Bigwigs on board

I’m not gonna lie, this week has been tough to get through. Not because of anything on board, but I think the constant travel and work is catching up with me. No matter how much sleep I get, I still feel tired. Needless to say, I’m back to drinking coffee. Only three more days, though, then I get a week off in La Paz. Hopefully it will revive me enough to get though four weeks down in Costa Rica and Panama!

We have a few important guests on this week. One is Tierney Thys, a marine biologist who National Geographic calls “the next generation’s champion of ocean exploration.” Tierney had spent the last decade devoted to studying a giant sunfish called the mola mola (pictured above. And no, I didn’t take it). These fish can grow up to 10 feet in length and weigh over 5000 pounds. Their main source of food is jellyfish. That’s a whole lot of jellyfish to get that big! Read more about the mola molas here.

Another, no less distinguished, guest is John Francis. Currently he is the vice president for Research, Conservation, and Exploration at National Geographic. He has extensively studied seals and sea lions in North and South America and as a film maker, has produced a number of NatGeo films, including several on the blue whales. Watch a clip of his video here

To go along with the NatGeo theme, we have Gil Grosvenor and his wife on board. Gil is the past president and chief executive of the National Geographic Society (which was established by his grandfather) and he just recently stepped down from Chairman of the Board of Trustees. In 2004 he was awarded – by President G.W. Bush – the Presidential Metal of Freedom, the highest civilian award in the US. It recognizes those individuals who have made “an especially meritorious contribution to the security or national interests of the United States, world peace, cultural or other significant public or private endeavors.”

Also, Gil Grosvenor is the grandson of Alexander Graham Bell. You know, the guy who invented the telephone.

Finally, though she’s not on board yet, Sylvia Earl will be joining us today (we’re in San Lucas Del Cabo for the afternoon) and sailing with us until Saturday. Sylvia has too many titles, awards, and accomplishments for me to mention now (you can read about them here), but basically she is the female version of Jacques Cousteau. An oceanographer by trade, she has been at the forefront of ocean exploration and conservation since the 1970’s. I’m very excited to meet her and anxious to hear what she has to say about the state of our oceans (I have heard that her current suggestion is to stop eating fish for two years to let the population recover).

Should be interesting!