My Grandfather

Written June 21,2011

It’s a cloudy moonless night as we creep along at just over 3 knots, our sails deliberately shortened to slow our progress.  We will arrive at the Banda Islands in the morning, and must enter the narrow, current-prone channel at slack low tide, which comes at noon at so.  Tides and currents run strong in these waters, and facing – or following – a 5+ knot current is a recipe for uncontrolled disaster.  Best to go slow through a pitch-black sea – if that’s indeed what lies beyond our lifelines … it’s so dark, we can only hear the water slide past our hulls.

We’re approaching our first Indonesian landfall, and I am reminded of the Jimmy Buffett song,” Son of a Son of a Sailor.”  My father spent a few weeks of his teen years as crew on large ocean ships – courtesy of a nepotistic placement by his mariner father, Johan.  I have Johan’s – my namesake and grandfather – autobiography on board ile de Grace, courtesy of my now-deceased Uncle Wim’s loving translation into English from the original Dutch.  I did not know my grandfather well – he was an ocean away from our American émigré family, and his several visits, touchingly and meticulously recorded in his memoirs, came when I was quite young.  A visit in my late twenties found him frail, and, apparently true to character, reticent, albeit with a quick smile. By family reputation, he was a stern man of inward focus – in many respects the prototypical Dutchman.

Johan spent most of his professional career in Indonesia, first as a mate on ships traveling to and from these waters, but then, for the bulk of his time, as an officer in charge of port operations in several of Indonesia’s largest ports.  It’s hard to overstate the importance of Indonesian exports during the 20s and 30s and early 40s, before the war broke out.  By the 1930s, the then-Dutch East Indies was producing – thus shipping – most of the world’s pepper and quinine, one-third of its rubber, and almost one-fifth of its tea, sugar, coffee, and oil.

Small wonder that Indonesia became a prime target for the Japanese as they embarked on their expansionist aims in the early 1940s.  As the Japanese spread east and south, they invaded Indonesia in 1942, and quickly rounded up the Europeans into concentration camps.  My father spent his teenage years in such a camp near Jakarta (then known as Batavia), an experience he neither shielded from us nor especially elaborated upon.  Johan too spent the war years in a separate camp (for all of the war, he and his wife were kept in separate camps, and their three kids – my father and his two older brothers – were kept in yet another camp). 

Johan’s memoir goes into heartbreaking detail about the privations he and his family suffered during these years. Family lore – and there is no reason to doubt this – recounts that Johan’s lifelong anger at the Japanese and Germans for their behavior in the war led him to refuse to own or be a passenger in any Japanese or German car for as long as he lived. 

As Jennifer and I return to the waters of my seafaring provenance, I want to capture a bit of the man I knew as Opa and pay tribute to his strength, his character, and his genetic gift of my love for the sea and adventure.  So on a dark night, with a gentle slush and hiss of water along our two bows, my thoughts turn inward, and I recall the words Johan wrote, just a few years before his death in 1991, of his days in school as a young boy of 15 preparing for a life at sea.  The year is 1914 – World War I is just breaking out:

“The Marine Academy was a boarding school.  I could go home every Saturday afternoon until Sunday evening.  We were taught, among other things, mathematics, navigation, astronomy, maritime meteorology, cosmology, theory of tides, compasses, oceanography, ship stability, rules of the road at sea, steam engines, geography, and foreign languages such as French, English, and German.

The days started at 5:45 am, and there was study hall from 6:15 am until 8:00 am. The lessons went from 9:00 to noon, from 2:00pm to 4:00pm, from 5pm to 7pm, and then from 8pm to 9pm.  The school was cleaned on Saturday morning after lessons, and then we had our weekly shower.  It was all in all a Spartan education.

In April 1916, we had to declare our preferences for which of Holland’s shipping companies we would like to work for.  On the 29^th of June, 1916, as a 17-year old apprentice, I was informed that I was to set sail for New York City on the SMN ship “Batja” the next day.”

