Chapter 1: Voyage to Fatu Hiva

 

November 2, 1982 - A passage of 29 Days

Departing San Diego

Eager to depart, Jenny and I climbed the companionway ladder only to discover that a thick, moiling fog had reduced visibility to a few dozen feet. So much for an early departure.

Joe had slept aboard, burrowed among the sail bags piled in the forecastle (the quarters furthest forward, and pronounced folk'-sull). He awoke and came to assist with the final chores of disconnecting, coiling and stowing the water hose and electrical cord, which seemed like a quixotic-spacecraft's umbilicals. Also he lashed the dinghy oars and a few assorted planks onto the coach-roof. His moral support encouraged us greatly, even if we could see through his facade of good cheer, overlaying an obvious astonishment at our undertaking. And granted, even though I had been planning this venture for years, I too found it almost incomprehensible that we were now about to go through with this seemingly mad scheme.

By mid morning the sun had dissipated the silver-white mist to reveal a glorious, cerulean sky. From a shoreside pay-phone Jenny and I each telephoned our respective parents with the startling news that we were about to embark on a 'round-the-world sailing voyage.

At long last we were ready. Returning aboard I started the engine, and after Jenny had loosened bow, stern and spring warps - our remaining manacles to civilization - we powered slowly away from the dock.

Motoring out into the channel, I did not feel fabulous quite yet, but I did feel that the rigors of the endeavor were bound to grind a few more facets into this rough ol' stone. Indeed, there is nothing commonplace about striking forth on a prodigious sailing voyage. This was the day we had long and eagerly awaited, and we could hardly contain our excitement. Our combined strongest emotion, however, was one of relief. Having shed the burden of the interminable preparations, we felt newly alive. So waving long farewells to the lone figure standing incredulous at the tip of Shelter Island, we turned and hoisted sail.

We were away!

Because the ketch was about to embrace the seafaring life for which she had been built, we deemed this the appropriate moment for her official re-christening. Hereafter we would call her Suka: acronym for Seeking UnKnown Adventure. As her crew, Jenny and I were determined to give her our very best, and we felt assured that she would reciprocate. Godspeed to us all.

Sailing Credentials

Once out of the protected harbor and into the rolling swell of the vast Pacific, Suka collected a breeze and sprinted nimbly away; her sails drawing to the freshening breeze, and her bow rising buoyantly to each oncoming wave and pumping deeply into each trough. With alacrity she laid a foamy wake astern.

At long last we were bound for the Marquesas, that archipelago cloaked in enchantment and lying nearly 3,000 nautical miles over the far horizon. And what a test this first passage would be, ultimately proving to be the voyage's longest across open water.

After we had rounded the Coronados Islands and set a course south by south-west, I pulled the set-pin from the self-steering mechanism and trimmed the vane into the apparent wind. Immediately the device took control of the helm. The North American continent began its inexorable dip below the horizon. If all went well, we would not be seeing our homeland for a few years.

My sailing credentials for embarking upon a month's passage across the world's largest ocean?

• I had chanced a few short jaunts aboard a Hobi Cat.
• I had motored Suka the 70 miles to and from Catalina Island, and the 12 miles to the Islas Coronados.
• and I had braved a few sporting afternoons sailing the ketch about San Diego Bay, dodging innumerable other yachts whose skippers were doing much the same.

Never, in actual practice, had I so much as reefed a sail.

And Jenny's inexperience was even more profound.

Yes, we were nautical neophytes, and by the book we utterly lacked the experience required for such an undertaking. No doubt the Coast Guard Auxiliary would have urged us straight back to the marina. Nevertheless, we possessed what I considered the genuine requisite: verve.

After a great deal of concerted effort, we were sailing what I deemed a seaworthy and well-found vessel. I had studied widely on the principles of her handling. We carried a year's supply of provisions, a compendium of spare parts, and a selection of the appropriate reference books. And I was not unaccustomed to improvising. Beyond this, I reasoned that one of the best ways to gain the experience was to go out and gain it!

In retrospect, no doubt blinded by aspiration I may have been heedlessly naive, but who among the venturesome is not a little impetuous? And as Kierkegaard expressed it so well: "Life can only be understood backwards, but it must be lived forwards."

First Lesson in Seamanship

That evening our Great Teacher unscrolled His first lesson in seamanship. The wind freshened and the seas grew rough.

Including her bowsprit, Suka spans nearly forty eight feet in length. Her main mast stands sixty feet over the water. Empty, she weighs some twenty eight thousand pounds, as much as a dozen compact cars; and we had stowed tons of fuel, fresh water and provisions aboard. Based on such colossal inertia, one might have expected her to behave relatively steadily on her feet. Not so! She bounced around like a cork, pitching sharply bow up and stern down, and vice versa. She rolled with unnerving violence side to side, and heaved sickeningly up and down. And what was more, this awful gyrating was interspersed with sudden and tremendous lateral thrusts, as the larger cascading crests walloped her windward hull in forceful bursts of flung spray. Nauseated, it was all we could do just to hold on.

In the utter blackness of night, an increasing wind suggested that we reef the sails (fold them to make them smaller). Like greenhorns we temporized - hoping that the blow would subside and spare us the intimidating job of leaving the safe confines of the center cockpit. This was a mistake born of inexperience, for we had not yet learned that the task of reefing sails becomes exponentially more difficult the stronger the wind; at least the way we were attempting it.

The brig began laboring, heeling far over to the blow, while anguishing ahead at what seemed a terrifying speed, slashing through each angry wave in tumultuous bursts of hurled spume. The urgency was now upon us.

Flipping on the spreader light, I crawled apprehensively forward and after easing the halyard and muscling the mainsail down to the first luff cringle, I strained to winch home the jiffy-reefing line. This line led through a block at boom's end, then to the sail's clew cringle. But the wind's pressure in the ballooning sail proved irresistible. The line would not budge. I could not drop the mainsail because its battens would snag the spreaders, so we had no choice but to start the engine and to turn Suka into the wind and seas.

