CHAPTER FIFTEEN

Goodbye Rio, Hello Beyond

H

eading out on the muddy Rio de la Plata to the mouth of the South Atlantic Ocean was tedious, and our tempers flared. With the wind on the nose, onboard conditions were uncomfortable. Since the river was shallow, the wind whipped the water up into short choppy waves that jumped on deck, splashing into the main cabin. Salt water on the couch, cushions, and other soft surfaces would never properly dry out since the salt maintained a pervasive, annoyingly clammy consistency in the fabric. To avoid clammy cushions, we had to keep all the hatches closed tight, and since it was very hot outside, it was stifling inside.

Adding to the bad mood mix, Michel had decided (again) to quit smoking, and consequently, we left Buenos Aires without any cigarettes on board. His occasional stop-and-go attempts to quit over the years had been unsuccessful, and by the fourth day of these conditions, he was insufferable. Pulling into Punte del Este at the mouth of the river for a rest—and to buy cigarettes—I decided that as much as I hated him smoking, it was preferable at this point to ease some of the reigning tension.

Finally, ten days later, we were back in Brazil with a clean slate for our tourist visas. We returned to Florianopolis for a brief visit with our friends, Familia Guapo, and then headed back up to Rio for the famous Carnaval.

Barely twenty-four hours after leaving Florianopolis, we had to turn back. A sudden catastrophic failure of our genoa roller furling system sent us in a limping retreat to the harbor. It was a calm, warm, sunny day and we were gliding along quite nicely when a sudden, loud crack came from the forestay. The forestay is the main cable that leads from the top of the mast down to the front end of the boat, and the front sail—or genoa in our case—is hoisted along this cable. The cable was housed within a long metal tube which allowed us to roll the sail in or out to increase or decrease its area. A drum on the bottom of the tube was the actual device that turned the tube, and the advantage of this system was that we didn't have to physically lower or hoist a different sail to fit wind changes.

The whole system—the forestay with the roller furl assembly, including the bottom drum and the genoa under full sail—began swinging around wildly, tethered only at the top of the mast like one giant pendulum. Michel quickly took evasive action by putting us into a heave-to position, minimizing our movement and the swinging around of this heavy, dangerous equipment. He was finally able to catch hold of the unwieldy drum and immobilize it.

Once the drum had stopped swinging, we needed to get the sail down since it was creating a tremendous drag and awkward listing of the boat. It had also been ripped in several spots by the runaway drum. The only choice was to release the halyard (the cable for hoisting the sail along the tube) that held the sail at the top of the mast, while we both attempted to gather the sail and tubes onto the deck as it descended. The huge mass of full sail, weighed down with the metal roller tubes, just crashed into the water. The sinking, curling mass entangled itself under the keel.

In its normal state, all this equipment was heavy. But now underwater and wet, it was like trying to hoist up a whale with our bare hands. We couldn't afford to just cut it all away, let it sink, and buy new equipment. We had no choice but to try and save it all. We spent hours hoisting all of this, inch-by-agonizing-inch, back onto the deck. It was an absolute nightmare. After jury-rigging a system with some other cables and some spare sails, we were back on our way to Florianopolis a good eight hours later.

Once again, the sea taught us a new level of patience. Installing new parts, repairing the rigging, and sewing became our priority. But even though this interrupted our plans, we weren’t too distraught. After ten additional days, we bid farewell to Florianopolis once again, and it was onward to Rio.

Carnaval! Full of vivacity, frenetic street festivals, and unforgettable evenings of theatrical extravagance. We romped with Sean and Brendan amidst euphoric crowds to the infectious beat of samba throughout Rio's teeming streets. The boys were wide-eyed and all smiles as we melded into the musical melee. The samba beat had its own heart and soul, and the festivities culminated each night with a breathtaking, glittery parade of the top twelve competing samba schools. With over 3,000 members each, the spectacle lasted from dusk to dawn as nonstop dancers, singers, and musicians gyrated and strutted in sumptuous and ornate costumes to each school's original music, all accompanied by elaborate floats. We were not disappointed to have prolonged our year in Brazil.

After Carnaval and some time spent port-hopping through neighboring cities, we realized that Rio had been our rallying point for well over a year, and now it was time to move on. During one of our last weeks, we went back briefly to the Marina da Gloria to fill up on water and tend to other chores for our departure. There, we met a French couple, Patrick and Sylvie, as they had spied our French flag from the docks. Residents of Australia, they were passing through Rio on vacation.

