La Cuarentena

Vigo, Spain | 42.2406° N, 8.7207° W | May 1, 2021

I step from the bus onto the cobblestone street in front of Hotel Bahía de Vigo, feeling dazed. Only faintly aware of the warm air, abundant sunshine, and surrounding picturesque landscape, I realize I haven’t been this sleep-deprived and jet-lagged in a long time.

In the past 24+ hours, I have traveled thousands of miles across six time zones via two flights, and one long bus ride. And now I’ve arrived, along with 18 expedition team members, in the lovely, coastal city of Vigo, Spain. This will be our home for the next two weeks.

I was fortunate to get fully vaccinated before leaving the U.S. and most of our team has been vaccinated as well. But the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution, like all responsible organizations running international operations during COVID19, requires us to complete a quarantine before we board the R/V Sarmiento de Gamboa and sail into the North Atlantic Ocean.

I’m familiar with pre-expedition quarantine protocols — I spent two weeks in a hotel in Seattle before boarding the E/V Nautilus last fall. The rules include: stay in your individual hotel room. No direct contact with hotel staff, food delivery folks, or other team members. Monitor your temperature (and general health) daily, and test negative for COVID before boarding the ship.

Instituting a quarantine period prior to a high-stakes expedition is not a new idea. Even before COVID19 changed the world, NASA required its astronauts to complete quarantines before their missions.

In his book Deep: Freediving, Renegade Science and What the Ocean Tells Us About Ourselves, James Nester writes: “Astronauts learned to deal with the psychological and physical trauma of space travel by focusing on specific tasks, reminding themselves to stay rational, and working and communicating with other astronauts as much as possible.”   

While being stuck in a hotel room for two weeks certainly doesn’t qualify as psychological trauma, it can still generate isolation and loneliness. Our group combats these feelings by engaging with each other on our phones. Through WhatsApp, we exchange hundreds of messages about grocery deliveries, views from our hotel rooms, Spanish customs, COVID protocols, laundry, internet issues, and perhaps most importantly, expedition plans.

In any quarantine situation, little things make all the difference — things like the ability to cook food (I’m delighted to discover my little kitchen has an oven) , the ability to exercise (grateful to have my travel yoga mat and resistance bands) and the ability to open my windows each morning to let in the sunshine and fresh, salty air. If I lean out of my window slightly and turn to the right, I have a partial view of the harbor and the Cíes islands in the distance. Every time I take in the view, I think of the time I got to go hiking there in the summer of 2016, the day before Jasmina and Santi’s wedding.

It’s a bummer that quarantine protocols prohibit us from exploring Vigo, but as I lean out my window, I enjoy reminiscing on all the fun adventures my friends and I had here five years ago.

Giving Gia some love while hiking in the Cíes Islands [July 2016]

Enjoying Vigo’s stunning coastline with a few of my favorite women [July 2016]

To fill the long, slow days in the hotel, I start putting together plans for expedition outreach and communications. I brainstorm with my new colleague and fellow quarantine team member, Michelle Cusolito. A former teacher and award-winning children’s book author, Michelle exudes a contagious passion for ocean science and storytelling, and I am very excited to work with her.

Michelle and I conduct interviews with half a dozen members of the science team. To adhere to our quarantine protocols, we do this over Zoom. I am delighted (but not surprised) to hear the passion and knowledge that infuses these conversations. Sometimes we discuss the intricacies of a particular oceanographic instrument. Sometimes we laugh about the challenges of working in a lab that is always moving. Sometimes we wax philosophical about the unique bonds between shipmates, or the perennial pull of the sea.

I love how John San Sucie, a PhD student in the MIT-WHOI Joint Program, sums up a few of these thoughts:

“In this day and age, people don't really travel by ship any more – they usually fly or drive. So, to be at sea at all is a rare gift. But to get to see the creatures that inhabit the ocean in the way that scientists on a research vessel do — it’s an extraordinary perspective, and an incredibly valuable one. I feel very lucky to glimpse into something that is so mysterious.”

John’s words, along with several similar sentiments shared by other members of the science team, remind me of the important bigger picture. We are a few of the lucky humans who get to do this profound work in the ocean.

If we have to sit patiently for two weeks before we can go out and explore, we will do so happily.

Spending two weeks in isolation isn’t so bad when you have a view like this one.