I Just Want to Die!
As we sailed out of the harbor and made a course for the tip of Palos Verdes Peninsula I was excited. We were on our way! Nothing could stop us now. Palos Verdes Point was only about three miles away. But the closer we got the less wind we had.
Soon it seemed as if we were standing still and the sea was like glass. Those who sailed in the area often called it the Palos Verdes Doldrums. It didn’t seem to bother Alan. He just sat back with one hand on the tiller (yes, the huge ship used a tiller!) and relaxed.
The world stopped. All of a sudden we were sitting about a mile off one of the most populated areas in the U.S., but we might as well have been mid-ocean. It was quiet. You could see cars, but it was silent. We drifted with the current, and somehow Alan kept the boat “pointed” in the right direction. It didn’t seem like there was any wind at all.
“Okay, let’s open the main topsail and see if we can’t catch some of the offshore breeze this afternoon,” Alan said, to no one in particular.
The crew once again jumped to action, but this time they started climbing the rigging on little pieces of rope that were tied between the shrouds, which I later learned were called ratlins. Not hard to figure where that came from, as it literally was a shortened version of ratlines.
Were they nuts? Once they got to the top they got onto a line that SV Stone Witch ran from one end of the topsail yard to the other. Standing only on this little 3/8” piece of rickety line called a foot rope, they spread out and untied the sail, and as they did it dropped.
I stood there stunned. On the huge topsail that had just opened there was painted a full-sized humpback whale. All of a sudden it came back to me. This is the flagship for Greenpeace. It was a new organization at that time, but it had been on the news plenty, and here I was about to sail on the flagship for Greenpeace all the way to Guatemala.
On deck Patrick undid one of the lines on the pin rail and pulled it tight, tightening the topsail. He looked at Alan, who said “Ease it a little, a little more. Good. Secure.” Dan then repeated it on the other side of the boat. Okay, I was impressed.
This I could learn. It was exciting. But the excitement wore off that evening as we rounded the point and sat in the Catalina Channel, drifting, no wind at all. I started to feel a little woozy.
Soon I felt even worse, and for the first time in my life I was seasick Maybe this wasn’t the life for me, or at least that’s what I was thinking as I went below to my berth. The boat was built for a crew of up to 10, so below decks the bunks lined the two sides of the companionway forward.
My berth was the upper bunk second from the forward anchor locker. Patty’s was the one below. She was in her bunk reading.
“How’s it going?” she asked, all innocent.
“I’m not feeling too hot,” I replied. I am going to lay down for awhile.”
And the feeling kept getting worse. And worse. And worse.
Just about the time I was ready to upchuck my breakfast, Alan hollered from the deck down thru the companionway, “Hey, Bob, it’s your turn on watch.”
Watch? Was he kidding? All I was going to watch was how my digestive system could work in reverse.
But, as they say, a mans gotta do what a mans gotta do. I never understood why that was, but it was. And so I pried myself out of the bunk and wobbled up on deck.
Alan looked at me and smiled.
He smiled! What kind of a sadist had he turned into?
“Don’t worry, it will go away. Just go over to the side of the boat and stick your finger down your throat. You’ll feel better, I promise.”
Yeah, right! That’s what I want to do. Like hell! I’m not gonna let people see me being weak.
Once more the “mans gotta do thing” entered my rapidly departing mind. “Okay,” he said. “Well, you’re on for two hours.” He pointed to the compass. “Just try to keep us on this course.”
I looked, and the compass was pointed at 180, due south. I nodded, sat down and took the tiller. In the three months I’d sailed Rogue I understood you push it one way to go the other, so I didn’t have much trouble staying on course. He watched for a few minutes (I guess he didn’t trust me?) and then he turned to go down the companionway into the boat. As he turned he said once again, “You’d feel better if you go ahead and puke,” and then he disappeared off the deck.
There was no wind and the boat was rocking. Soon it got to a point where I could not hold my gorge down any longer. I wrapped the little tiller line around the tiller and ran to the port side of the boat. I made it to within one or two steps from the rail when my reverse digestive system went into full gear. Fortunately, I was moving fast enough for it to make it over the side. For the next minute or so I watched as everything I had consumed for the past 40 years (or so it seemed) became fish. food. I felt as if I could have won the projectile spewing contest in the Olympics!
But you know what? I did feel better. The headache wasn’t as bad, the stomach wasn’t upset, and all was good with the world. For about 20 minutes.
Then I started to think I was gonna die.
Then I wished I would die.
Then I was afraid I wouldn’t die!
Then I made another trip to the rail. This time it was just a lesson in futility. Try though I might, nothing came up but my expectations. However, once again, I felt better. And once again, for about 20 minutes. By the end of my watch I was sure I had nothing left to throw up but my toenails.
This went on for two days. In those two days we made less than 20 miles.
We were still off the coast of Long Beach for God’s sake! Catalina Island just sat there looking at us.
On my dog watch the second night, I looked longingly at the lights of Long Beach. I could make out the Queen Mary. I could see Parker’s Lighthouse where I had downed numerous Terminal Island Iced Teas (that’s an iced tea made with all the white liquors, a little coke, and then topped off with a float of Everclear) and spent many a fun night. And that’s where I wanted to be. I was trying to think of how I could ask them to drop me off in Long Beach without looking like a wimp. I figured I would do it tomorrow. After all, we weren’t going anywhere at this speed.
I headed down below after my watch for the few hours that remained until the next sunup. I opened my port (I was lucky, I had a port in my berth) and tried to go to sleep before I had to puke again.
And I did go to sleep. And then a miracle! When I awoke it was a whole new day, and a whole new life! I felt fine! I noticed that there was actually air coming thru the porthole. I wasn’t seasick any more! In fact, I felt better than I had in a very long time.
As I walked into the galley area I saw the old coffee pot sitting on the gimbaled stove and poured myself a cup. It smelled great! I walked up onto the deck and Alan was on watch. He smiled.
“Feeling a little better today?” he asked.
“Yeah,” I responded. “It’s like I am a new me.”
I sat down opposite him and we just sat there sipping coffee and enjoying a beautiful sunup.
After awhile I walked forward on deck. Life could not get any better, I thought. By now the breeze had come up and we were making about 5 knots on a due-south course.
Our first planned stop would be Cabo San Lucas, and that was about 600 miles “down the road.”
I sat down on the edge of the inflatable dinghy looking out at the sea before us, and all of a sudden there were dolphins gliding along beside us riding the pressure of the bow wave.
I was home.
