Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
fizzle out. It is the same with romance. Ask a girl out on a date on a waxing moon; you
will be pleasantly surprised. Police stations and emergency rooms at hospitals will agree
with me too on this. It is my pet theory and seems to be backed up by plenty of empirical
evidence.
Several hours later, an enormous, orange ball of fire slowly rose in the east, setting all in its
path alight with a rich, golden light. It brought reality back to our world. Déjà vu was wet
and shining. The decks were littered with the prostrate bodies of some sweet, little flying
fish that never made it. I scooped up a bunch to fry for breakfast. Crispy fried flying fish
and eggs were a delicacy along with a strong cup of sweet, condensed, milky, instant coffee
and tempered with a strong first morning Full Speed cigarette. Nothing could be finer! The
strong wind remained with us all day that day, the thirteenth of May.
We saw a tug towing two large freighters heading northwest. I called them on the radio and
was rewarded with a weather report and confirmation of our position. They were on their
way to Honolulu, Hawaii, still a long way away for us.
Gavin wanted a haircut which I carried out in the cockpit. Short hair is a must for sailors;
it is so much more convenient to keep clean and does not whip about in your face and
eyes. I remember what one of the world's great old sailors said about short hair in his book.
Eric Hiscock firmly believed that men made better downwind helmsmen than their female
counterparts as they could feel the direction of the wind on their bare necks. I have to agree
with this wise old man. It was his book, Cruising Under Sail, that really inspired me to
build the boat as I had and to adopt his rational commonsense approach to all things naut-
ical.
Our noon fix today put us a great one hundred and twenty four miles away from the day
before. The hard-working little walker log on my stern taffrail could not be more accurate,
its little black propeller spinning faithfully around, day in and night out. I was in the galley
about to boil some water for tea when the stove flame went out. I thought nothing of this,
as the propane would burn what's left of the gas in the feed line after it is turned off at the
tank. This was one of my golden rules. The bottle was always turned off after cooking.
“Gavin, can you turn on the gas, please,” I yelled up at him. He had just finished cleaning
up a nasty oil spill in the lazarette locker and was wiping his hands on an old rag.
“It is on,” he returned after a few seconds, puzzled. I froze.
“What! It can't be, that's the bottle we had filled in the Galapagos!”
“Well, I've cranked the handle full on.”
“Oh Jesus Christ, if it's not the one thing it's another,” I was worried. “Let me see.”
