Beyond the South End



Elizabeth's class aboard the Havey Gamage.
Elizabeth is second from left in front row.

Student Sailor Gives

Graduation Speech

We have enjoyed following the adventure of Elizabeth Sherfey, our “Student Sailor,” as she participated in a “semester at sea” in the Ocean Classroom program aboard the Harvey Gamage. She is the granddaughter of my classmate, Jean Monroe. Here’s what Jean had to say about Elizabeth’s journey:

“She certainly had "the experience of a lifetime" - and we are so thankful for all who helped make this dream come true.” Jean

Our last entry of the adventures of Elizabeth Sherfey is the following graduation speech she gave on May 22:

One ship, four months, 17 weeks, 2,856 hours, 31 people, three heads, ten countries, 120 sunsets, 12 hikes, infinite snorkles and swim calls.

Together, we have done it. We survived. Congrats! Throughout these four months we have learned so much. Not only have we learned how to live, we’ve learned how to fully appreciate the little things. At first we learned how to sleep with everything we brought, work the head, pull on a halyard until our muscles burned, and to throw buckets in a seamanlike manner. As time went on and we got deeper into the Caribbean, we learned how to deal with the heat, enjoy the seemingly endless fruit, look for the green flash, climb coconut trees, and harvest cassava. Right around then, we started our metamorphosis into salty sailors. In the Dominican Republic we learned how to give all we could and appreciate our lives, how to speak broken Spanish. In Trinidad we sat through many long bus rides and learned to never close our eyes. In Tortola, when a ray jumped out of the water and over Softie, we learned to never look down. When we came back to the States, we saw our own culture through different eyes, learning about ourselves. The cold taught us how to wear all our clothes and still fit into our harnesses, while time itself made us appreciate the cold, misty, mornings as we headed up through New England. Maine taught us to be adventurous. Mystic taught us how to effectively shop for warmer clothes, and lookout underway taught us the beauty of singing the song stuck in our heads. From everywhere we’ve been, we have taken a little piece of knowledge, a little bit of a culture, a ticket to life.

The Caribbean taught us how to laugh and embrace the world. The US taught us how to be strong and carry on. The Harvey Gamage how to give it all you’ve got, and still have fun.
I have enjoyed becoming a schooner bum with you guys. Thank you for making our trip great.

- Elizabeth Sherfey, Camden, Maine

Note: If you would like to follow the complete journey of Elizabeth as it was reported on this blog space, check the archives for 2012 for January through May. Look for key word: Student Sailor. The February blog is “Harvey Gamage Log.”