When Jenny wheeled the ketch around, the tempest seemed to intensify fifty-fold. As the boat confronted the storm and heavy seas head-on, they created the impression that we were now in the throws of a vicious gale. The sails flogged vehemently, heavy seas broke over the bow and swept aft along the deck, and flung spray soaked us through. In a test of nerves, and after a protracted struggle, we managed to shorten the mainsail and to dowse the jib (to reef the large sail and to take down the forward sail).

Sitting in the cockpit, we turned the boat back around and resumed sailing downwind. And with that, the storm seemed to subside almost entirely. The difference in the ride was astonishing. Appropriately canvassed, Suka settled into her stride.

My lessons in seamanship had adjourned for recess, leaving me with yet another homework assignment: to figure out how to shorten sail while sailing off the wind.

Throughout the dark hours of obscurity the wind shifted direction and altered strength many times. So ours was a long and largely sleepless night of adjusting the sheets and steering vane, changing headsails, and of gazing wide-eyed in reverential fear into the impenetrable blackness.

Sextant Navigation

Dawn seemed to illuminate the sky with a piquancy that accentuated the fact that, full circle, the sky and the sea met. Land was conspicuously absent. Looking around the vast horizon and contemplating our plight, Jenny uttered in amazement, "There sure is a lot of water out here." This struck me as amusing, and we joke about it to this day. But it certainly epitomized my feelings of incredulity as well.

The wind and seas had slackened, bringing a welcome respite from our white-knuckled clutching of the cockpit coaming. Now the ocean seemed far less hostile. But rather than make more sail, we enjoyed the respite so much that we kept sailing short canvassed, despite the greatly reduced pace.

When one considers the astronauts who hurl around the globe in a mere ninety minutes or so, it felt ironic for this former aerospace engineer to be aboard a sailboat that would require not hours - not days - nor even months to encircle the globe, but years. I could only reason that education does not quench wanderlust, and that for the civilian individual, space technology has a vital drawback: it's prohibitive expense. I agree with Edward Abbey's flippant opinion that the ultimate goal of technology is to reduce the intervening space between two distant points to zero. Yet Jenny and I wished to see and experience every mile of this intervening distance. And we were quite satisfied to be powering the quest in the traditional way, using the wind.

That afternoon a woodpecker flew headlong into the billowing mains'l (mainsail). After bouncing off apparently unscathed it attempted a landing on the mainmast aloft. But this proved no easy task, considering that the ketch was reeling and heaving its masts across the sky like a pair of overgrown baseball bats as though a pair of children were swatting at wasps. Nevertheless, the poor bird finally managed to alight on the uppermost mast step, and there it clung until well after dark. Woodpeckers are not seabirds, and we could only surmise that this one had been blown from land by the storm. One hundred and fifty miles off-shore, the little creature was indeed fortunate to have found at least some measure of respite. And granted, a woodpecker perched on a wooden mast might not seem the most favorable combination, but the bird seemed exhausted, and indeed after a time it flittered down to the deck and found a snug niche among the folds of the dowsed staysail lashed on the foredeck. And there our feathered companion spent the night.

From my journal:

“Day 3: We haven't perfected our nocturnal discipline quite yet. It happened to each of us during the night, that the watchkeeper awoke to find the other, supposedly sleeping belowdecks, sitting nearby on watch.

“Early in the morning the woodpecker flew away in the correct direction. How it had known in which direction to fly we can't imagine, but we certainly hope it reaches land. While bucking these headwinds, what an imposing distance of open sea it must cover.

“We are beginning to adapt to our new sea-going environment. The queasiness has subsided, mostly, and our appetites are returning. This morning Jenny braced herself in the vertigo-inducing galley and prepared an exemplary seagoing breakfast of corned beef hash, eggs, English muffins and coffee. Despite a twinge of lingering mal de mer, we are really enjoying the trip so far. Having literally left it all behind, we feel more than a little insecure. But the anxieties surface only when we think about them; otherwise life out here is grand.”

Throughout the day we busied ourselves with various projects. I rigged a pair of lines along the topsides, stem to stern. To these "jack lines" we slide-ably affixed our safety harnesses with a pair of carabiners each. Also, we fitted a main-boom preventer: a stout nylon rope made fast to the boom's after end. Led forward, this line rove through a block on the leeward bowsprit, then aft to a cockpit winch. Hardened in, the line levered the eighteen-foot wooden boom forward, restraining it from lurching dangerously from one side of the boat to the other - that is, from jibing, in the advent of an unexpected and sudden shift of wind.

During the afternoon we experimented with flying the big cruising sail, termed "the chute." First, I climbed aloft and wrapped each spreader tip with a rag, padding it to prevent tearing the wispy sail.

A month prior to our departure we had gone to a local beach to shoot the twilight stars with a plastic sextant. Returning to the office, I had reduced the data using a navigational calculator. My first results were down-right preposterous, but subsequent field trips yielded far better results. The math was not difficult because the calculator simplified the sequences to a cook-book procedure, and with a background in theoretical space-flight mechanics I was not unaccustomed to finding my way among the stars. So now while Jenny marked Greenwich mean time on a wristwatch, I obtained a round of twilight measurements to the stars Vega, Altair, and Polaris. Using these measurements I then computed what seemed an accurate position fix. "Seemed" because we no longer stood on a known beach, and therefore knew of no means to determine whether our methods and calculations were correct. The figures seemed in order, and they reassured us that we would be passing by Guadalupe Island in the night with more than enough offing. Nevertheless we resolved that the watchkeeper should keep his or her eyes open.

Suka flew her jib, her staysail, her mainsail shortened with a single reef, and her mizzen sail. With the wind holding steady over her starboard quarter she scampered ahead willfully into the night. By now we had far exceeded normal VHF radio range to the mainland, but by some fluke of airwaves we managed a clear contact with the San Diego marine operator. Remarkably, a few hundred miles from land we placed telephone calls to Jim and Deidrie, and to our parents.

Safety Harness

During the blackness of night I could not escape nightmarish portents of one of us loosing balance and falling overboard. In fact, this was perhaps the greatest danger we faced. The person sleeping belowdecks would not have noticed the helmsman's absence for perhaps hours, and by then a recovery would have been most unlikely. We had heard of seafaring couples reining themselves together with a cord, and this no longer seemed ludicrous. Suka lacked a pushpit (a railing aft), so I felt especially vulnerable whenever I had to leave the cockpit and crawl aft to adjust the trim of the self-steering wind-vane.

