From today at seven in the evening, when Princess Leonor is received at the Naval School of Marín – to later try to become “one more” among the 628 students of the Navy in this town in Pontevedra – her life will be “non-stop”, says Pedro Cardona, the commanding director of the military installations. “Here the regime is very intense, from the time they get up until they go to bed, the students always have an assigned task. They have to achieve excellence, and for that they need all the hours of the day”, the command has defended before the media during the visit, the day before the arrival of the princess, of the head of the Ministry of Defense, Margarita Robles. The minister toured on Wednesday all the buildings that make up this Naval School, the fifth on land of the Navy since 1943. It is not the first time that Robles has visited the facilities, but as she has recognized, on the previous occasion some property was in very bad condition and this year it looks in perfect condition again.
This is what happens with the large dining room, presided over by photos of the King and Queen. “Years ago it impressed me because it was very inhospitable, the dining room was full of humidity,” said the head of Defence when stopping, during the tour, at the Cuartel Marqués de la Victoria, the building where the students have breakfast, lunch and dinner. Sources from the Naval School of Marín explain that these facilities, now impeccable, have been “under construction for two years.” They assure that there are “facelifts every year before the start of the course,” but they admit that “this year” the princess “got a few more things” than what is requested each season. This Wednesday Robles found the place so pleasant, flooded by the smell coming from the kitchen, that she even suggested staying to try the lentils that were served.
The food will be laid out on the table ready for the arrival of the students who went out rowing on the Pontevedra estuary on Wednesday. On the horizon, two wooden boats could be seen advancing heavily towards the dock while on the quay, at the foot of the cannons of a battleship and the mast of an old sailing ship that decorate the esplanade, the minister made statements to the press after her tour of the school. For Robles, the military training of the Princess of Asturias is “fundamental”, because “it carries with it a series of values of commitment, loyalty, love for Spain, solidarity with citizens and leadership, which is very important for someone who is going to be the head of state”. “I believe that it also has a calling effect for our young people, boys and girls, so that they know that serving Spain in the Armed Forces is something very important”, claimed the head of Defence.
Princess Leonor will enter this afternoon – “as another student”, in the words of the minister – the Military Naval School of Marín to undertake the second part of her military studies in the three armies and after a few months of training in the Army at the school in Zaragoza. The now Second Lieutenant Borbón Ortiz will start as a midshipman and will remain at the school, where her father and grandfather already studied, until January as a third-year student. From that moment on she will embark on the training ship Juan Sebastian Elcano to learn to navigate in the traditional way, guided, at least for an hour each day and “if there are no clouds”, “by the stars”. This was explained by one of the school’s teachers, Lieutenant Loreto Fontanals, the only woman among the instructors of the General Corps in Marín (there are other female teachers, but they are engineers, psychologists or lawyers).
Fontanals will teach Leonor Manoeuvring and Navigation, and this Wednesday he was in charge, with other colleagues, of receiving the press and the minister in the simulation rooms. There are four exact recreations of the bridges of a ship, where the students can experience navigation in the faithfully reproduced scenarios of the entire Spanish coast. With all weather conditions, day or night, and even with a fire on the deck of the ship. The sensation of movement is so real that Margarita Robles had to abandon the simulation. ship because she was seasick. As she left bridge number 1, and still recovering from her discomfort, she confessed to the commanders who were accompanying her, dressed in summer uniform, that, despite her position, she still cannot distinguish “the bow from the stern.” There, guiding her through the complex, in addition to Cardona, were the Admiral Chief of Staff of the Navy, Antonio Piñeiro, and the Admiral Director of Personnel, Ignacio Paz.
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As if this experience was not intense enough, the politician’s visit continued through a room where – in addition to sextants and an old celestial dome (with maroon velvet curtains and drawings of the zodiac signs) where students, until now, learned to guide themselves by the constellations – there is virtual reality equipment for 24 students. Robles put on one of these glasses and moved with two controls until she saw Orion and oriented herself as if she were on the high seas. During her tour of the Naval Military School, the minister also saw the gym, with trellises, weight training equipment and a swimming pool with six lanes and diving boards where Leonor will have to train for an hour a day this year. Finally, Robles visited the Student Barracks, where the princess will study, shower and sleep with other classmates (there are nine girls in her class), in a room with two bunk beds and a total of four beds. There she was especially interested in the timetables.
“The battalion”, as Pedro Cardona explains, of students at the Naval School get up from Monday to Friday at 6.45 am and, unless they ask for special permission to study later, they must be in bed with the lights off at 10.45 pm. This is the way to guarantee them “the necessary eight hours of sleep”, stressed the director of the school, who had planned a promotion this year but, as sources from the academy have clarified, it has been postponed until the princess finishes her course. The same sources stress that there will be no “privileges or silverware” for the princess. Only the security of the premises will be reinforced due to her presence.
Remaking the bed and free time
If the reveille is rung at 6.45 in the morning, they must then “completely unmake the bed” (“make a ball” with the sheets, as they say there) and go to breakfast, and on returning “make the bed properly, because here it is not enough to straighten it, and tidy the whole room”. After daily instruction, the students have time to study between 6pm and 10.30pm (with a break for dinner at 8pm), in the rooms next to their rooms or in the library. The entrance to the Student Headquarters is through a large hall decorated with flags, a picture of the emeritus King Juan Carlos I as a young man, diving suits, old navigation devices and bronze sculptures, including, in the presidential seat, that of Felipe VI.
“Anyone who wants to come to study here must first see Anchor Button and The midshipmen“We have to go out for the night,” joked a soldier who accompanied the delegation yesterday. Cardona explained yesterday that the students have free time on Saturday afternoon and Sunday. On those two days, the reveille is rung two hours later. The first-year students can go out until 1.30 in the morning, always in uniform during that course. The older students can choose to go to Marín or to places in the province of Pontevedra (permission is required to leave the province) and to go out if they prefer. The deadline for returning at the weekend, for third-year students like Leonor, is 3.00 in the morning. They can sleep outside, but, again, they must justify it and have prior authorization. “Everyone has to be on board at three,” repeated several times, in front of the minister and the journalists, this director of the school who has postponed his promotion until Leonor leaves.
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