With a few other guests and accompanied by the Second Officer, I visited the Command Centre of the Rotterdam today. A perfect day to let the eye roam across the sea to the perfectly delineated horizon about twenty miles away. Not a speck of land in sight. The sea calm, just undulating with never ending swells.
Through the glass floors at the edge of the Bridge, I could watch flying fish fleeing the turbulent bow wave of the ship, and - sadly - a constant stream of flotsam and jetsam obviously originating from human civilization somewhere on dry land. Plastic coffee cup lids, a few shopping bags, other UFO's (unidentifyable floating objects) dotted the ocean surface and bobbed by every few minutes. All presumably on their way to the GIANT GARBAGE PATCH in the centre of the circle of currents of the North Pacific Ocean. With luck, all that trash will some far off day in the future solidify into one solid mass, and give birth to the first man made floating Island in the Pacific - it may even become a tourist attraction - palmtrees, plastic bottle beach huts, and tourist submarines diving under millions of tons of plastic trash to observe all the fish who find shelter under the man made shade island.
For now - under the blazing sun, the water shimmers in violet hues, the froth of the bow wave creates emerald coloured swirls, the light reflects in blinding glitter - still magical...
