We've been out here for three weeks now - none of us have set a foot on dry land since leaving Auckland on May 27th. It feels longer though - when you're on a ship for a certain amount of time, it becomes your world. Sending email to friends and family is a bit like contacting some other universe. There's 24 of us on the Warrior right now - captain, mates, cooks, radio operator, medic, deckhands, engineers, campaigners, boat drivers, photographers... and we all have to get along, in a sailing ship that's only 55m long.

You learn a lot about people in situations like this. You can make friends for life - and understand how to deal with the habits and eccentricities of other people - that in another situation might seem irritating. And you've got to be conscious that one of your own minor quirks might start driving someone crazy. But there's also fun - we laugh till we hurt. When downtime is needed, you learn how to find your own space, and how to switch off from the hectic day-to-day of running a campaign.

It's a whole other world of experience too. There's the sudden realisation of familiar things that have been forgotten (trees, cars, bills, TV, land). There's seasickness to put up with - there's no shame; we all suffer from it at some time. And even out here, nature is all around - the bioluminescence in the water, the daily companionship of albatrosses and pintado petrels, the occasional pod of dolphins or passing school of sperm whales. We've seen sunfish surfacing beside our inflatables, catching some rays from the winter sky. And that sky - the night skies are incredible, and the sunsets, oh the sunsets. I've started labelling my photographs 'IMG_1234_another_bloody_sunset.jpg'.

Then there's the swim stops. Some of us - the New Zealanders, Australians and me, the token Irish guy - have taken to jumping into the Tasman whenever the sea is relatively 'flat'. It's strange, bobbing around in the water, knowing that there's at least 1km of water under your feet. It's even stranger when a huge albatross (these guys have wingspans of 2-3m) is sitting in the water in front of you, wondering what you might taste like.

But it's not all fun and games - it's hard work out here. On a busy day, we get to work at 8am, and often clock off in time for bed, around 11pm. For the last couple of weeks, we were out of bed long before sunrise, after tracking down another bottom trawler, or to revisit one we'd already got. One our work on the water is done, getting back to the ship often means the beginning of the next part of our day - getting the story out to the world. In my case, that means sitting down to write my weblog,

It's pretty weird, sitting out here in all this weather, trying to understand the waves we're creating back on land. As you'll have seen earlier in the weblog, last week we had New Zealand fishing industry spokespeople announcing that our claims were 'unsubstantiated claptrap' - and that NZ bottom trawlers 'simply do not drag heavy trawl gear across pristine sea floor'. A couple of days later, we witnessed an NZ trawler hauling up a massive piece of red coral - so large that it took two men to drag it to the stern ramp, and dump it over. News from the shore says that even standup comedians and politicians are talking about bottom trawling. The fishing industry seems strangely quiet, amidst the fracas.

Last Sunday, after we had caught the trawler Waipori with its haul of precious coral, I was standing on the deck of the Warrior with Chris. 'Today', I told him, 'made me remember *again* why I do this job, what makes it worthwhile'.

- Dave