So at dawn the next day I began contriving the necessary safety implements. First, I fastened side-lines from the mizzen shrouds to the corresponding taffrail aft. Then I modified our fore-and-aft jack lines into a system that we would use throughout the voyage, with various modifications. This consisted of a 1/2 inch diameter line leading along the center-line of the cabin top, and secured at the bowsprit, the main and mizzen masts, and at a heavy padeye on the afterdeck. A second and identical line paralleled the first, one foot away and on the opposite side of both masts. With safety harness shackled to the appropriate jack line, a crew member could now move safely the full length of the vessel, re-clipping around the knots.

Each of our safety harnesses comprised a four-inch wide belt made fast around the waist. Rock climbers called this a "swami belt." Using girth-hitches, we attached to the belt a thirty-inch doubled pennant of 1" nylon webbing. At the pennant's distant end we clipped a carabiner. Actually, we attached two such pennants (what we referred to as "quick-draws") to our belts. The carabiners quickly secured the person emerging from belowdecks, to one of the jack lines. And unlike the system commonly used by other sailors, I had designed our tight, inboard jack lines and short quick-draws to prevent the wearer going by the board and falling into the sea. This feature obviated the need to wear a chest harness, which is designed to keep the hapless swimmer's head above water while being dragged through the water at speed. And unlike the chest harness, the swami belt is secured snugly around the torso's smallest section, so it would not slide inadvertently over the uplifted arms and wrench free of the wearer's body. Additionally, onto each of our swami belts Jenny sewed a scabbard that held a razor-sharp, single-blade folding knife, attached to the belt with a long lanyard tucked away into the pouch.

As a final precaution I paid out a hundred feet of line astern, and secured it to an afterdeck padeye. In theory, should one of us fall overboard unnoticed by the other, the trailing line would offer one last hope. The line's drag was considerable, but we compensated, in part, by setting more sail. And we would deploy the trailing line only at night, and only for a week until we grew more accustomed to the boat's forceful lurching.

The wind abated to the point where, under full press of canvas, the ketch lugged ahead at a mere two-and-half knots. Taking advantage of the pleasant respite, Jenny busied herself belowdecks with sorting and stowing the remaining provisions boxed loosely. As yet she was unsteady on her feet, so after each half-hour's work she would need to "surface for air," emerging from the companionway for an absorbing gaze at the horizon, to regain equilibrium.

We enjoyed a comfortable night. And once again around midnight I climbed topsides to relieve the watchkeeper, only to find her fast asleep. Quietly, I asked how things were going. Then in a medium tone. And again louder. Still she slept. Finally I had to actually shake her awake. "Some watchkeeping," I sighed. The following morning she commented, "See, you didn't even catch me sleeping last night, did you?"

Murphy's Law

During our fifth day at sea, while moving slowly ahead in scant winds, we busied ourselves with more projects. I assembled, epoxied and clamped into position the galley cupboard-kit that Jim and Deidrie had built. Seated in the cockpit, Jenny wove a baggy-wrinkle, the first of many chafe pads we had planned to affix to the rigging in those places where the free-sheeted mainsail contacted the wire shrouds. Her project ultimately proved so time consuming, however, that she abandoned plans to make more. In deference to her change of heart I volunteered to buy a set of plastic shroud covers at the first opportunity. Meanwhile, Suka sailed slowly onward, resolutely and single-baggy-wrinkledly.

If things aboard ship can go wrong they will, and that morning the whisker pole befell to a series of calamities attributable only to a cosmic attack of the dreaded Murphy's law. Experimenting, I hanked the pole's outboard end directly to the dowsed jib's clew, and the pole's inboard end to a head-high padeye on the mast (a fitting that I had installed previously). Then I hoisted the jib. But with too much slack in its sheet (sheet: nautical term for a rope used to trim a sail) the sail billowed to life. And with a BANG! the snubbing jib sheet yanked out the pole's end-fitting as though it was a giant metallic tooth. Of course, the pole crashing uselessly to the deck suggested the inferiority of the equipment. "It is impossible to make something idiot-proof," someone once quipped, "Idiots are too ingenious." Indeed.

I replaced the end fitting into its hollow aluminum pole, hand-drilled a few small holes, then set-screwed the fitting securely into place.

Later, the wind slackened so I decided the time was right to fly the chute. In my second attempt at using the telescoping pole, I extended it, then mounted it to the cruising spinnaker. The following progression perhaps illustrates the shortcomings of learning solely from books. One of my references explained that the whisker pole is to be extended from the mast padeye, and positioned at its outboard end using a topping lift, a foreguy, and an afterguy; and then, that the sail's sheet is to be rove slidably through the pole's end-fitting. To me this seemed unnecessarily complicated. But what the book failed to mention was that this seeming complexity is not without reason. It is to insure that only compressive forces are applied to the pole. The writer had left the reader to discover why this is so. He had not mentioned that if the sailor attaches the pole directly to a jib clew, then the headsail might yank out the pole's end-fitting as though it were a giant tooth, which was what happened first. And he failed to explain that if one flies a spinnaker without a foreguy and afterguy to hold the clew down, then the pole could rise out of control and bend out of shape. Which is what happened next.

After we had corrected the pole to approximately its former straightness by re-bending it against an inflated fender, we found that the pole had not lost its functionality. It was then an easy matter to rationalize by saying that the pole's battle scars now lent the boat more character.

Spirit of Adventure

Again the following day the breeze merely wafted, and as the journal banters: We tried all the usual sail combinations, but none encouraged the wind to blow with any enthusiasm.

Clouds thwarted my noon shot. Then at twilight I stood in the companionway, clutching the sextant and watching the sky without much hope. At the last moment, though, with darkness beginning to obscure the horizon, two stars appeared weakly. I recognized them as Vega and Altair and hurriedly obtained the shots.

By way of explanation, the sextant measures the angle from a celestial object down to the horizon. During daylight hours, the horizon and the sun, and sometimes the moon, are visible. So shots of the sun, and sometimes the moon, can be obtained in the daytime. The planets and stars, however, are not usually visible in broad daylight. Conversely, the horizon is not visible during the night. So the planets and stars can be shot only at dawn and dusk.

