ensemble and workshops of different theatrical aspects), and had two days off. Yeah, I was dead the first day in. Keep in mind, I just spent five days traveling, not getting nearly enough sleep, and having to stay chipper while being filled with stress. So, yeah, I was definitely feeling run over by a train by the time I got to camp. Though, that didn’t make it any less fun. It was amazing to go to such cool classes, and I made some awesome friends that I’m still keeping in touch with. Plus, I found those Swiftie friends I talked about in “Speak Now (Tay’s Version)”.

Anyway, at the end of those three weeks, we got graded (ofc, ur gurl got an A+), got college credit for two of our classes, and put on a devised piece (that just means we made tf it up)! After all that, I spent another three weeks with family friends still in LA, recuperating, sleeeeeeping, doing summer school to prepare for the fall, and taking advantage of being in LA.

Then, on Aug. 3, ur gurl’s life changed FOREVER:

That’s right!!! I went to THE ERAS TOUR?!?!?!??!? I still literally can’t believe I can say those words, and I’m so incredibly thankful to our Lord and Savior, Taylor Swift, that this tour was created (and that I didn’t experience any amnesia). It was the most magical 3.5 hours of my life—it was actually way more than that, cause we were waiting in line, wayyyy too early, and saw the openers, too. Anyway, I have an instant smile anytime I think about it, and I feel so lucky that my parents did this for me. (Side note: the TET movie that’s set to release [!!!] was partially filmed on the night I attended, I think.) Here are some pics from that wonderful night:

I know, I know, she looks so gorgeous, right? Plus, just look at that smile—so cute! Safe to say, I think I’ve been blessed by God/Taylor that the movie was partly filmed on my tour night—it’s going to be so fun to try to figure out which clips were filmed at my show and if I can spot Cleo and me in the crowd. OMG, what if they do that thing they did in the reputation stadium tour where they zoomed in on people’s faces? What if they did that to Cleo and me??!?! OMG, I would dieeee!

Anyway, enough of getting sidetracked by Taylor, it happens too often. Back to my summer. After the concert, and getting lots of sleep, my parents and more family friends arrived for a fun weekend together in LA. Then, I flew to Nashville to meet up with a close friend who had invited me to spend time with her and her extended family, who lived about an hour outside of the city. We had such a fun time and I’m really thankful I was invited to explore Tennessee, which I’ve never visited before! Also, shoutout to the lovely extended Hornsby tribe!! Y’all are so welcoming!

After that, we all flew to Philly, where I spent about two weeks with my grandparents, hanging out, seeing family, and going up to their lake house for a while. While I was there, my parents, who were still in LA, moved Cleo into her dorm at Pomona College for her first year there!! Finally, I got on a train and I came up here to Connecticut, where I am now, to spend the last part of my trip with my other grandparents. My parents were here for a little bit but then flew to Bolognia, Italy, where Stella’s spending her semester abroad to move her in.

Now, I’m still in CT, spending time with family, but, most importantly, preparing for the coming school year. I’m getting in touch with all my teachers, setting up meeting times, getting all the physical materials I need here in the US, and one of my classes has even started (my history class). Also, my b-day is coming up, which always sneaks up on me, but I’ve planned a super fun weekend with two friends here in CT before we head back to the US! I’m literally so excited, cause they’re arriving today, so wish me lots of fun birthday wishes and I’ll post pics from the weekend soon. Love y’all and hope you had as exciting a summer as I did!

Sailing 101 (from a boat girlie)

So, this has been a long time coming! I’ve hinted so many times that a lengthy post of everything I’ve picked up while living on a boat for almost half of my life was coming; but, as I’ve been barely able to post all my travel and book review posts, I haven’t had the time to reflect and draw up a list of everything I want to explain to you guys about my life. That’s what this post is for!

Here I’m going to be talking about nautical terms that I may have mentioned in previous terms vaguely but was never kind enough to elaborate on, or just interesting, little-known facts about boat life that you guys might find fun. Let’s get into it!

So, if you didn’t know by now, my family and I have been sailing around the world for the past decade, off and on. Actually, we just hit a pretty big milestone—we just circumnavigated, which means we’ve sailed around the entire globe. We started in the Caribbean when I was five, then sailed for two years to Australia, then sold our boat and moved back to the US for three years, before continuing our journey again in Australia on a different boat—Dafne II. We’ve been sailing on Second Dafne for about five years and plan to continue until I head off to university.