With that short summary, Johan told the story of his education, after which began his career with SMN, a career that would last until his eventual retirement from the same company on June 30, 1960, after 44 years of service.  

Those were different times, as they say, when a boy of 15 was expected to chart his life's course, and at 17, commit fully to a career.  As things turned out, I was 15 when I first went to sea ... but I had no sense of needing to make life decisions at that age.  All I knew was that I wanted to sail the oceans.

Johan’s first years as a mariner were spent on ships making voyages to the Philippines, China, Japan, Korea, and Eastern Russia, but Holland’s colonial interests in Indonesia (then the Dutch East Indies) proved a frequent destination.  As the global economic trends ebbed and surged, shipping followed suit, and after a time, promotional opportunities seemed more available on a land-based posting.  In June 1928, Johan accepted a position in Jakarta/Batavia in the stevedoring department, whose function was to off- and on-load ships in the traditional method – using hundreds of strong, in this case, local native, men. 

In a number of these ports, reliable labor was difficult to muster for the irregular shipping schedules, so SMN would create camps for the workers, where they and their families would live.  This typical colonialist approach to addressing labor needs was arguably both enlightened and self-serving.  In his account, there was a mosque and cinema, and food was prepared in a central kitchen for bachelors, with families having their own kitchens.  There were an astounding 3500-4000 laborers in these “Unie kampongs,” and “even when there was not enough work, these people were paid and fed.”

Over the ensuing years, his family and professional responsibilities expanded, and by the time the Japanese invaded Indonesia, Johan had three teen-aged kids, my Dad among them, as well as the job of overseeing final pre-invasion preparations, which included disabling port facilities (despite the lack of dynamite), and overseeing final loadings and departures:  “The last company ship I handled was the motorship “Java,” which left February 19 with, among other things, all of the gold of the Java Bank, which eventually arrived safely in the United States...”

Soon, the Japanese arrived in his town. 

“On Sunday, June 14, 1942, I celebrated my birthday with my family, and I was picked up (by the Japanese) on June 25.  Piet and Wim (my Dad’s brothers) followed us on their bicycles to the police station.  We were to register there but we had no idea where we were going.  When we were registered, we were loaded into lorries and brought to the so-called ADEK building, which was turned into a concentration camp. Fortunately, Piet and Wim were able to follow the lorries, so they knew where I was.  Being interned in Batavia (modern day Jakarta) gave me some hope that we would be able to see each other once in a while, but fate changed all this shortly afterward.”

Imagine the spirit of a father watching his children follow him to a concentration camp, and imagine the feelings of my two uncles as they watched their father disappear.  It breaks my heart just thinking about it.


He next saw his children on September 5, 1945, and his wife, on October 4, 1945 -- a full three years after being taken by the Japanese.

Next:  The war years and beyond

A History of the Spice Islands

Many years ago, just after Adam tasted the first apple, Arab people of the Middle East began to celebrate Adam’s discovery with a drink they called “seder,” made from the juice of the apple. Unfortunately, another group of people adopted that name for their annual dinner where they kept waiting for a missing friend.  To avoid any confusion with the dinner of the same name, the Arabs began to call their drink “cider.”  More years passed, and Arabs began to tire of the taste of plain cider, so some Arab sailors took to their boats to find ways to enhance its flavor.

Sailing east, across the Indian Ocean, they encountered stories of a small set of islands where, it was said, there grew plants and trees with fanciful flavors called “spices.”  Traveling far and wide in their boats, they encountered Chinese philosophers that showed them the way -- or, in their words, the “tao” -- to these islands. Ever since, Arab sailors have called their boats “dhows,” in honor of the guidance of these ancient philosophers.

More years passed, and eventually, the Arab sailors encountered the people of these legendary “spice” islands, and discovered the tastes of cinnamon, nutmeg, mace and clove, which grew plentifully on the hilly, rainy slopes.  Returning home, the sailors introduced the taste of these new spices to their church leaders, or “mullahs.”  Proclaiming it good, these church leaders then introduced “mullahed cider” to their congregants.  As people learned to let the cider ferment, tongues began to slur the word, and the spice drink was soon known as “mulled cider.”