In somewhat increasing winds, Suka ran throughout the night dead down wind at a much improved four knots. One might imagine the sailing to be silent, but this was not so. Gurgling past the hull, the water reverberated into the cabin and sounded as though we were in a giant barrel about to plunge over Niagara Falls but inadvertently jammed in the rocks. The free-spinning propeller audibly indicated the brig's speed: the faster she sailed the higher pitched was the prop shaft's industrial-like whining. Moreover, the vessel's heavy rolling motion was rattling and clattering our worldly goods, so carefully stowed belowdecks.

From the Journal:

“Sailing into the blackness of night is an eerie feeling," I wrote, "unable to see what might lie directly in our path. This, especially so, considering that two days ago we passed a large drifting log--the sight of which shivered our timbers.

“But the friendly if somewhat diffident porpoise have joined us once again. Like denizens of the dark they visit us, and we hear their lively splashing and cavorting. Like underwater comets they carve long, serpentine trails of pale green phosphorescence that compliment the long straight train emanating from Suka's stern.

“The accomplished sailor would probably find this voyage routine, but for us first-timers it is an experience of genuine awe. Nevertheless, having committed ourselves to the expanse of the open ocean, with no protective harbors to duck into should a storm eventuate, we feel vulnerable. In this we have great anxiety; our ability to bring Suka safely through a gale is, as yet, untested. Unequivocally, though, our strongest sensation stems from the abrupt change in lifestyle. Our minds still cannot grasp the reality of our situation, and that of heading for the Marquesas. Anxieties aside, this is a wonderful journey. The spirit of adventure pervades.”

Rolling, Pitching and Heaving

During the morning of our seventh day at sea, the wind freshened. Flying only a deep-reefed mainsail paid far out, Suka maintained a steady five knots, which by our reckoning was a most suitable clip. To our dismay, though, the sky darkened. Quartering seas grew ominous, and the ketch began rolling invidiously. Even so, her stern lifted buoyantly to each overtaking wave, allowing only the occasional dollop to sluice across her afterdecks and cascade harmlessly out the scuppers.

Eventually the vessel began rolling, pitching and heaving so vigorously that the task of holding-on dominated our existence. Jenny endured most of the day belowdecks, lying listlessly on the port settee, secured by her fabric lee-board. Indeed, with the advent of rougher weather this bunk would become home to one of us practically on a full time basis; for here was the singular place aboard ship where a tired crew member could rest, albeit with the aid of a few pillows crammed into the appropriate places.

Braced in the cockpit, I weathered the blow studying Suka's motion as she fell aslant into each successive wave trough. With her mainsail paid out, I could see that the yacht carried considerable weather helm, and that this pressed the self-steering mechanism into quadruple duty. Remarkably, whenever the apparent wind shifted in the direction that threatened to jibe the mainsail, the wind-vane compensated, albeit after a few seconds' lag.

An impervious cloud cover had precluded navigation throughout the day. But nonetheless, the evening brought diminishing winds and seas. So to our immense relief the comfort factor began to soar. We passed a reasonably pleasant night: our little brig reefed down and swishing along at a conservative four and a half knots.

First Big Storm

At dawn we found our first flying fish on deck. It smelled positively fishy, and I committed it back to the briny deep. The weather had calmed even further, so to maintain our speed we shook out the mainsail and poled out the jib, wing-and-wing opposite the mainsail.

However, the meteorological respite proved short-lived, as an ever blackening afternoon strengthened the wind and backed it toward the west. We sped along under deep reefed mainsail alone, hanging on as evening faded into impenetrable darkness. Ultimately the wind intensified into a tempest, entangling Suka into the maws of her first full-fledged gale.

Belowdecks, I clawed the reefable staysail from its bag. Fumbling in the confines of the rebounding cabin, I tried to roll the sail's foot, and to tie its reef points - but with little success. This job had been so simple back in the office, but by my present mindset I needed to deal with reefing working canvas in order to fashion storm sails about as much as General Custer needed more Indians.

Climbing outside into utter blackness, spotlight in hand, I found that for some reason the ketch was no longer making way. The blast had pinned her steering vane hard over, but in headstrong disregard Suka lay beam to the gale and implacable seas. The pressure in her double reefed mainsail was heeling her far over, but oddly it was not driving her forward. Overpowered, Suka had taken the appropriate measures, and had hove-to of her own volition. Storm-pressed into the utmost service for which she was designed, the brig's heavy displacement, wine-glass shaped hull, and full length keel were now proving their worth.

Stormbound, a modern, so called "go-fast" yacht with its fin keel, flat bottom and light displacement requires her crew to sit at the helm round the clock, steering downwind or off the quarter. Lacking extra crew, Jenny and I were glad to allow Suka's traditional design to cope with the bellicose seas.

Short-wave radio reception was marginal, but after several hourly attempts we gleaned the synoptic situation. Disseminated were warnings of fierce gales beleaguering the North Pacific, but none for our area. No bad news was not bad news, I reasoned. But this blow was genuine, and obviously it had not yet come to the attention of the meteorologists.

As the storm intensified, the night became frightening. Jenny occupied the lee bunk and I lay on the staysail in its heap on the cabin sole, listening to the dreadful wail of wind shrieking in the rigging. The ship's motion was indescribable in its violence. As the brig climbed each passing wave, it rocketed skyward; then as the wave passed she plummeted haphazardly into the next trough. We felt as though riding a wildly gyrating elevator suspended on a long spring, bouncing up and down two or three stories - this while some psychopathic Cyclops stood outside bludgeoning the elevator. Seas continually washed over the topsides, some with great force, as tempestuous seas thrashed the yacht unmercifully.

Storm intensified

By morning the gale had only intensified. Tumultuous seas were thundering with a vengeance. Wind wailed in lament through the rigging. Monstrous waves were breaking everywhere across the face of the ocean, and occasionally palisades of rushing spume would come crashing headlong into Suka's hull and cabin top. For hours on end I braced myself in the aft cabin passageway peering through a port, watching immense seas marching toward us, one after the other, ad infinitum. It was a fearful experience for both of us.