Phew, now that that’s out of the way, we can get down to defeating the actual Huns: boat structure! Now, even though I’ve been sailing for almost half of my life, my boat knowledge is not as expansive as I hoped it was. However, we’re going to attempt this.

This, my dear friends, is my best friend and favorite thing in the world: my home, Dafne II. She’s a beauty, isn’t she? I know you don’t have to tell me twice. She’s a 50-foot Lagoon—which is a French boat—(or a Lagoon 500, as some call it), and she’s absolutely the “condo of boats,” as my family likes to call her. We love our girl though, she’s just not as sleek or fast-moving as some other boats. That’s generally the rule for most Lagoons; though they can be fast, other, less comfortable and made for living in boats may be faster, like this one.

Notice anything? That’s right! This is Dafne I, our first boat. She was a Leopard, which is a South African boat that’s a really nice make. However, she got a bit tight with the five of us on there, so we definitely needed that upgrade to Dafne II when my sisters and I got to be a bigger size.

Now, to get into more specific facts about both of the boats my family and I have had, both Dafnes were/are catamarans, which means they had two hulls. This is different from monohulls (one-hull) and trimarans (three-hulls). Whenever I get too confused, I always think of the numbers hinted in the names: MONO-hul and TRI-maran. CAT-amaran is slightly less obvious, but I think it may be helpful to think of it like a cat, which walks on four legs, but two lines of legs. Does that make any sense? IDK, but it works for me.

Our boats also had masts (which balance the boat, as well as hold the sails when they’re up), a rigging system (a system of lines and ropes to hoist sails and keep the mast and other parts of the boat in place), rudders (balance and steer the boat beneath the water), propellers or props (to drive the boat when the engines are on), and many other various parts that drive a sailboat.

These parts and the many others I haven’t listed are essential to most of the boats within our genre, but boats like motorboats, industrial tankers, or racing boats, have other systems, so don’t blame me if you hear things you’ve never heard before about boats from me. I’m just trying to share my boat!

Okay, moving on, I thought it would be fun to move away from monotonous and boring boat facts and instead talk about some interesting facts about sailing and cruising the world I could tell all of you guys about. I’ve created a list myself, but please drop a comment for anything specific you would want to ask me. I do better when prompted than when asked for my own creation—that shows my convergent thinking mindset!

The Daily Rotation (of Not Only the Sun!)

While we’re actually sailing (by which I mean our anchor is pulled up and we are fully in transit between places), we usually have a watch schedule. “What, like the kind on your wrist?” you may ask. No, like the kind that rotates between people that happens in the military or in sci-fi novels. The kind during the night in most of these examples, but also happens during the day for sailors. Our kind of watch is similar to this in that we divide the hours of the day and night evenly between all on board unless some are crew or not capable of being in charge while everyone else is asleep. Then, everyone else is allowed to sleep or rest or do whatever they please, while one person is awake and alert to the happenings of the boat and our geographic surroundings.

The person on watch holds the world in their hands, but it doesn’t really feel like it. Every 15 minutes, they scan the horizon, looking for anything out of the usual (lights, boats, storms that could be dangerous), as well as check the electronics (the autopilot, the engines, if they’re on, the wind speed and direction, etc). Both of these things check that the boat is going in the right direction, is moving at the right speed (not too fast or slow), and nothing amiss is happening within eyesight of our surroundings. The on-watch person also checks our radar chart, which is on my dad’s iPad, and shows our direction, speed, and the location of any weather problems or boats. We use this to see in advance any nearby boats that we have to adjust away from or to prepare for a weather increase ahead of time. Where would be without our radar? Probably at the bottom of the ocean by now, sorry for being morbid.

The person on watch also has to do one other thing: fill in the log every hour. I know, I know, this is so old school; but my dad has insisted that on every major passage, we fill out the log. The point of a log book is to show our most recent location in case our electronics konk out and we’re lost at sea. Of course, we have many electronics that are kept up to standard and it’s very unlikely that the log book will be put to good use, but my dad insists. Recently, the log book has become almost full, so we’ve taken to filling it out at the end of each of our watch cycles, instead of every hour.

