Farewell

Farewell to the patients - the very last patients onboard the Global Mercy were discharged and sent home a couple of weeks before the ship left Sierra Leone. Many of us were on the dock to say good bye, pray for them and wave them off on their journeys home - many of them had been away for a considerable time so it was going to be an emotional home coming for them. For many left behind, it was an emotional farewell. A hospital with no patients is a strange, quiet place. We suddenly found ourselves with no patients to visit in the evenings, which had definitely been our greatest joy up until then.

In typical African style - everyone was loaded in to the bus which Mercy Ships had hired, all their belongings were safely (?!) lashed to the roof....and then the engine wouldn't start. No problem...just move some dock fencing, get a few strong men behind the bus...and they were off!

Farewell to crew - after much deep cleaning in the hospital and tying up of loose ends, a large number of crew (especially nurses) disembarked before the ship sailed. Included in this number were a good few people who had become good friends to us in the weeks we had been together. Again we gathered on the dock for an emotional farewell - for some it was their final departure (like Keren the wonderful hospital director returning to Australia after 6 years serving with Mercy Ships), for others they already know when they will be back. For us, the dining room has lost many familiar faces.

Farewell to Sierra Leone - and finally, it was time for the ship herself to leave. We were only delayed by a few hours on Sunday morning to allow the dive team to dive once more to clear the rubbish from the water intakes for the engines! That done, we were off. With crew lined up along the decks, waving a multitude of international flags, as we were let free from the dock and after 10 months of being tethered, the technical crew finally got to go somewhere. And not just a short voyage, but 9 days at sea, heading for dry dock in Cadiz in Southern Spain.

A few hours in to the voyage and one of our two azipod propulsion units failed due to a burnt out circuit board, which couldn't have been predicted. So, this ship is not built for speed, and generally travels slowly in order to conserve fuel - but now we have only one engine we are going even slower - around 8 knots. The plan is to rendezvous with a service boat as we pass through the Canary Islands so that our engineering team can get the part to fix it and speed up our journey somewhat. We are currently expected to arrive in Cadiz one day behind schedule, on Wednesday 25th - no problem for us, we are enjoying the sail....more on that later.