CHAPTER 23
Sunrise this morning was remarkable; looking astern, the sky gradually lightened as the ball of the sun, hauntingly large, pushed above the ocean mist to become the sun we avoid with our eyes. We had logged 197.9 nm the previous 24 hours, spinnaker up, riding a gentle sea pushed by slowly strengthening warm tropical breezes.
We were two days and ten hours from Tony’s predicted landfall in the Maldives Islands, and only twenty hours from an event that would influence our lives forever. All of us.
The Amazon delivered a tasty scramble for breakfast. We savored hot coffee, the last of our once fresh cherries, and, being in a good mood, she rewarded us with cinnamon biscuits.
Routines this day, like most, were simple. We checked fittings on deck and aloft, entered creative log comments, played some backgammon on deck, listened to the helmsman’s choice of music, dreamt about Polynesian beauties, and grabbed a few zzzz’s.
Nearing dusk the wind was down a bit, as was our guard.
We were seven hours and fourteen minutes from the event when the sun slumbered to the west. In the cockpit conversation was light, varied, and occasionally serious.
The Amazon: “It’s been days since we landed fish; why keep dragging the stupid lines?”
“You think it slows us down?” Kyle’s voice carried mild irritation.
No answer. Tony chimed in: “Who cares? First of all, no fishing line is stupid, second we’re in the middle of the ocean over 1,000 miles from any land in any direction. My burning question is—has any boat ever crossed this exact spot in the ocean?”
“Atta boy, Tony! Show us there is something between your ears,” I said.
“I’m curious what’s under us,” Jim remarked. “It’s deep, like your mind isn’t,” offered Kyle.
“All of you . . . fuck off!” said the Amazon, falling into one of her moods.
And so it went, serious, not so serious, until the event that changed us.
Tony was surrendering the wheel to Kyle for the 0200 watch, when he suddenly shouted, “Flare! Over there! Flare!” He pointed forward. We all saw it.
Bone-tingling shivers throttled down my spine, raising chicken skin bumps. A flare in mid-ocean, late at night can only mean serious trouble for someone.
“Grab a bearing. OK?” Tony told Kyle. “Got it!”
I got one too,” I said, “with the hand bearing compass.”
Kyle altered course. Ten eyes looked into darkness for another flare. Tony dove below to plot our best-known position.
“Eight degrees 15 minutes and 27 seconds South Latitude, 136 degrees, 30 minutes and one second West Longitude” he said. “We are 505.25 miles south of the Equator and 2132.3 miles off the coast of Ecuador.”
And someone desperately needed help.
We tuned our VHF and high seas radios to distress channels and fired up the ham set. Tony put the radar on twenty-mile outer band limit.
I flipped on our thousand-candle strobe light, broadcasting our presence to a vast empty ocean.
Minutes passed.
Nothing. Not a sound, radar return, or eyeball burning sighting. “Or, was it really a flare?” Kyle asked.
“I saw it clearly,” said Tony. “It lasted three or four seconds. I’m sure it arched. Yeah, it did! I saw it arch. It had to be a flare.”
I agreed.
Tony, with binoculars trained on Kyle’s bearing, said he had checked and estimated the elevation and then checked the luminous scale, finding nothing to relate what he had seen to any star or planet. “If it’s a distress flare they have to be closer than twenty miles or we wouldn’t have seen it over the earth’s curve.”
Our radios and radar remained mute. Not a sound.
We sailed, engine assisting, in the direction of the flare, intensely watching the sky and monitoring radios. We shared deep concern this night for another mariner, in distress, on a vast sea. After two frustrating, intense hours we concluded it thankfully was a false alarm. But, we had all seen at least a portion of it. I still had the willies.
Our final conclusion, never unanimous, was that it had been an extra-bright shooting star behind a thin veil of cloud giving the illusion of a flare.
Unquestionably, the calls “Flare, Man Overboard, and Fire,” are frightening words at sea. Though we hadn’t heard of any other vessel in this area, we had been honor bound to assist had it been a flare. We may never know the answer. It was interesting, however, that on the next ham net roll call, both Renaissance (now 200 miles distant) and a base in Hawaii reported last night’s flash in the sky. Being seen from such diverse distances signaled to us that it must have come from the heavens.
Though this frightening fraction of our sea time is etched forever in our collective memories, it’s comforting to believe this was likely a meteor, reminding us once more of our finite place in the scheme of life and the universe.
We sailed on and at 0800 on the last day of April, we positioned ourselves 100 nm from Traitors Bay, Isle of Hiva Oa in the Marquesas Island chain fringing French Polynesia. Soon we would touch land, visit Poste Restante for mail, eat ice cream, and possibly see some legendary Polynesian goddesses. Stifling the mood, I told my mob it was time we began thinking about “slow sailing.”
“What the hell is that?” asked Kyle.
“Well, Kyle, let’s estimate we are able to make out the island by mid-afternoon, meaning arrival after dusk. It’s just my rule, Kyle, but I won’t sail into a strange, small South Pacific harbor at night with no moon and no navigation aids. I’d like to break the rule, but no dice. We’ve been sailing fast—we need to slow down to make our entry in daylight.”
“Aw shit,” said Kyle with a grin and a chuckle.
The following midday we dropped the mainsail and took a small reef in the jib. Endymion slowed to a crawl in the beefy, steady wind. Out came the fishing poles and along came—no fish. We didn’t care. Jim and the Amazon, standing on the bow, were first to see the island and define the mountains’ ragged edges as separate from the clouds. The Amazon let fly a whoop. Jim drew her into a hug and a kiss. The rest of us settled for handshakes and fist bumps. Drawing closer we brought the charts to the cockpit table, where hunching over them we could identify each peak. They were exciting moments. It was the first port in a long, well-done journey. Arriving today would put us in port after eighteen days at sea, and in time for an evening cocktail at anchor. Pleasing thoughts.
May 1st. 1745 hours. Tony is at the foredeck windless: “Let er rip, Pops!” I put my finger to the remote, and our anchor slips into Traitors Bay, headed for the bottom. We’d sailed over 3,000 nm in eighteen days and ten hours, averaging nearly seven knots around the clock. Standing in the cockpit, I was struck by the tropical splendor of our first landfall, mentally patting my crew on the back—yet taking a moment to remind myself, that if we had been off even a fraction of a degree, we could have missed the island by thirty or more nautical miles.
It felt odd, standing on a motionless deck, no sails above me, no sound of rushing water. Endymion was firmly anchored in thirty feet of crystal-blue water covering a slightly visible firm sandy bottom. Here we were, in Michener’s paradise. More palm trees than I had previously imagined lined the nearly five-mile bay. Ambush Point jutted out at one end and Alligator Point contained us from the other. Colorful names no doubt denoting history, and somewhere in the lush green hills, with rain clouds hovering over rugged peaks, lay the grave of the French Impressionist Paul Gauguin. All in due time, we would visit. For now, I just wanted to forget the ocean’s emptiness and focus on the beauty of this island.
Anchored in Traitors Bay—Nuka Hiva Island
It was so quiet and so serene before me, except for a heavy woman in bulky clothing doing laundry on a rock. Were she here, my Denise would say, “Now, that’s crapola.”