Despite being taken on my really rubbish phone-camera, I really like these photos. They've come out really grey, which is exactly how I feel at the moment. This photo above, shows all the ships on exercise with us at the moment. There's a type 23 frigate close by, a couple of RFA ships, and HMS Ocean in the distance. There's a couple more too, but they had the luxury of docking alongside a wall instead of anchoring. Every time I see Ocean, I can't help thinking how ridiculously mean it looks. Well, from the side anyway. She's an amphibious landing platform... which means she doesn't deal with any jet aircraft, just helicopters, and marines. But she's nicely decorated with guns and other mean stuff. And apparently she's bigger than our current aircraft carriers, making her the biggest ship in the fleet... though I'm not so sure whether that's a fact or not.
So away from the macho stuff, I'm really bunged up, ill, tired, worn out etc etc... and I lost my voice this week, bizarrely. Everyone found that rather amusing. But the long hard days continue, and the drills and exercises are picking up more pace... It's been 3 weeks for me now, so I'm looking forward to a weekend back home soon! I think most of the mess feels the same too, judging by the mood. Don't get me wrong though, there is a lot of exhilarating evolutions taking place... but it's in the down-time; when you are always alert and waiting for something else to happen, that you find yourself wearing thin. All this in preparation for a "possibility". Buster reminded me the other day: "It's weird isn't it!? The way we live- what we're doing, what we have to put up with, how we live our lives. I mean really- who lives like this...?!"
