Sailing games

When you're stuck on a ship in the middle of the ocean for 2+ weeks with the same people, you have to find something to occupy your free time. We have a couple of sailing traditions on the AFM. The following videos and picture give you a little taste of 2 of them.

This is Sock Golf, which involves balled up socks, paper 'holes' taped on walls, and a full 18 hole course spanning 4 decks and the entire length of the ship.


My valiant team of 4 placed third out of more than 30 teams. Not too shabby. These are our closing ceremonies.


We play poker every week on the ship, but during the sail we have a special poker night where we all have to dress up based on a theme. I bet you can guess this sail's theme. Oh, and we play for honor, not cash.

Drills and meetings

Welcome to some of the mundaneness of life on the AFM. We love our drills and meetings.

Fire drill 1


Fire drill 2


Fire drill 3


Hospital meeting (turn up the volume to hear me whispering)

A few random sail vids

Here's another round of videos to check out. Some of them are from a couple of days ago when we hit some rough weather. Things are calmer now. 8 days from Sierra Leone...


A foggy night on Deck 8



Our Gurkhas invade the galley! (google Gurkha if you don't know what that is)



We were watching a movie when all of a sudden...

Cape Town videos

These videos are from the short time we had shore leave in Cape Town. I got a chance to explore the city a tiny bit and get up to the top of Table Mountain (cable car because I'm a wuss). In the video from the top you can see the AFM under my hand as the camera starts to pan. It's the long white boat-looking object.

The waters have calmed a bit now and we are still chugging along toward Freetown. Tonight I played in the worship band, which I've been doing for a couple months now. I had a very negative/bad attitude this morning but singing and playing up there wiped all of that away. I'm reminded of God's unfailing love for me.


Coming into Cape Town



The view from atop Table Mountain

More sail videos

Thanks to Caleb, all the kinks with the video posting have been cleared up. Here's three new ones...

The bridge of the AFM part 1


The bridge of the AFM part 2


One of our many garbage tosses. The paper bag contains only food waste and paper products, which degrade quickly in the ocean. This is the standard practice for all ships once they are far from shore. Don't worry, we aren't contributing to marine pollution.

Well, still no videos yet. I'm trying to figure out the problem and get it solved because the new videos are just piling up. I think I'm at 10 now.

We left Cape Town a few hours ago and we have hit a bit of rough seas. There have been some things crashing over, but overall no major incidents. I'm not seasick at all thankfully. In lieu of the videos, here are some pics of interest...

A signpost in Cape Town. I'm a long way from home...

The infamous bow, from the bridge, on a very calm day.

A cool photo by my friend Maggie.

Me and some friends just before leaving Durban.

Technical Difficulties

Arrgg. I've got 7 new videos that I'd like to post, but the internet is not cooperating. Hopefully tomorrow I'll get it worked out.

Briefly, we made it to Cape Town today. I spent the whole day outside on a bus or on Table Mountain or eating in an outdoor restaurant and I've got the sunburn to prove it. Tomorrow we are backing to rolling along on the Atlantic. Check back tomorrow night. I promise to at least have some pictures posted...

The first sail update

Remember the video blogs from last year? Well they're back. At least for the sail anyway.

We pushed off from the dock in Durban yesterday around noon. After the harbor pilot was lifted by chopper from our top deck we embarked onto the open waters. The engineers have been conducting all kinds of tests to make sure the systems are all working properly and we are golden so far.

Right now our course is set for Cape Town, which is on the opposite side of South Africa. We are going there to have a couple of inspections made and for the final touches to be made on the generators. I hope to get out into the city and see what's good. We will stay for about a day, then it's off to Sierra Leone.

The sail has been great so far. Fairly smooth with almost no problems. Check out these videos to get a look at how things work on the sail. I hope to post a new one daily.


A look at medical supply during sailtime.


The bow. I spend every spare second out here.


Some dolphins I filmed from the bow. Don't worry, they are not in danger, just playing.