Sometimes things just click with certain people, and so it was with Patrick and Sylvie. After an exchange of customary greetings and some polite conversation, we invited them onboard for a beer, which stretched into an impromptu dinner, and then several more dinners in the days that followed. We felt as if they had been our best friends for years. They were easy going, had a great rapport with Sean and Brendan, a good sense of humor, and perhaps the icing on the cake was that they had a restaurant back home in Australia. Sylvie knew how to make bread and pizza dough! After a year and a half of trying to perfect my bread-making skills, I still only had occasional successes. Sylvie showed me her simple tricks in just a few minutes, and the mystery was solved.

We invited Patrick and Sylvie to travel with us for a while up the coast, which they did. After a short week with us, they began their preparations for their long journey home, and we parted ways. To this day, I still think of Sylvie when I get around to making pizza, and I wonder where she is. We sadly lost all contact with them, but I wish I could tell her how grateful I still am that she forever enriched my culinary skills.

When we first left France, we had $20,000 in savings. We had whittled down a sizable chunk of that amount over our time in South America, so we decided it was time to start planning to find some new work. Our new target became Cayenne, French Guiana, just over the northern border from Brazil. The word on the water in French sailing circles was that work was easy to find in Cayenne for French expats since it was a French territory. So we set off, moseying along the Brazilian coast.

We soon came across Buzios, the islands of Abrolhos, and Bahia da Salvador—all tropical enclaves with their own particular flavors. In 1984, Buzios was touted as the quaint, new, South American version of St. Tropez. At the time, St. Tropez, on the French Riviera, was the European jet-setting vacation hotspot—the place for the rich and famous to see and be seen. We only planned to spend a day or two, but multiple chance encounters with several multinational expatriates led to unending invitations for breakfast, lunch, dinner, and cocktails. Ten days later, we finally extricated ourselves and moved on to Abrolhos, a collection of five little islands rising from coral reef outcroppings.

Designated a marine preserve and home to a small military outpost and lighthouse, Abrolhos provided a welcomed, isolated respite in nature. All four of us delighted in seeing the nesting birds and wild goats, as well as the slower change of pace. We had actually spotted Abrolhos over a year earlier on the horizon—it was the first land we spotted as we came nearer to the Brazilian coast. We stayed a day or two poking around the islands before continuing on.

From day one, when we first began our adventure with Cowabunga, our engine was an ongoing source of anxiety due to regular breakdowns. These difficulties often defined our trip and caused many unplanned and prolonged stops. We worried about the cost of repairs, searched for parts, waited on ordered parts, and even tried to manufacture parts at times. But many of these unpleasant engine-related experiences turned into memorable moments, sometimes fostering fond memories and friends for life despite the circumstances. Such was the case in Salvador da Bahia, or simply Bahia.

We anchored in the bay intending to have just a quick "look-see" visit to get the lay of the land, catch up on our mail from General Delivery at the American consulate, attend to some routine engine maintenance, and then continue on up the coast. After having accomplished the routine maintenance, Michel went to start up the engine and…nothing. He tried and tried, to no avail.

Over the next few days, Michel went down the diagnostic list of how to discern the problem. Nothing worked, so he reached out to some of the other boats in the anchorage. One person knew about this, and someone else knew about that. Someone had a certain tool, and someone else had another. Another fellow cruiser had the same engine and knew it backwards and forwards, he said. Slowly, our engine problem became the whole anchorage's problem. For almost three weeks, our engine was the focal point of most of the afternoon activity. A crowd amassed onboard Cowabunga each day with favorite wrenches, screwdrivers, and other what-nots for the latest round diagnostic session of the Cowabunga "repair-a-thon."

Since the engine was centrally located inside Cowabunga, the whole interior got progressively more crowded and cluttered while the engine was slowly dismantled. It was extremely difficult for us to do anything other than sleep there, so the kids and I became itinerant in that families from other boats took us aboard, fed us, or would take the kids during the day. In the evenings, we were wined and dined from one boat to another, and many impromptu parties erupted. We organized occasional outside tours in town together, and a couple of the older teenage girls became faithful, wonderful babysitters.

The Franco-Swiss family of Alec, Nadette, and their two children, Jim and Gougou, were lifesavers. Their boat, Jakaranda, stood out amongst every other in the anchorage—the hull was decked out in a striking violet-pink hue, like its namesake flower. The family onboard proved to be just as colorful. Alec was tall and lanky at his six feet, always sporting a long blonde ponytail down his back. He was reserved, and always immersed in meticulous analyses of some matter or other, be it a technical boat issue or the latest family communications from Switzerland. An extreme perfectionist, he could spend hours devoted to the minute details of an issue. Nadette, a nickname for "Bernadette," seemed an unlikely partner for Alex with her short frizzy bob, extreme gregariousness, and a perpetual cigarette dangling from her lips.