More years passed, and the Arabs grew tired even of mulled cider, and they eventually gave up on Christmas – and mulled cider -- in favor of another feast that came earlier in the year (before the apples had a chance to ripen and become soft).  So it was left to the Portuguese, who still celebrate Christmas to this day, to sail their big ships to the Spice Islands for the spices needed to make mulled cider.

More years passed, and then the Dutch, who also celebrated Christmas, outgrew their fascination with tulips, and decided they needed more exotic plants to exploit monopolistically for the gold they needed to build their big cities.  They came to the Spice Islands and defeated the Portuguese, killed or expelled all the natives, and destroyed all the cinnamon, nutmeg and clove trees except for a few trees on a few islands. 

The British posed a last minute roadblock to a complete Dutch mulled cider monopoly when they commandeered an adjoining Spice Island.  The Dutch finessed this last barrier by giving the pesky English a little Dutch  island in the New World -- Manhattan – in exchange for the last remaining Spice Island.  Once the Dutch acquired a complete monopoly, prices for the now-extremely-rare spices tripled for cider lovers all over the world. 

Eventually, people grew tired of mulled cider, just as people eventually grew tired of tulips, and the Dutch spice monopoly collapsed.  Today, cinnamon, nutmeg, mace and cloves are grown by local islanders, ancestors of the survivors of the Dutch invasion, and are sold to the Chinese traders, who, as luck would have it, never lost their “tao” when it came to turning a profit on Christmas. 

As a result, we can now all enjoy a cup of Starbucks mulled cider at a reasonable price.  Thank goodness for the Arabs, the Portuguese, the Dutch and the Chinese. 

Oh – and don’t forget to thank God for the gift of apples, the Spice Islands, and their wonderful people – who ironically, have neither Christmas nor apples.

This is a true story.

Bandaneira

We woke early to make our appointment with Pac Mann, the English teacher at one of the local public schools; we had promised to tell his class about ourselves.  He’s an enthusiastic teacher who lacked the funds to complete his university degree in Ambon; the current tuition is about 1M Rp/semester, or about $128.  The local university, which attracts itinerant teachers from Ambon, charges 350,000 Rp/semester – about $30.  As a teacher, he is paid a monthly salary of 1,200,000 Rp/month, or about $154/month.  He is well-off, comparatively, in this tiny village of Banda Neira, on the island Pulau Neira.  Four centuries ago, the Dutch, in a misguided effort to retain a monopoly on the lucrative nutmeg trade of the time, massacred the entire population of the island – an event that Pak Mann (Pak is a Bahasan title of respect, like Mister) was quick to recount on our 20 minute walk from our boat to his school.  Families have long memories on these islands.

We had a delightful time with his students.  Both Jennifer and I spent a few minutes describing our trip, and then Pak Mann turned the floor over to his class of 25 or so 11-13 year old girls.  A number of them introduced themselves in formal, accented English, and then asked questions:  Why did you come to Banda?  How old are you?  Do you have brothers and sisters?  After a time, attention spans began to wane, and Pak Mann dismissed the class, allowing us to get back to the boat for a promised appointment with Hamdi, who runs the local collective dive shop business.  He’s been in business for just two years, with the help of a start-up grant of equipment from the Indonesian government.

Not many tourists come to these islands, so business is slow.   There’s only one flight a week to and from here, maintenance conditions permitting.  The price is 350,000 Rp.  The barely more regular ferry service costs about 500,000 Rp to the same destination.  I expressed a bit of surprise at the apparently upside-down pricing scheme, but was calmly reassured that the ferry, after all, did take eight hours, while the plane just took one hour.

Pearl Farm.  Volcano Api in the back ground.