Had the pounding waves threatened Suka structurally I would have turned tail and run bare-poled before the wind (steering downwind). But this I was reluctant to do. If the storm was, in fact, a hurricane, (which in retrospect I now feel that it might have been) then our running downwind would have been the worst possible maneuver, for it would have driven us in a sweeping spiral toward its eye. So as a compromise I attached the emergency tiller to its rudder post beneath the aft cabin berth, and lashed it about 10 degrees a-lee. This eased the wave-bashing to at least an acceptable level.

For another twenty-four grueling hours we lay-to, experiencing the dismal palpability of the ancient seafarer Anacharsis' remark: "There are three kinds of humans: those who are alive, those who are dead, and those who are at sea."

Suddenly in the night something smashed Suka with a horrifying crack. Unlike the usual explosions of the relentlessly battering waves, this sounded urgently structural. Vaulting to our feet, I yelled for Jenny to lift a floorboard to check the bilge, while I grabbed the spotlight and charged outside. To my relief both masts were standing. The vessel's integrity above decks appeared sound. Jenny called that the bilge was staying dry. So we were not sinking. Still, something had almost certainly been fractured. We searched everywhere but found no damage.

(A week later, while leaning over the railing, I discovered the evidence: Suka's larboard trailboard, a large plank of teak, had been smashed away, and all that remained were its ragged ends. To this day we do not know what had caused this. It could have been sheer hydraulics, or maybe an impact with some floating object. But there were no marks on the boat, otherwise.)

Incredibly the next day the blow intensified further. Mountainous, mind boggling seas rolled and tossed their heinous peaks everywhere lathered in white spume. We ventured outside, and while communicating at the tops of our voices, as our clothing flogged frenetically, we wrestled with the mainsail. After lowering the boom-end into the cockpit and lashing it securely in place, we frapped the sail tightly to its spar using a dozen gaskets (lengths of stout cord). Bare poled, Suka now rode with considerably less strain, yet the tempest wailing aloft in the rigging continued to pin the vessel hard over.

Again the night was intolerable although survivable. Having endured seventy-two hours in this realm of the damned, our nerves were fraying. The ship's motion had grown so extraordinary that we could do little but brace ourselves on the cabin sole. Lying there, we could only listen to the pounding waves and to the groaning joinery. The journal quips: "If we could have somehow sold Suka for a pittance and walked away from the storm, we would have run instead."

It is said that he who would learn to pray, let him go to sea. And this is the prayer that Jenny and I later taped to the salon bulkhead:

"Then they cry unto the Lord in their troubles
and He bringeth them out of their distresses.
He maketh the storm a calm, so that the waves thereof are still.
Then are they glad because they be quiet;
so He bringeth them unto their desired haven."
-Psalm 107: 28-30

The wind and seas began to subside during the storm's fourth night. But as the wind relinquished its grip on Suka's bare rigging, the ketch began rolling violently, rail to rail.

For the last three days and nights we had not eaten, slept, or even drank water. So we were beginning to flag of bodies and minds. As such, we were extremely reluctant to climb out into the heavy rain and the black press of night in order to set a steadying storm sail. In retrospect this was not the best decision, for in the wake of a mighty storm, when a sailboat is rolling violently, it is her rigging that suffers the greatest stress. Suka's rigging held intact that night, but her excessive motion threatened to launch books across the cabin's interior, along with the ice box lid, settee locker doors, and even the floorboards. So we retreated into the aft cabin, and there at long last we slept.

The Storm Subsides

Daybreak; we climbed outside to find that the awful storm had slackened. Groggily, we made shortened sails, and with that Suka sprinted ahead at an exhilarating pace, bounding over the mountainous but far less dangerous seas. We were overjoyed to be making way again.

In the storm's aftermath we found a pair of strikingly beautiful dorado swimming by the hull as though using the brig for refuge. Their presence was reassuring. We watched enrapt as the bright sun scintillated them in golds, yellows, and blues.

The skies cleared somewhat that evening, allowing a few mediocre star shots. My calculations indicated that the storm had driven Suka sideways some thirty miles west-sou'west.

Mizzen Sleeping Bag'sl

Beneath empyrean, azure skies, the ketch scuttled along at hull speed, while for two days she flew only her shortened mainsail and her jib. Her windward deck lay awash in moiling spume, and her cabin top glistened in flung spray. We were on our way to the Marquesas.

The tremendous storm had soaked everything belowdecks. Twice we laundered a few clothes in an attempt to render something dry to wear. Our technique was to half-fill a large bucket with sea water, add a dash of soap, and then after churning the mixture and draining the bucket, to add sea water to rinse away the suds. After twisting each item between clenched fists, Jenny rinsed it in a small amount of precious fresh water in an attempt to remove the remaining salt. Then she secured each piece to the lifelines, to dry. But the flung spray soon drenched the flapping garb.

“This is a battle,”, I wrote in the journal,

“of a pair of sailors wrestling their scant possessions from the all-pervading wetness.”

After repeating the washing we hoisted a few garments aloft with the mizzen halyard, sleeping bag included. And there, out of the spray's gangly reach they eventually dried. We joked how sprightly Suka would have sailed into San Diego Bay flying her colorful little mizzen laundry'sls and her sleeping-bag'sl.

From our experience, when the seas are rough they oftentimes grow more so with the onset of darkness. And because the seas were still scabrous, weighty, and occasionally capped with froth, our night watches were not entirely pleasant. The apparent wind blew fresh over the port beam, and every twenty minutes or so a wave would crash against the hull with what felt like the force of a pick-up truck running a red light and T-boning the boat. By design Suka had no dodger that would have offered some protection for her center cockpit; so when the bursts of brine leapt into the air, they plummeted into the cockpit in veritable cataracts. The watchkeeper's singular defense was therefore to remain beneath a small tarp. During my watches, I staved-off the occasional briny wallop by throwing the covering over my head with the utmost dispatch. And this I did whenever I heard and felt a collision against the hull. I had not been nodding long when a much larger "automotive accident" startled me from my nap. Reactions slowed by drowsiness, a bathtub volume of water smashed me in the face, cast itself inside my rain jacket, and sluiced into the sleeping bag, flooding it like a child's plastic wading pool. The water was stunningly cold.