As I said, the cycle of watches and watch lengths changes boat-to-boat and case by case, depending on where you are and how many capable people are on the boat. When Dafne was fully crewed, we would have five people on the boat, but only four were able to do watch—that’s right, your girl was only 11-12 and couldn’t be trusted with a half-a-million dollar boat. So, the cycle would be three hours each. But, when Stella and eventually Cleo left, we were cut down to just my parents and me. Now, I am fully capable and trustworthy, so I’ve taken a watch schedule, but it is difficult to split watches three ways. We’ve also only had two or three serious watches where we’ve needed a watch schedule, but we’re still figuring out how that’s going to work moving forward.

Chores of Your Local Boat Girlie

So, who woulda guessed, that not only land kids have chores? That’s right, your girl has a lot of chores she has to do and knows a lot of other boat kids who are the same. However, boat chores, as you can imagine, are super different from land chores. Also, I am not a whiny child, and I understand the responsibility and work needed from me to help my parents run the boat, as they’ve done so much for me. So, I’ve never viewed my chores as “chores” and hated them, but have instead known that I contribute equally to all the work we have to do.

My chores, unlike other kids, change day-to-day. I usually do a lot of the cleaning, mostly because I enjoy it, but also because I don’t want my mom to be working so hard. We have a rotating schedule of cooking and dishes, so I do my share of those, though I do understand that my mom is a much better cook than me, so I usually do dishes more often than is equal. My dad usually puts the dinghy up and down, but sometimes I do it with him, or on my own. I help him with his repairs when he needs me, as well as carry or hold all the parts he asks of me. Many of his jobs require help, and my sisters and I have been his trusty assistants since we were little. I also do a lot of washing of the boat, as it’s a big job when we do it, and really requires the most amount of manpower. All-in-all, I am mostly the assistant and intern to my dad and try to do as much work as possible for my mom, though I leave most of the complex cooking to her.

Well, this has been my relatively brief explanation of all things boaty from a boat girlie! If you have specific questions or want to remind me of something I’ve missed, please, PLEASE, drop a comment below. Also, I would love to know if you have a fun fact you want to ask me about, as these two are the only ones I could come up with. Love y’all and hope you like my experiences as a boat kid!

Speak Now (Tay’s Version) Reaction!!

O.M.G!!!! Guy’s it’s finally here! Of course, I was counting down the days, but it still felt like the SNTV release snuck up on me. Taylor’s big releases always do and I am always mind-blown by listening to them like I haven’t been given time to adjust. I’m writing this about a week and a half after the album has come out (it feels unreal to say that!).

I should start by confirming that this album has knocked my socks off and I love it forever & always. To me, that’s a given for any TS album, but it’s especially true here because Speak Now is my fave album and I’m devastated to learn that some people…don’t like it? Can that be true?! Anyway, it’s not my job to force people to appreciate a banger album when they hear one. I’m actually kind of happy SNTV hasn’t been “TikTok-ified” or popularized by the media; it means I can enjoy it without fake Swiftie trying to make small talk with me about the album. Ugh!

The album came out while I was away at camp, and leading up to the release, I did a mini countdown, as well as set up a plan for a listening party with some fellow Swifties I had discovered in the wild. It was so fun and exciting getting to camp and noticing Tay merch on some of the other students there—it immediately made us notice each other and start talking about all things TS! I’ve never really had intense Swiftie friends and it was so much fun!

We planned in advance to set up a small listening party, but a minor problem occurred. You see, we had night classes almost every day, and on the day of the release date, we were going to be in class when the album dropped at 9 PM (the camp was in LA). So, while in class, I kept sneaking looks at my phone, counting down the minutes until 9…and then had to wait another half hour before I was let out and could race back to the dorms!

Thankfully, though, my Swiftie besties and I raced back to the dorms listening to the stolen version for the last time *sniffle* and then set up camp in the communal hallway in our dorm in front of the vending machines. We listened to the first 6 or 7 tracks there before we were kicked out of the way and had to move into an empty conference room.

I will never forget listening to those first few notes of Mine and hearing her old woman vocals….agh! It was perfection and with every slight change, we freaked the frick out!! I filmed the whole thing and will include snippets of it in my podcast (https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCAorbv8M26I6NOgkWrDIQLw) so check that out!!

