Not Back to School Pirate Cruise

This is a late entry for August 30th, 2004

A group of area homeschool friends decided that we should have a "not back to school celebration" for this day, as this is the day the public schools go back to school. I organized this Pirate Cruise out of Anapolis.

When we arrived on the dock the kids were dressed in pirate costumes and painted and tatooed. The  Captain of the boat arrived and taught the kids some pirate language which mostly was a lot of grunts and growls. Then the did a secret 2 block walk to the ship, keeping a close eye out for enemies. Once a board the ship, the adventure began. They read treasure maps and directed the Captain to a sunken treasure, which they managed to hoist into the boat and were delighted when they discovered it  was full off gold coins. They fought off enemy pirates (there was a young man standing on a rowboot dressed in pirate garb, that the kids got to fire water guns at and eventually were successful in knocking him off his boat and into the bay) and they also drank (root) beer.

The best part for me is I got to sit in the back of my boat and do nothing. It was a great time for all and a great way to kick off the new homeschool year.  As usual it gave me the opportunity to turn it into a lesson plan and we learned a lot about pirates. I didn't realize that Blackbeard actually used to weave hemp into his hair and light it on fire to make his head smoke which added to the fear factor. There were also several famous women pirates. Most of the pirates were closely connected to the Kings and Queens of the time and would give up percentages of their stolen goods in turn for freedom of prosecution. Ahhh, good old government corruption.