Rough Conditions Abating

On the journey's 14th day the rough conditions abated. "Warm, not too windy, and absolutely wonderful," reports the journal.

Our ship's batteries nearly depleted, I installed the trolling generator for the first time. This apparatus consisted of an electric generator housed in a gimballed bracket attached to the afterdeck, and a hundred feet of half-inch line trailing astern and terminated with a propeller. Towed through the water, the whirling propeller spun the generator. In theory this idea had seemed valid; but in practice the trolling line would frequently hockle into an inoperative glob of rope, requiring me to haul aboard the tangled hodgepodge in order to straighten the line.

Flying fish, six to ten inches in length, continually whizzed this way and that, a few inches over the water like errant Frisbees. Our daily allotment was one. When this gift of the sea was not received in the watchkeeper's lap as a tail-buzzing, smelly endowment, it would be found more circumspectly at daybreak lying deceased somewhere on deck. We had not yet come to realize the culinary potential of these dead fish, and once I tossed one to a passing red-footed booby, a type of pelagic seabird. Showing not the slightest appetite for my bestowal, but tracking it like an computerized radar antenna, the bird watched the lifeless fish arc upward toward it, and down into the water with a splash. These birds function largely on instinct, I supposed, and a dead fish catapulting so high - yet so inanimate - did not fit the mold. Or perhaps these birds simply prefer their fish fresh. For after all, the boobies would chase living flying fish continually, and in so doing they provided us with endless entertainment.

Freeing the Propeller

In a few days the seas calmed considerably, meaning that it was time for the skipper to abandon ship.

Being only fair, I never asked my companion - however brave she always proved herself to be, whatever the task - to do any job that I would not have done myself. And this job certainly fell into that category. So with no little trepidation it was now time for me to clear the ship's propeller. It seemed that during the storm, one end of a jib sheet had worked free and washed through a scupper, and from there it had fouled the slowly free-spinning prop. We had tried to haul the line free by pulling from different angles. We started the engine and nudged the transmission into reverse gear, but this only killed the engine. We even tried winching the line ever so gently so as not to break the prop shaft and possibly sinking the boat. Alas, the task was unavoidable. I had to go overboard, knife in teeth like a pirate, and slash away the fouling line.

I eased the leeward jib sheet and winched in the weather sheet, backwinding the jib and causing Suka to heave-to. This slowed us to one and a half knots. This was still too fast, so we dowsed all sail and lay the ketch to. At this, she stopped dead in the water, pivoted beam on, and began to roll heavily. Moreover, because of the sizable swell running, each passing wave bounced the boat's stern high into the air, then slammed it down with a great splash.

The prospect of casting myself into the boisterous seas was not in the least appealing. Aside from the hazards of the waves, I imagined that surely great white sharks were lurking everywhere down there. So after rigging all manner of safety lines, then donning mask and snorkel, I climbed a few steps down a makeshift knotted rope ladder. As the hull splashed down I leaned far over and momentarily plunged my head into the water. An instant later, still clinging to the rope ladder I was elevated high into the air. Having managed a momentary look around underwater, I had not noticed sharks; but I had seen tiny jellyfish by the hundreds.

This was no pleasure swim; that line had to be cut free of the prop. So I donned a pair of flippers and simply jumped overboard.

The clarity of the water was astounding! Looking downward I could see long shafts of sunlight plunging deeply into a fathomless abyss. A ghastly chill ran down my spine. But at least the tiny jellyfish weren't stinging, so pushing aside my emotions I inhaled deeply, submerged, and swam to the prop. Despite the hull's severe motion, clinging to the rudder proved remarkably easy. The line was wrapped many times around the propeller shaft so tight that I could not unwrapped it, so I had to slice through the wraps and I soon had the line cut free.

Resurfacing, I swam around the boat like an astronaut suspended in hyperspace and drifting about his life-sustaining capsule. Scrupulously I inspected the hull as it bounced about, as though suspended in a pellucid, but turbulent cosmos. The hull's fittings appeared sound: the through-hulls, the bobstay stemhead fitting, the sounder transducer and knot-meter paddle-wheel, the propeller, the rudder, and the self-steering brackets were all looking fine. So I climbed back aboard.

The prospect of jumping into those heavy seas had seemed rather appalling, yet contrary to expectations the job had proved ridiculously easy. It was a good lesson, yet again.

Visits by Birds

Late that evening an old and somewhat tattered masked booby alighted on the cabin top. Showing us no fear, it passed the night a mere four feet from the cockpit where Jenny or I sat on watch. Maybe it considered us castaways also.

The following morning, perhaps encouraged by the booby, a white egret landed aboard. The next day the egret flew away, only to return a few hours later with the remaining fifteen of its bedraggled covey. Although the cattle egret is a proficient flier, it is not a seabird. Clearly, these poor creatures did not belong out here. They could not drink seawater, and presumably they could not feed from the open sea or even alight on it. Only they knew the inestimable marvel of their survival, having been storm-hurled 1,700 nautical miles across an inhospitable ocean.

Sounding a few purposeful squawks, the booby would waddle to the rail and fly away, only to return an hour or so later. Aboard, it experimented with several locations about the topsides, and eventually determined the afterdeck as the place most suitable. There it established its eminent domain. In order to adjust the self-steering vane, I had to nudge the comical creature aside to get at the mechanism. At my first intrusion the bird snapped at my hand with its long and sharp beak. Viewing this as rude behavior toward one's host, I retaliated by delivering a gentle thwack to its snout. And so we came to amicable terms; the bird could reside there if it pleased, with the understanding that I could come adjust the vane when necessary.

Beneath darkening skies, a stiffening, veering wind had Suka walloping along, close-hauled at speed. The flock of dainty, white egrets endured a slanting mist while perched gloomily about the cabin railing, the mizzen boom, and the lifelines. Jenny and I tried feeding them, and they seemed interested, but unfortunately they did not recognize our offerings as sustenance. We learned later that we should have set out fresh water for them, but unfortunately this did not occur to us.

