Part of the Trident: we don't buy it tour blog 
I never thought I'd be so pleased to be woken up at 7.30 on a Saturday morning to go and clean some toilets. I've spent the past 36 hours greenly clinging to my bunk, plastic bag in hand, as the ship was tossed about by a force 10 gale. But this morning, I managed to get out of my bunk without being catapaulted to the other side of the cabin, and came up on deck to see calm waters and a strong winter sun, instead of the hostile broth of a sea we've become used to.
A word about the Arctic Sunrise: she’s an ice-breaker, which means she has a rounded hull and no keel (see how casually I'm throwing in nautical terms now?). Basically, her underside is as round as an egg.
Which means that, at the merest whiff of weather, the ship rolls. And pitches. The Sunrise has such a special combination of rolling and pitching that, amongst Greenpeace ship buffs, she’s known as The Washing Machine. Last year, in the Southern Oceans, the Sunrise’s maximum roll was 70 degrees. This is what a 70 degree roll looks like:
What a ship should look like.
A 70 degree roll one way.
And back the other way...
I've been known to get seasick in a bath so, on the advice of the many experienced seafarers on board, I took some travel tablets before we left Leith on Wednesday. On Wednesday evening, for the first time in my life, I managed to enjoy the movement of a boat - I ate a fantastic meal cooked by Patricio, our Argentine cook, to the swaying of the ship, and fell asleep to its gentle rising and falling.
On Thursday, feeling proud of my newfound sea legs, and I ambled into the mess for breakfast (because I now know what messes are for). In the mess, there’s a blackboard that us newbies on board have named The Oracle; nobody ever seems to write on it but, every time you look, it holds a new snippet of wisdom. And it always speaks the truth.
"Bad weather coming", said the Oracle.
"Bad"? A spot of rain? A mild gust? There was nobody around to ask, so I went off to get on with my cleaning duties.
As the ship's movements left the realm of "rising and falling" and entered definitive "pitching", the order was given to batten down the hatches (people really do say that at sea). Paul, the first mate, came into our cabin to check that the porthole was shut tight. "If it gets real bad," he said, "pull down the cover - that will stop anything from coming in." It took me a few moments to realise that by "anything", he meant the sea. And that the porthole sits at least three metres above sea level.
The bad weather started in earnest just as we were approaching the Orkneys. The term "washing machine" doesn't really do justice to the elaborate movements this ship's capable of. There's definitely a strong element of washing machine, but there are also good pinches of rodeo ride, rollercoaster and those pens you have as a child that tilt every which way but never quite fall over.
On Thursday afternoon I retired to bed with a plastic bag, and more or less stayed there until Saturday morning. Every now and then someone would come in to apologetically give more specifics on the Oracle’s pronouncement. "Just to warn you it might be getting a bit windier soon," they'd say. Or "sorry, it's technically a gale now". Or simply, "Force 10 - you OK?". And finally, after I'd been glued in bed for several hours: "The ship's going to turn soon, which means we'll really start feeling the weather".
At one point there was excellent news though - Sarah popped her head in to say we'd won our legal case against the government; the judge ruled was that the government's decision to back nuclear power was unlawful, meaning that a new and fuller review will have to be conducted if the government wants to justify their continued support of nuclear power. Hopefully the government will learn its lesson - it's promised a "full debate" on the issue of replacing Trident too, and we're still waiting...
Luckily for my pride, a lot of the seasoned sailors on board have been feeling ill too (although they've all seen a lot worse) - they just haven't stopped working. On my few brief lurches out of the cabin, I've come across people sewing (including threading a needle in between lurches), painting, sanding, you name it... In the evening, there was even a quick game of basketball to unwind.
I've just been called out onto deck - we're dropping anchor in a beautiful island bay for the night. "What's that?" I ask, meaning "which island?". "It's a big metal thing that keeps the ship still," said Slade, the assistant radio operator. I think I may have a way to go before leaving my reputation as a landlubber behind.
Tomorrow - a day later than planned, because of the weather - we arrive in Greenock near Glasgow, and our work to stop Trident's renewal continues...
