Episode 6: Sitges, Spain

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Yesterday evening, after I wrote my previous blog post, my mom and I had a spanish lesson with Bibiana, a friend of Shawn. After that, my mom, Teja, and I had dinner and went to bed.

Today was the second day of the Esplai beach activity camp. The first thing we did at the camp today was kayaking. I was in a Kayak with 2 other kids and a camp instructor. We had a lot of fun on the Kayaks, and there were countless water-fights.

After our Kayak got back to the port, we had lunch. Then, we went to the beach. We swam, played football (soccer), and did body surfing. Everybody had a blast. Literally, people were blasting each other with water.

Then we went back to the port. The camp instructors split the kids into two groups. Each group got into small inflatable boats called 'unsinkable insubmersibles'. The boat I was in was a 20 horsepower boat and the other boat was 25 horsepower. Just to give you and idea of how much 1 horsepower is, your average car is around 200 horsepower. So obviously these boats aren't going to be that fast.
Right?

Wrong. The camp instructor that was in the same boat as me gunned the boat to full throttle, and we sailed onto the ocean as smooth as butter. JUST JOKING! The ride was so bumpy and fast, my butt would bounce 4 feet into the air and then land on the deck of the boat. Have you ever imagined what it would be like to jump off the golden gate bridge? This was kind of the feeling I had in mind. I was totally not expecting this. I mean, I've driven a 50 horsepower boat before, and it was nowhere near as bumpy. Maybe it's some weird European measure of power that isn't horsepower. I don't know. All I know is that I was had a blast that day, literally.

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Comments

[Kathleen]

sounds scary!
Your literal "blast at the beach" sounds super scary to me! As for me, I encountered a wild boar on my three-hour walk on the mountain in Italy this morning . . . I know that may sound scary, but for here it's just a normal walk in the woods! (He scurried away.)

[Dad]

Power-to-weight
Hi Skye - What a great adventure! Sounds like a blast! Horsepower is the more or less the same all over the world (1 HP=about 745 Watts). The key to understanding why your Sitges boat goes so crazy-fast compared with our boat at Echo Lake is a concept of Power-to-Weight (or mass). This ratio is a measurement of actual performance of an engine or engine/vehicle system. Sitges boat = 25HP/50Lbs = 1/2 HP/Lb. Echo boat = 50HP/500Lbs = 1/10 HP/Lb. So, rough guess, the Sitges boat has 5x the power-to-weight of the Echo boat. Did it feel about 5x as powerful? Xxxooo, Dad

[Skyedude]

YO DAD!
Hi dad! Got your comment! I think that was my math for today. That clarified it. I haven't been doing much math, but I have been doing some and am now in the exercises.