Leaving the birds to fend for themselves, I retreated to the shelter of the aft cabin for a nap justified by a long night on watch. Jenny busied herself sorting through the not-so-fresh-anymore fruits and vegetables. I later awoke to find lemons, limes, grapefruit, onions, cabbage and potatoes dangling nearly everywhere about the cabin in little satchels of cheesecloth and woven nets. This way, she explained, the fruit and vegetables would not tumble onto the sole, or become bruised by bashing about on the forecastle berth.

In the days to come the weather settled. The skies cleared, the wind and seas gradually surrendered their impertinence, and the egrets took to wing, leaving us to swab the decks.

At various intervals throughout the day the booby would sally forth, presumably on fishing excursions. Once it returned bringing another of its kind. This new bird flew around inspecting us distrustfully, and refused to land.

One afternoon our booby was descending on the aft rail when it made a minor miscalculation and crashed into a life line. From there it flopped into the water, unhurt. My insensitive laughing only further humiliated the poor creature. Chagrined, the proud bird flew away and never returned.

The shifting wind continued heading us, and eventually required us to come about onto the opposite tack. Having lived for more than two weeks heeled well over on the port tack, our home seemed disconcertingly askew, slanting heavily athwartships the other way. But in another few hours the wind had shifted back, enough to allow us to come about onto the port tack again; and with that our domain regained its port-listing normalcy.

Crossing the Doldrums

At latitude 10 degrees north, the dying breeze signaled our having reached the infamous doldrums. With sails hanging oddly limp, Suka motored across a surrealistically calm, almost mirrored sea. Now, not only did the sunshine blaze from above, but with nearly equal intensity it also glared reflectively upward from the face of the burnished-metal sea. The helmsman suffered the brunt of a pair of tropical suns.

After standing at the helm for eight hours, we collected a breeze, and as this matured Suka eagerly embraced it with full working sail and self-steering vane, wafting us on toward our unseen goal.

The next few days were characterized by light to medium winds on the port beam or quarter. Squalls, sudden cloud-spat outbursts of remarkably heavy wind and rain, beset us often. And invariably, at least one sudden tempest, unheralded in the darkness of night, would send us scurrying. At the sudden onset we would leap into action, shortening sail and battening down the hatches against the downpour; and for a few minutes Suka would slash across the ocean as though on a rampage. Each time the exigency would seem desperate, but within a few minutes tranquility would return, leaving us shaking out the reef, re-hoisting the jib, and swinging open the ventilating hatches.

My navigation shots were sometimes frustrated by innocuous little cumulus clouds that seemed to willfully race across an otherwise open sky with the intent of obscuring my intended stars at the most inopportune of moments. Of course, this was a purely subjective observation. For after all, we plied an ocean so large that any lack of success with the sextant was not crucial. Our straying somewhat off track mattered very little. For the record, though, we navigated, or attempted to, using the stars Vega, Altair, and Archenar, and occasionally Mars and the Moon.

Jenny spent considerable time standing braced in the galley, refining her seafaring culinary skills. And considering the circumstances she succeeded admirably. Even after nearly three weeks at sea, we carried plenty of vegetables; and although these were by no means firm, they were nevertheless nutritionally acceptable. Our favorite dinner, prepared in a pressure cooker, was a hearty mulligan stew of potatoes, cabbage, carrots, onions, and tinned corned beef. For breakfasts the mate normally prepared fresh squeezed orange juice, hash browns, and fried eggs.

Preparing hash browns is practically a lost art in this era of modern conveniences, yet it is so simple that I would like to describe the method here. After grating a few potatoes, Jenny would remove much of the fluid by forcefully hand-compacting the mass, as though packing together a dense snowball. Those who haven't tried this might be surprised at how much fluid can be extracted in this manner. Then into the pan went the grated potatoes. When they were well browned she folded in a couple of eggs (chicken, not booby).

In the afternoons she would take from her gimballed propane oven some savory delight such as a deep-dish apple pie or a pan of cinnamon rolls.

We had departed California with some 200 gallons of fresh water, and had been using our precious supply sparingly. As mentioned, we washed and first-rinsed our clothes in sea water. We showered by the briny buckets-full, then rinsed sparingly with fresh water. We washed dishes in salt water, then wiped them dry. And we brushed our teeth with saline. (Ironically, this conservation proved largely unnecessary, for subsequently we were to arrive in the Marquesas with some two thirds of our original supply.)

It was here that the cruise began taking on dream-like qualities. The hours, even entire days seemed to fly past on celestial wings. The days had grown warm - broiling but for the cooling tradewinds that played with remarkable continuity. The intense solar radiation bronzed our hides perhaps too much; so we fashioned a shading portico by suspending a small makeshift awning over the cockpit. This, we found, also served double duty as a splash-guard by night.

Swimming Mid-Pacific

Suka encountered a second windless zone two days after the first one. Negotiating it required a 12-hour stint of motoring. As suggested by the brand-name inscribed boldly on its coolant reservoir, we referred to the diesel engine as "Perkins." And Perkins was beginning to run hot. We were learning that a sea-water engine cooling system is much less efficient in warmer climes. Twice the engine overheated completely. After my fussing over it, burping a few bubbles from the cooling circuit but doing nothing of real consequence, its temperature gauge needle would decline suitably - as though the machine needed occasional attention and reassurance.

Jenny suggested we allow a recess from the monotony and heat of the constant motoring, and go for a refreshing swim. After all, our accommodations came with a large pool in the back yard, one small step from the transom. So I shut down the engine and allowed the ketch to glide to a graceful halt. Tethered to a length of safety line attached to her harness, Jenny donned mask, snorkel and fins, and with gleeful abandon jumped overboard.

"See anything with big teeth down there?" I asked.

"No, nothing but a little fish under the boat." She splashed about while I stood by, gripping her line anxiously, ready to haul her to safety at the first indication of a menacing shark. Beaming, she climbed the self-steering rudder mounts, and stepped aboard exclaimed: "That was fantastic!"

Encouraging her to keep a sharp lookout, I donned my snorkeling gear and walked the plank. Compared with the water I had last swam in, this water was far less bracing. And it was just as clear. In fact, astonishingly so! And unlike Jenny's flat-glass mask, mine was ground for my eye-glasses prescription, so underwater I could see more clearly than she could. I found that my lenses also provided better depth perception. To my amusement, I found that her "little fish" was actually a dolphin swimming perhaps 150 feet below the surface.