The Black Lava Flow continues under water

We dove two sites, traveling to and from the sites in a wood-planked, roughly-hewn fishing boat powered by a recalcitrant 15HP Yamaha engine.   

We had to stop at the Japanese pearl farm on the adjoining island to get our tanks filled; Hamdi’s compressor was on the fritz, and was in Jakarta for repairs.  The diving was terrific – remarkable visibility (>100 feet), with spectacular coral gardens and associated reef fish.  Our second dive, off the new lava falls from the volcano’s 1988 eruption was especially amazing, with table corals extending out 10 square meters into the “thin blue” water.   

Imagine a one-eighth inch thick lattice work of finely meshed coral, each polyp reaching horizontally to spawn another, impossibly-precarious neighbor—in effect, a wafer-thin, table-sized coral waffle, perforated rather than indented --  and, in toto, creating a vast “table top” of coral suspended across the water.  These were everywhere, and must be especially fast-growing to have reached these dimensions in just 23 years.  Their delicacy left us breathless, and called to mind the science fiction fascinations with the engineering possibilities of weightless environments.

China service!

Returning, we spent some time with Eddie, one of our dive masters, who showed us how the bark of a cinnamon tree is stripped and then rolled to create the spice.  Returning to the boat, we hosted some our new local friends, Eddie, and Irwin,  who had helped us to anchor – and then to re-situate ourselves – along with Pak Mann for afternoon tea on the ile de Grace.

Another day in Banda, where time passes, if at all, at a snail’s pace.  We rest tomorrow.

Withdrawals and Deposits

Introspective meanderings aside, there are times when sailing a boat around the world can, for all its challenges and adventures, just leave you drained.  Today we lie at anchor in the bayside village of Banda Neira, one of 12 villages in the Banda Islands.  We arrived yesterday late morning after a straightforward 7 day downwind sail from Thursday Island, Australia.  As we approached the island, we received our first rain in several months – the ocean-laden  tradewinds hits the small mass of islands, and rain ensues.  We look out our front window onto Gununj Api, an active volcano that last erupted in 1988, and tomorrow we dive the lava flows from that eruption, where magma ran down the hillside and sizzled the ocean.  Alongside our little vessel is the 75-foot or so Gemini, a wood-planked island hopper that waits here for the local fishermen to fill its holds with tuna; once full, they sail to Bali.  Local fishermen can earn 15,000 Rp – the US equivalent of $2.00 – per kilo of fish.  The 3-foot tuna I caught inside the Barrier Reef weighed about 15 kg … but the 6-foot black Marlin I caught weighed about 35 kg … we made 15 meal bags out of that fish.  We understand that the recent rains have made fish scarce in the market, and we plan to give some our fish away to locals that have helped us anchor and get settled in here.

A black marlin ... 6 feet long -- 15 dinners!

Bandaneira fishing boats, tied to the dock

We’re anchored in a bit of an awkward position, squeezed in between Gemini, with its crew of a dozen or so, most using handlines to fish for dinner as they await the Banda tuna fishermen, and a dozen or so local boats – narrow canoes, really, with small outboards or “roostertails” – the James Bond-like engines with a driveshaft extending back into the water.  Behind us is the Hotel Laguna, capably managed by Bang-Bang, who helped us anchor yesterday, along with his friends Hadji – who runs the local dive shop, Eddie, who seems to be everywhere, and quiet Edwin. The hotel has no guests.  We’re the only non-local boat here, and there are only 3 or 4 non-locals on the island, ourselves included.

The sea bottom drops off quickly – our stern, secured by crossing line to palm trees that line the harbor, is in about 10 feet of water.  Our bow – secured with one of our anchors – lies in about 40 feet of water.  Our anchor, just another 45 feet ahead of us, is in about 80 feet of water. Going from shore to 80 feet in about 120 feet of horizontal distance poses an anchoring challenge … since the bottom continues to drop at that rate to 300+ feet just offshore.   Arriving, we made a rookie mistake, and were not prepared adequately for the stern-to anchor requirements of having two lengths of 200-foot line for the stern crossing lines, and I didn’t do a good job in choosing how and where to drop our bow anchor.  In addition, I inadvertently caught one of the local’s mooring buoys in my prop – had to dive and untangle that mess.  As a result, we spent a restless night worrying that we’d swing into the adjoining fishing fleet, and I re-hashed the botch I made of the anchoring.   This morning, we worked with Eddie and Hadji to re-orient ourselves, and I felt a lot better.