To set the record straight, I highly approve of the BTR lyric change. Taylor realized soon after releasing the OG version of the song in 2010 that the song carried the wrong message. It’s a banging song, and whenever it comes on, my feminism immediately turns off, but that one line in the chorus just isn’t the feminist queen we know Blondie is. So, I approve and support her mature decision to change it—isn’t that a perk of re-recording, that she gets to re-do things she messed up when she was younger?

Anyway, our listening party was a total bop…until we had to head back to our rooms for bed checks at 11 PM. Ugh! By that time, we had only managed to listen to the whole original tracklist and didn’t have time for the vault tracks, which sucked! But we promised to listen to them first thing tomorrow by ourselves—and that’s exactly what I did! I remember, the next morning I was so excited to listen to them, I forgot to film my reactions. But, my roommate was there watching me and I couldn’t hide how much I loved each one. They were all the exact opposite of what I expected. I totally thought Electric Touch and Castles Crumbling would be pop-rock, grungy bangers—and they were absolutely stunning, but weren’t those styles I was expecting. I Can See You on the other hand….I freaking gasped! I loved it—it gave me such hard reputation-core, I couldn’t do it. And the music video?? Per.Fec.Tion!! We love an ex-bf cameo (stan Taylor Lautner or die). I’m obsessed with Emma Falls In Love and Foolish One (they own my soul now), and Timeless is just perfect and I can’t wait to listen to it more. I can’t wait to listen to them all more!

I love that the vault tracks absolutely fit the Speak Now vibe check. Like, they’re all different from each other (some are pop, some rock, some country), but that’s exactly what the rest of SN is as well. And, the important theme of the album is storytelling—which is carried on in the vault tracks! Absolute perfection and my heart is captured by how enchanting the album is. 10000/10

Martinique (pt. 2)

So, this is part two of our stay in Martinique; if you’d like to check out part one, here’s the link: https://jadebennett.com/2023/06/10/tobago-martinique-pt-1/.

Anyhow, I wanted to make a part two to give more detail on all the things we did while in Martinique. We rented a car and spent a few days exploring the island. We loved Martinique and I think we’re planning to sail back there at some point in the next year.

We rented a car last week, and our first order of business was saying “goodbye” to Cleo’s friend who had been staying with us and driving her to the airport. After that, we drove to the botanical gardens on the island, explored the beautiful botany, and had lunch. After that, we stopped by the mall and stocked up on all the food we had been missing. It had felt like forever since we’d had access to a good grocery store with everything we needed, so we ended up with a loooot of bags.

The next day, we drove to a waterfall my mom had heard about and hiked a short distance to it. It was in a cavern, so after descending for a while, we had to walk through the valley-like stone to the beginning of the waterfall. It was so beautiful! And the water was amazing!

Now, we’ve sailed away from Martinique and are currently in St. Vincent. We’re parked here for a bit because Cleo is flying out today, and we’re picking up one of Stella’s friends. Then, I’m flying out on the 23rd to start my summer in LA with theater camp (aghghghgh!!). I’m so excited and will try to capture as much as I can and post while at camp, but I can’t make any promises—I expect to be kept very busy!

Tobago & Martinique (pt. 1)

Hey, y’all! Howdy! What a long few weeks it’s been, huh? I can’t remember when I last posted, but I know it was about Brazil and Fernando de Noronha. I think, in retrospect, not a significant amount of stuff has taken place since then, but it just feels like it’s been a while. Anyway, into what’s been happening…

So, Tobago was awesome! It was definitely super great to be back in full Caribbean mode, which wasn’t happening in Brazil and Fernando. The fruit, the heat, the water, the accent—everything feels like deja vu to me! We spent a year in the Caribbean when I was five, so I have very vague memories of things we’re doing now, which is eerie. But we never got to Tobago, so it didn’t feel particularly nostalgic or odd to me when we walked around town. We checked in in the main town, then sailed around to a nicer anchorage where we spent about a week waiting for Cleo to fly in from Guatemala, where she’d been at camp.

Once, she got on board, we spent another few days in Tobago, doing some exploring with her. We rented a car for a few days, ate amazing Tobagan food, and did some exploration of the island. Then, we sailed to Martinique! Martinique we also didn’t get to when I was younger, so it hasn’t felt too familiar either. But, though I haven’t done as much exploring as my family, I did find it super pretty. The French food is just—*french kiss*. Also, the check-in process was heavenly; online, easy, and didn’t even need Cleo and me.