“The wind has returned this evening, and we're cruising across glassy seas at four knots. This is fine sailing and I'll take a big dose. Suka is heading for her equatorial crossing, which according to my evening round of star shots is only thirty five miles ahead. Tomorrow the scumbags will cross the line to become shellbacks, and in lieu of celebrating with King Neptune, Jenny is planning a sumptuous dinner.”

That night King Neptune alighted on the bow pulpit, having taken the form of a red footed booby. As was the case with the masked booby, this bird showed us no fear. Subsequently, it remained aboard for several days while occasionally foraging at large.

The South-East Trades

Sailing along blithely, Suka fell in with the south-east trades, characterized by remarkably steady force five winds blowing from the port quarter, and reasonably benign seas. Enrapt in their maritime inquisition, the crew of the little galleon was adapting well to their seafaring life, and finding it very much to their liking.

As the weeks had unfurled, we had devised ways to facilitate life aboard. Reefing the mainsail, for example, was no longer a grandiose task. By accident one afternoon, early on in the journey, the topmost mainsail batten had inadvertently slid out of its pocket and dropped into the sea. This struck me as a serious misfortune, imagining that the sail would no longer draw properly. But not only did the sail function as well as before, but I found that it could then be made and handed much easier without that troublesome batten catching on the spreaders and shrouds. So a few days later when the second slat shook free, I viewed the matter almost with equanimity. And when the sail even then performed as well, I removed a third wand myself. Suka's main boom is jumbo, and the sail's leach is but softly roached, so on all points of sail the battenless canvas drew well. And without the baneful battens, the sail could be easily dowsed and hoisted as the ketch sailed on a broad reach, or even flat before the wind. This discovery gladly heralded the last of our having to round the ketch to windward, and to put her into irons in order to reef her mainsail.

Another pleasant week rolled by.

Jenny had cleared the forecastle berth of its voluminous sail bags and cartons of miscellany, and had carved a comfortable reading nook. This area was favorably ventilated by the open fore hatch, yet was protected from the harsh, tropical sunlight. It was an ideal nook where an off-watch crew could idle away a few pleasant hours.

Endowed with fair weather and a waxing gibbous moon, the nights became even more pleasant. As the brig penetrated deeper into the southern latitudes, more specifically now at ten degrees south, her navigator could no longer see Polaris (Kochab as it is known astronomically) nailed staunch against the northern sky. In exchange, the constellation Crux, the Southern Cross, now adorned the austral firmament. My evening celestial measurements were now of the stars Archenar and Altair. At dawn I shot Sirius: to man's eyes the brightest of all stars; and Canopus: second brightest and a primary space flight navigational star.

And assuming that my calculations were correct, we were nearing our first landfall.

Nearing Landfall

Our 29th day out of San Diego, (Nov 30) at the first hint of dawn I wielded the sextant expectantly, and after working through the sight reductions I penciled the following entry into my navlog:

Heading: 244 T, 234 M.

Fix: 10.045 S, 137.227 W

56.1 miles to go.

Should sight island at noon's-run log 107, at approx 11:00 a.m.

The horizon ahead was empty, as always, but throughout the morning we anxiously scanned it, looking for a faint hint of the island crouching low on the water.

Although my sextant exercises on the California beach had proven successful, since our embarkation I had no means at my disposal to verify that my HO-249 celestial calculations were correct. Day by day, my x-marks penciled on my chart had marched in the appropriate direction across the ocean void. And although these marks seemed accurate, the possibility of wretched Murphy glaring over my shoulder now cast a shadow of increasing inscrutability into the mood.

So when in the late morning an indistinct smudge seemed to be adumbrating in the clouds far, far ahead, we did not know whether to shout for unbridled joy or to ignore it as an apparition.

Gazing so long and intently at a shape the mind says should be there, yet that the eyes cannot quite discern, eventually imparts an uneasy sensation to the stomach. Having seen nothing solid rising from the ocean for twenty-nine days, we worried that our sea-crazed interpretative abilities may have gone by the board. Were we seeing the shadow of a figment borne in minds bloated with anticipation? I stood at the tip of the bowsprit clutching the headstay and leaning forward, as if to scrutinize the view all the closer. Meanwhile, Suka sailed ahead, rather too slowly for us now.

Land Ho!

In a few hours the amorphous smudge began indeed materializing, until we were certain we were seeing genuine real estate.

LAND HO! FATU HIVA dead ahead!

Having sighted the island at a distance of nearly thirty miles, we sailed throughout the afternoon exultant. The land seemed to draw us magnetically, almost spiritually. Then at eventide we closed with a staggeringly imposing, upthrust and verdure-carpeted escarpment.

The night was not dark, for as the sun fell away to the west, a glorious full moon rose to the east and began washing the magnificent island in mercurial luminescence. We rounded the southern flanks and found the island's protected lee, and in so doing we shook free of the ocean swell and its motion to which we had grown so accustomed. Likewise blocked by land, the trade winds diminished to a whisper. Suka lay strangely calm.

The island's ethereal glory was far more than we could have imagined. Towering and incredibly steep-to, the monolithic hulk seemed to lunge skyward from the sparkling, moon bespeckeled waters. The coastline rose with singular abruptness, composed mainly of sheer rock slabs. These withstood the incessant onslaught of a reverberating surf, bred from the restive swell rolling in from the never-never, the high austral latitudes.

Having experienced nearly a month upon a comparatively barren ocean, we were stunned by the tropical beauties that fell upon our sea-glazed eyes. Unbridled joy flooded every nook and cranny of our souls. This upthrust escarpment is but a fragment of planet Earth taken as a whole, yet our consciousness embraced it as though it was our very link to the cosmos. Every shard of toil during the previous months was here and now brought to fruition. Our satisfaction at having reached this, our first landfall, was supreme. We had reached Fatu Hiva--the island of our dreams, and the first milestone in our global voyage.

Standing away a mile or so to the southwest, we drifted, eagerly awaiting daylight.