Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
appreciating the wonderful, balmy trade wind sailing, the lovely companionship of a beau-
tiful, young girl, and the heady feel of freedom and suspense that comes from an open
ended adventure such as this. There was the dangerous finale to this trip that added sus-
pense right throughout.
With three of us now on-board, we could take our watches a little more relaxed. Three
hours on and six hours off: this worked well for a reasonable sleep. We seldom kept watch
during the day as it was almost too hot to sleep; rather, we tended to lounge around either
on the cockpit cushions or down below on our bunks.
The novelty of Penny's and my new relationship was at its height, and any excuse we could
find saw us sneaking off down to the very private double bunk up forward. Being practic-
ally a teenager, Penny was insatiable, and it was all I could do to keep abreast of her sexual
energy. She had a great sense of humor and laughed gaily all the time. She was very happy
and carefree, and her sense of joy infected Gavin and I. We were very grateful to her as
well for practically taking over cooking chores. She was equally pleased at being relieved
of dishwashing. A win-win situation, if ever!
Gavin and Penny got on well together; they had a common interest in the fishing, and she
taught us both a few tricks that her father had passed on to her. She found the towel on the
fishing line hilarious and returned the joke on both of us when she was on watch. A few
days out we all had a really big scare, and it made us think about the ocean and how pol-
luted it was becoming. In broad daylight one morning we heard, or rather felt, a loud bang
from the front of the boat. Suddenly the boat reared up, as though we had struck a reef or a
rock, and then suddenly slewed around quite out of control. “What the fuck?” I yelled out
in shock and fear.
“Feels like we hit a rock or something.” answered Gavin, white in the face.
“Jesus Christ! We've hit something!” yelled Penny. We would have laughed if it hadn't
been so serious; she had a very forceful way of spitting that particular oath out. “Jesusssss
Chrrrrisssst!”
The boat had lost all its speed and was floundering about with her sails flogging uselessly
in the wind. I had raced up to the foredeck and saw with a shock, a huge, black, floating
balk of timber. It was obviously very old as it was encrusted with a fringe of bright green
seaweed and thick with barnacles of all sizes. “We hit a huge log or something,” I yelled
back. The other two came quickly over to see. It wallowed heavy and sluggish, and like an
iceberg, was only showing a fraction of its bulk in the sunlight. As it bumped and scraped
its way past the hull, we could see little fish following faithfully along behind. It even had
crabs running along the top; it was like a miniature floating island.
