November 5 Noontime Position: Lat 44deg 49,5 N; Long 178deg 12,0 E

During breakfast we crossed the international date line, and to the outside world it is Sunday, November 6 instead of Saturday, November 5. However, for administrative reasons Hanjin Copenhagen is leaving the weekend intact and will be making Monday disappear. What wonderful shipboard logic!

After a desperately dull Friday, today has brought events that pass for excitement on a long voyage. It’s been sunny, for one thing. The dawn glow blasting the containers, making their colours stand out. We also passed a container ship and an auto transport heading for North America. Bulky Lego blocks on the morning horizon. There’s also been a course change from WSW to WNW as we slalom back north to avoid a storm building to the west of Japan. And finally, rather prosaically, I’m doing laundry.

As you might expect, I’ve also been doing some reading. Earlier this week, I wrapped up a book on cities, and am now into the tense finale of the latest John Le Carre. Any tomes I finish on board will stay with the ship, which already has a fair-sized library in the Officers’ recreation room. Among all the Crichton, Ludlum and Follett titles, I’ve picked out Hemingway’s “For whom the bell tolls” as my next read. But I’ve also gleefully found an erotic novel about naughty Oxford university rowers translated into German from the original English. Here, for your reading pleasure, is a brief passage that I’ve converted back into English.

“At least we have a chance. Unlike your crew, which will probably wind up in the second division. And I’ll tell you one more thing. If we don’t end up as ‘Head of the River’, then you can spank my bare bottom – in front of both of our crews.”

Wouldn’t rowing be more interesting if it always included trash talk like this?