Welcome to Med below deck season nine! For those of us who have watched the flagship series, we don’t have weeks off between seasons, nor does the breakneck pace of turning boats around for back-to-back charters. Before the premiere begins, the preview for the upcoming season promises rope breaks, making out, almost kissing, and too many blondes, so I can’t tell who it is. I can’t wait to see all these moments in context and realize that most of them are just trailer fodder and not a big deal at all.
Now let’s take a look at this season’s crew, led once again by Captain Sandy. Sandy proclaims that they have complete trust and respect in her until they show her otherwise – who will lose it first? My bet is on Nathan and Bri.
Aesha, the head of the stew: Aesha was the second stew in seasons four and five, then the main stew in both seasons Below deck. She and Sandy are very excited to work together again. They remained friends over the years; Aesha and her boyfriend Scott even visited Sandy in Denver. Sandy loves that Aesha goes out of her way to please her guests. People, there is a high risk of problematic favoritism.
Iain, Bosman: Iain from South Africa has been working on yachts for five years. His father is a professional kayaker (thank you, Iain, for teaching me a new word), and he started working as a river guide for his dad’s company at the age of 16. Iain’s mum’s name is Sandy and we’ll have to unpack that fact someday as we get to know him better.
Elena, aka Ellie, Second Stew: Ellie only completed the last charter of the seventh season, which inspired her to continue working on yachts. She’s trained in co*cktails and prefers serving to cleaning, so Aesha arranges for her to come out in the evenings.
Jono, the chef: Jono describes himself as a “culinary architect,” partly because before he became a chef, he was literally an architect. Once he replaced a friend’s yacht chef and that ended his career. Learning that he is self-taught fuels my illusions that I could become a yacht chef.
Joe, the chief sailor: Joe is from Liverpool and lives in Spain. The gang had only met a few hours ago and he had already confessed that he loved to finger his ass before going to sleep.
Nathan, deckhand: Nathan comes from a small Irish village of only 600 inhabitants. He tells us that he likes to cause trouble and do things he shouldn’t. I’m sure he told the casting agents the exact same thing.
Gael, deckhand: Australian Gael started out as a stew, but loves the outdoors and was drawn to the deck section. Her fellow sailors are disappointed to learn that Gael has a boyfriend of five months, a fellow engineer. She says she’s a girl in a relationship because she doesn’t like starting over with someone new, which doesn’t convince me that she likes her boyfriend that much.
Bri, third stew: Bri has been sailing for two years on smaller boats than Mustik. He admits that he has room to grow, but he also tells us that he wants to remain a child forever. “The thought of taxes scares the crap out of me.” Does this woman admit on national television that she doesn’t pay taxes?
The Mustik it quickly lives up to its musty name, as one of the crew cabins has a ceiling leak. Sandy hopes to eat a fourth stew, but they don’t have room for it when they go to the cabin. For cabin assignments, Aesha wisely brings Gael’s bunk with her, so she doesn’t share a room with her direct reports.
The team goes to work getting the boat ready, but supplies don’t arrive until after 8 p.m. Greek ferries are notoriously late, so this doesn’t seem too surprising. To make matters worse, the delivery is only a quarter of what Aesha needs and there is no base alcohol. They only have one bottle of champagne. The rest are scheduled to arrive at 11:45 the next morning, even though the charter starts at noon. Sandy remains optimistic about the delay: “Pressure makes us better.” He also sets the rules in a team meeting: no drinking during the charter and mutual professional, sexual and cultural respect. Speaking of sex, Nathan is already flirting with Gael as they unload supplies, while Bri keeps an eye on Joe and loves his bushy eyebrows.
The next morning, Elena is inexplicably wearing Playboy bunny ears. I don’t know if this is to remind us of her earlier appearance on the show when she wore them to get the guys’ attention, or if she just really loves costumes. He says he travels with a lot of costumes, 10 percent of which are PG-13. It’s unclear whether this means the remaining 90 percent are tame or R-rated, but I’m sure we’ll find out as the season goes on.
The first guests are the influential representative of Generation Z, Jacob Ward, and his friends from London. His content seems to focus on fitness and cycling. Aesha wonders what she’s doing living in a van with her boyfriend when these kids can afford to charter a superyacht. Aesha condemns herself: she and Sandy have more Instagram followers than Jacob (837,000 and 763,000 to his 306,000). She has just under 400,000 on TikTok, which is probably where you can make the most money, and Aesha is willing to help with taking photos and videos.