A few days ago, a friend of Cleo’s and Stella arrived. I’ve been focusing on finishing the school year, so we haven’t done much more exploration of the island, but we plan to in the near future, which is why I’ve made this a part one. I’ll post again with a more in-depth review of everything we’ve done in the future! I’ll also try my hardest to post during the summer, but it will probably be as sporadic as the regular year because I’m going away to camp for three weeks and then moving around the US for a while, but I’ll try to be as regular as possible!

Also, sidetrack, I am absolutely living my most nurtured life as a Swiftie rn! With her being on tour, I’m already at my peak existence, but also with the appearances in NYC, the Speak Now TV announcement (*incoherent screaming*), and the break-up with Ma**y He**y, I’m thriving. Although I did die for a second there when she released You’re Losing Me, I was soon brought back to life and have learned to avoid that song if I wish to remain that way. I just feel so blessed and lucky to be under the T. Swift umbrella of karma, where I know she is the best of the best and will continue to produce better and more art than anyone else out there. She is truly amazing and I want her to be so happy! Love ya, Blondie!

Recife, Brazil (Pt. 2) – Fernando de Noronha, Brazil

Hey, I’m back—finally!! It feels like it’s been so long since I posted and a lot has happened, both in my own life and in the general world! Of course, by “the general world” I mean the Swiftieverse, but you guys already knew that. It’s so exciting to see The Eras Tour begin over the past month, and see tons of clips of the different eras. I’m definitely okay with seeing spoilers because they help to hype me up for when I get to see her in August. I still have to get through the school year but all I can think about is TET! Aghhh!

And, on top of that, she fricking announced Speak Now TV! What?!?!? Is she trying to make me fail all my classes by taking up 100% of my brain mass? Seriously, I’m convinced she’s trying to kill us all. Hearing that Nashville crowd go absolutely berserk was exactly what was happening in my brain. Anyway, I can’t spend my entire post talking about how T. Swift is trying to give me serious medical conditions; I have to actually tell you guys what’s been happening in my life.

I took my AP Psychology exam on May 2nd, which I’ve been prepping for throughout the past two months, basically. I felt pretty good about it, but we’ll get my scores back in July, so plenty of time to nurture my anxiety and convince myself that I failed the test! Yay!!

After my exam, we spent a few days relaxing in Recife, then packed up the boat and sailed for two days to an island off the coast called Fernando de Noronha. The passage was a little tough, just because we haven’t sailed in a while and Cleo left while we were in Recife. That means Dafne’s crew is down to only three members, which makes my watch schedule longer. I definitely felt a bit overwhelmed by the added responsibility, but we still have time to find the right balance. We’re planning to only spend a few days in Fernando, then head off on a two week passage to Tobago.

However, we’ve encountered some maintenance malfunctions in Dafne, so my dad is trying to fix those before we start that passage to Tobago. I also have some school and classes to catch up on, so that’s what the last few days have been. I do like being on passage, but it’s going to be tough to try to do school on passage these next weeks. Ugh. I wish I was in the US going to Taylor’s concerts every night. Well, at least I can live vicariously like all other international Swifties!

Recife, Brazil (Pt. 1)

After being disappointed by St. Helena, we set off for the longer of the two passages, heading to Recife, Brazil, on the coast of South America. I’ve been excited to visit South America for years—it’s super high on my bucket list—so I was excited when we planned to spend the last few months of the school year and my AP exam in May in Brazil.

The passage was about two weeks long and actually flew by without any hiccups. I did a ton of schoolwork, however, mostly centered around the AP Psychology course I’ve been taking this year. I plan to take the exam in May and wanted to finish the course with plenty of time to review and feel secure in my knowledge—though I have a feeling I’m not going to do super well. So, over the passage to Brazil, I buckled down on the course, not focusing on my other classes (which is paying off now), and instead finishing it before we pulled into Recife. Since then, I’ve refocused on my other classes and caught up in time to begin meeting with my teachers again.

We’ve been docked in Recife now for about a week and we’ve cleared into the country, explored some of the city’s history, and gotten familiar with the layout of the marina. For me, I’ve been focusing on school, but we all took a break yesterday for my dad’s birthday to explore all the cool stuff he wanted to know about Recife.

