If on land, it usually takes a minute to remember where I am and what I’m doing there. I still wake up in that bloody Venezuelan prison sometimes. That one is hard to shake. Most of the time I lay staring at the ceiling penciling in my day.
At sea, It’s usually dawn when I wake. Can’t help it. I usually take time to lay in my berth and listen for anything out of the ordinary, anything not right. I listen to the rigging, for a loose line slapping against the deck or a sail luffing, hardware banging aginst the hull somewhere. Then I listen for weather and take a measure of the roll of the boat. If nothing demands my immediate attention, I go up to take a peek above decks to check for immediate navigation hazards, check the rigging and read the weather. Back below I’ll make coffee, check the radar for any large shipping in the area, then mark my morning position on the chart by dead reckoning. If beyond the sight of land, I might consult the gps.
By this time I’ve decided whether to pluck breakfast from the sea, eat at a local cafe, or raid the galley. If in transit, it’s always from the galley. At breakfast I’m usually planning the next landfall, or the next dive spot along the next day’s course. Back up on deck, I pull the hook and set the sails, and if there are calm seas and a gentle wind, I’ll sit behind the wheel and make entries into the log concerning the events and positions from the day before. The morning ends and the afternoon begins at the noon sighting with sextant.
I’m thinking about all these things, on one level, but I’m also thinking about people back home, food not available onboard, something interesting I’d read recently, what film I’ll be watching next, a screenplay I’ve been messing with, how the skies read differently in different climates ad infinitum.