While showing the guests around, Aesha informs them that they don’t have any more champagne or rosé, but it’s coming as soon as possible and they can enjoy a co*cktail in the meantime. Guests ask if someone can go to the store to buy some rosé before they leave, but this doesn’t happen. They order spicy margaritas, which will have to be without cilantro because it hasn’t arrived yet either. I’m pretty sure cilantro isn’t an essential ingredient and Aesha didn’t have to tell her already disappointed guests that they were missing another dish.
An emergency shipment of champagne finally arrives, but there’s still no rosé or red wine, and the rest of the food won’t be delivered until 7 p.m. Aesha has never had a problem like this before, and Sandy doesn’t understand it either, but she’s willing to help the crew if needed. They sailed from Athens, heading for Aegina. Both leaving the dock and dropping the first anchor go smoothly. Iain is pleased that everyone on his team is competent.
The same cannot be said for the internal staff. Bri’s task is to steam the guests’ clothes and this is: fight. While I’m trying to figure out how to use the steamer, there’s a loud beeping sound that makes me think my house alarm has gone off, but luckily it’s just incompetence within a 6,000-mile radius. It can’t hurt me. Bri shares that she grew up with a maid and a cleaning lady, so this is new to her. He spends the entire afternoon – SIX AND A HALF HOURS – steaming, but when the guests go to change for dinner, they don’t have their clothes back. One guest even goes down to the laundry room to find his clothes. Aesha takes over from Bri, who “explains” that she likes to take the time to make sure she’s doing everything right. This excuse doesn’t fit. Then Bri drops a bombshell in an interview: In her two years of sailing experience, she has never once made it through an entire season! At some point you have to stop and ask if the job is right for you, but Bri didn’t do that. Later, when he goes to deliver the clothes, he mixes up which clothes belong to which guests. AND Below deck the yacht might be the only one to hire her.
The editors set such precise time frames as if they were preparing material for a dissertation. Twenty-nine minutes after the supplies were supposed to be delivered, the delivery man tells Aesha that they were delivered to the wrong water taxi and won’t arrive until 9 p.m., when dinner is scheduled. Guests asked for surf and turf, so Jono changes the menu from lobster to crab. He is impressively unfazed.
For dinner, Ellie quickly changes into a disco ball top and metallic leggings to dress the theme. Aesha and Bri didn’t even change into their black clothes, which meant it had been a rough day. There is no wine left, but at dinner more finally appears. Somehow still no red. Despite the lack of wine, guests are satisfied with the food. During dinner, Ellie pulls double duty between courses to help Bri challenge the cottages. Bri asks if the bathroom she was cleaning looks okay, and Ellie politely points out that the floors are still wet. He says don’t break a sweat on the first day – he’ll train Bri. Aesha similarly doesn’t want to stress Bri any more and focus on getting through the first charter. Aesha finishes work at 11:40 so she can get up early and help Bri. She’s learned that she has to trust her stews because she can’t do everything, and she trusts Ellie.
Unfortunately for Ellie, the guests won’t be going to bed yet. They party with a confetti cannon, which may look great content-wise, but looks terrible to clean. At 12:20 they ask for mojitos and late night snacks – grilled cheese, macaroni and cheese, nachos, guac, etc. Ellie has never had to prepare food for drunk people before and feels overwhelmed, so she wakes Jono up. Jono, half asleep: “Mm-mm. I don’t think so.” Ellie says she’ll make grilled cheese and tells the guests that’s all they can make. Meanwhile, Gael turns on the hot tub, which seems like it should be ready by now. Now the mojito is 45 minutes late and they’re asking for more co*cktails. Gael talks on the radio to Ellie, who comes over and explains to the guests that she is the only one who has drinks and food. Judging by the timestamps we received, somehow this conversation lasts 15 minutes?! The grilled cheese could be made at this time, we didn’t I didn’t even see the cheese hit the bread. Ellie makes mojitos and Gael helps with the grilled cheese a full hour after ordering. Ellie then tries to wake Jono up again at 1:30. She believes that his selfish behavior makes her look bad, as if she can’t deal with guests. From what we can see, he can’t handle them! He tells Jono that this will be a big problem. He still refuses, claiming he didn’t get enough sleep. Ellie just wastes more time failing to convince him. He’s right that it’s a problem, but judging by next week’s previews, he’s wrong about which of them will be in trouble.