They were both down-to-earth, devoted parents to Gougou and Jim who were about the same age and similar dispositions as our two boys. Their shy and reserved daughter, Gougou, (Alec and Nadette were incapable of explaining how that nickname was derived from "Tina"), and bubbly son Jim became fast friends with Sean and Brendan. We eventually found out through many conversations that they belonged to a societal elite far beyond our financial reach. Their boat, Jakaranda, was a custom-built, comfortable sailboat. We could fully stand up inside with plenty of individual space. It was almost cavernous, and for a cruising monohull that was amazing!

Alec also had a dedicated, well-equipped workshop onboard. A lot of our engine ended up there in various pieces. Also, since we couldn't charge our batteries with the engine dismantled, Jakaranda lifted their anchor and tied up alongside Cowabunga on occasion, running their engine to charge us up. Since all four kids got along well, our side-by-side afternoon sessions proved to be a magical solution to keeping all the children occupied and happy in each other's company, and we parents were soothed.

With all this communal help, the engine was eventually put back into working order. We were overwhelmed by everyone's generosity and decided to throw a thank-you party. After tallying up the number of people who helped us out, we realized that Cowabunga was too small to house a party for over twenty people, so again Jakaranda came to our aid and rafted up alongside us. With two deck widths to spread out, we hosted a party to remember.

By now it was June, and again our time frame had been impacted. But despite this, we set out to explore a bit of the island of Itaparica in the bay, and also headed up the Paraguaçu River as we forayed to a secluded waterfall and the waterfront village of Maragogipe. A Saturday morning market was quaint and colorful with the local country folk and merchants, and cargo-laden burros crowding the plaza with wares for sale. Brazilian saveiros, local, flat-bottomed, barge-type sailing vessels, followed the tides. Loaded with varied loads of grains and odd goods, they painted an otherworldly tableau as they plied the waters of the Paraguaçu River and the greater Bahia area. We eventually set out for Fortaleza, which would be our northernmost and last Brazilian destination.

A few days out from Bahia and making good progress up the Brazilian coast under pleasant conditions, we were suddenly intrigued by the idea of making an unscheduled stop at St. Joao de Pessoa. After reading some brief nautical instructions and studying the charts, it seemed like a pleasant spot and a good opportunity to catch up on a night or two of uninterrupted sleep. The kids could stretch their legs a bit on land, too.

The chart showed a lot of reefs, shallow areas, and underwater rocks. But it was high tide, and Michel was confident after reading the nautical instructions that we could take a short cut, avoiding the longer, winding marked route. I preferred, however, that we follow a freighter just ahead of us that was entering via the channel. Michel insisted we could take the short cut over the reefs, and we began to argue vehemently about it. Just then, the wind whipped through and grabbed the chart in question from the cockpit table, whisking it away overboard. We were both cut short, our mouths agape having lost our only valid tool to enter the port. We both blamed each other, but our decision was made for us. There was no choice but to head back out to sea, to our original target on this leg of our journey.

A night or two before our arrival in Fortaleza, we were perplexed when we came upon little bobbing white lights, low and widespread on the water. They weren’t normal navigation lights, and as we closed in on them, we saw they were simple, flickering kerosene lamps. The lights surrounded us, and we could make out what looked like planks, the length and width of windsurfing boards, but rough-hewn wooden versions. They had primitive wooden masts, furled cloth sails, a bench, a box, and a few other sundry articles scattered about onboard. In the dark and fleeting lamp light, we couldn’t see any people on these vessels.

Later we learned that the local primitive skiffs were called a jangadas, and typically five to eight fishermen would set out to sea on one of these for a week of fishing! There were no sideboards or any construction that would prevent water from spilling over. For sleeping at night, they lie down, side by side like sardines, surrounded by big sponges to stop some of the water from sloshing over them. Typically, they would venture a hundred miles or so from the coast. We marveled at how they made their way back to home port without any navigation device whatsoever.

A desolate place in a years-long drought, Fortaleza was every bit a desert with a dune-like landscape. It wasn’t uncommon to see hunger-stricken children with distended stomachs wandering naked in town. Nevertheless, the city of Fortaleza was trying to capitalize on its potential for tourism, with its unrelenting sun and wide beaches. Some new flashy high-rise apartments, condos, and hotels flanked the waterfront, and the city sponsored a lively open-air bazaar in the evenings, trying to lure visitors to the cafés with a festive atmosphere. Unfortunately, so much widespread poverty mingling with tourists was a perfect recipe for jealousy and robbery.