This past week, we’ve been marking Recife on our checklist of a new place that I mentioned in my St. Helena post. So far, we’ve run into some basic problems: the water is dirty, there are rats at the marina (a really big “no, no” for us!), and the climate is so different from Southern Africa, we’ve been sweating nonstop. Even as I sit here after the sun’s set, I am still sweating illogically! After that, some other frustrations we’ve had is with the language barrier here. Recife is a large city in Brazil, but not as big as Rio, so it’s not exactly centered around catering to English-speaking foreigners. All the same, we’ve been super surprised by the lack of any English and had to quickly up our game in Portuguese. Also, of course, it’s Portuguese—of course! They just had to be the only Portuguese-speaking country in South America! Argh!

Other than that, we had a ton of fun exploring everything about the city, and the history is super novel and interesting to us. If we can get past the basic problems, I can see us loving it here for the next six weeks!

St. Helena

St. Helena is a pretty cool place to say you’ve been to, but the same can’t be said about actually experiencing the island. There are different sides to the coin of this opinion, and I’m sure many people have visited the island and found it charming and perfect. But, this wasn’t the view of my family and me upon arriving, and even though we found some cool activities to do, there were many downsides to our visit.

From the Dafne Crew’s perspective, St. Helena island was not at all superb. A lot of the things we look for in a place that makes it a great experience are small(ish) things that are almost unique to travel on a boat: a clean harbor/marina, good moorings or anchoring area, dinghy access, clean water to swim and filter, no bugs, etc. These things are basic stuff we’ve discovered has a nasty tendency to drive us away from a perfectly nice place. The second priorities after these basic ones are met are less bothersome frustrations and more pleasing inclinations: great natural life to experience cheaply or easily, accessible and interesting culture/history. We’ve been to a lot of places that don’t tick many of these boxes, and we find that we tend to not like to spend much time there, depending on the priority of each unchecked box. St. Helena was a bit of a mixed bag on this checklist.

On the one hand, our basic priorities were met, for the most part. The harbor was safe and clean, with no bugs, but the transportation to and from land was tricky, as there was only a ferry service that was poorly managed. Our secondary priorities were much more skewed to the other end of the spectrum. Even though the natural world was great and we went diving and swimming much more than in Namibia, the whole island was extremely expensive and so was, for the most part, inaccessible to us. We went on a few touristy trips and hikes to see the island and its history, but not as many as we wished for. On top of that, and probably most importantly, the internet was expensive, difficult to find, and not an option for us at all. Although we had planned to get back to classes and work comfortably after passage, we couldn’t do that in St. Helena, which cause us to cut our visit to the island shorter than we intended.

Now, this bleak description is a response to my family’s own specific needs; if you’re not looking to have access to the internet while on St. Helena, you will greatly satisfied with your situation. However, that’s not what we wanted.

For one thing, everything was expensive, but nothing more than the stuff we needed most: the internet. St. Helena is a British colony, so they use pounds, but even then, they are a tourist economy, so most of the touristy stuff we wanted to do (hikes, whale shark dives, etc) was expensive. On top of that, SIM cards and other internet options were just as pricy, as well as supposed internet cafes charging by the hour wifi access. To say the least, we were all expecting to get work done, have internet after a week of none, and, most of all, DO SOME SCHOOl, but had to absolutely abandon these plans after one day of exploring our internet options and coming up both empty handed and penniless.

Secondly, the island is super small and there aren’t a ton of tourist attractions. This was a fine revelation for us until we realized that the main thing we wanted to do (hike) was expensive and not worth it. After a week of being cooped up on a boat, the first thing you want to do is stretch your legs, and we were frustrated we couldn’t do that on St. Helena.

But, like I said, all of these things and other grievances we had were completely subjective and we meet plenty (or as many as a tiny island can generate) of other cruisers and tourists who didn’t feel this way about St. Helena. Also, we found joy in other things, as the natural life of the island was beautiful and we budgeted for a trip to see the famed whale sharks.

All in all, the trip wasn’t a complete bust, but we did end up cutting our time short on St. Helena, as I really wanted to get back to classes with my teachers and my dad had pressing work deadlines. I’d not say I’d want to go back there, but, for all the frustrations we faced, it was good to know there was a silver lining.