QotD: The Never-Ending Boat Ride
What's the longest boat ride you've ever been on?
I went on a whale watch off the coast of Plymouth, MA, on a day when I was 11. A smallish, ferry-type ship took a group of passengers (30? 50?) out into international waters to look at humpback whales. We were out on the watch all day, from early in the morning (6 or 7) to late afternoon (4 or 5). I have a small phobia about deep open water, so it's amazing that I was able to handle the whole thing. I read a book and drew pictures of Snoopy during the trip.
It took hours to get to the location where the whales hang out, and we waited for a long time without seeing any, but eventually we did see a few. They even told us some stuff about the whales we saw and their histories, since the whales are generally recognizable from their tail flukes. The whales seemed pretty friendly, breached a lot, checked us out, and were huge.
Later that year, we had moved to Florida, and I brought in some swag from the whale watch (floating, plastic-coated foam keychain shaped like a whale, whale-shaped patch, adopt-a-whale information, pictures of whales that I'd taken) for show-and-tell. My classmates were distinctly disinterested, and I was disillusioned into thinking that what had been an interesting experience at the time was totally lame.
But now, I think it was cool and I'm glad I went. How many people really get to see humpback whales up close?
Now I just think show-and-tell usually sucks.
