Janet Jensen and I are set up aboard Eagle.
I was tempted to say we are settled in, but this ship is so complex, that would be an overstatement.

Over the next few days, we aim to give you a taste of life aboard America’s Tall Ship.

That taste in the wardroom, the officers’ dining room, is pasta salad and sautéed broccoli. Lunch is early today, so everyone can be on deck for the sprint to Port Angeles, the first race of the Tall Ships Challenge.

The first thing you learn onboard is that you knock on every closed door you intend to open. The doors are watertight, and you open them with a lever that could crush the fingers of a person opening them on the other side. Already this year, one person has a case of flat fingers.

I’ll be rooming with Food Service Chief Leta Gibbons.

Remember the stories from Astoria, where the cadets aboard ate everything except the amaretto non-dairy creamer? They hate amaretto non-dairy creamer. They wondered who bought it, and why.

FSC Gibbons buys it. Why?

“Because they hate it,” she said.

She might be joking. She might not.

She has fitted out her bunk, the lower one, with a satin quilt and decorative pillows. I have the top rack, and have pledged to make it every day. I also have promised myself not to sit up suddenly in the night and slam into the metal beams. We each have a locker, and there’s a sink and a fold-out desk.

Each morning we will muster to the waist of the ship, the broad deck at the middle. Throughout the day, we will check in three times, so the officers will know we have not gone overboard. For safety drills, we will report to Lifeboat 3, starboard. We should not confuse lifeboats with the motor launches winched up to each side of the ship.

“The lifeboats are in the big white cans,” EMC Michael Barnhouse said.

We will be welcome on deck at any time, and we will be encouraged to pitch in and help with most any task.

“Anybody want to get on a line, get on a line,” Barnhouse said.

On Eagle, we’ll learn by doing.