Of course, that didn’t last long – I returned to the boat and saw that the display panel of our auto-pilot was fogged up.  I had seen this movie before, in Panama, and then we discovered – after the autopilot stopped working – that water had entered the delicate circuit board enclosure, and in the heat, began to evaporate and fog the display.  I removed the panel, opened it up, and watched a good 2 oz. of water drain out.  Fresh water, so not as bad as it could be, but we’ve had ther air conditioning on for a few hours, the panel sitting on one of the vents, drying it out.  I’ll need to use some silicone to seal it, since the seal is obviously shot.  I hope the leak isn’t in the LCD seal …

In addition to our re-anchoring and de-watering, we were dealing with our watermaker, whose output is running at 60% of specs, and whose water quality is below par.  Those of you taking careful notes for the final exam may recall earlier issues with our watermaker.  We ask a lot of it, and it usually performs, but it is a bit finicky.  Today, I spent 20 minutes on the satellite phone with my new best friend, Neal, at Hybrid Energy in Brisbane – the friendliest and most helpful Aussie I’ve met by several orders of magnitude.  We have a diagnostic game plan but no diagnosis yet.

Finally, on the issue of boat logistics – this is not all surf and sun, folks – we’re trying to fill up our diesel tanks at the Indonesia government price-regulated rate of 0.65 / liter – a far cry from Australia’s free market rate of $1.65/liter.  The small native boat carrying the drums of fuel to this island was scheduled to arrive today – hence the urgency of re-aligning our anchoring job.  It’s not yet arrived, depriving us – and more importantly, the local fishermen – of the chance to refill our tanks.  Maybe tomorrow.

Lots of kids!

In the background are the five-times-daily calls to prayer for the Muslim population, the clamor of kids – “Hey Mister” – and the periodic solicitation for some of this and some of that. Jennifer went for a long walk today through this little town, and while we do a very good job of being polite and greeting folks in the native Bahasan, and are learning phrases, it can be a real mental drain to stay local all the time so we retreat to our boat to catch our breath.

In one of those retreats, as I was completing the diagnostics on the watermaker issue, I was hailed from the dock by Mann, the English teacher in the local school; he’d like me and Jennifer to visit his 14-year-olds who are studying English and give them a brief talk on our voyage … and that puts  all the day-to-day issues in perspective.  I took stock of my situation:  we’re sailing our boat around the world.  How cool is that?   Suddenly, with that simple request,the energy withdrawals of our boat challenges and cultural adventures were replenished –“come tell us about your trip.”   

Pac Mann's school -- publicly financed

We meet him at 8:00 tomorrow morning – in his words, “not island time, real time.”  I’m feeling rejuvenated already.

Passing Surprises

Our bedroom is at the back of the right - starboard - hull, and since Jennifer had the foresight to buy a real mattress for it, it's a very comfortable place to sleep. Until, of course, the waves and swells are coming from left-to-right, and the noise from the slapping of the waves against the inner hull as they pass under the boat can keep you awake. So it was that I found myself in the bedroom in the front of the left - port - hull, known locally as "Kate's Room," with its foam mattress, and spent my first night on the Arafura Sea trading softness for silence.

Heading east, the Arafura Sea begins at the Torres Strait, and its bottom contour reminds us that the land masses of Australia, Papua New Guinea, and Indonesia were once connected. As we entered the Sea, the depth sounded indicated 30 feet.. For the next 120 miles, as the north-south distance between the respective shores of the land masses expanded to several hundred miles, the bottom ever-so-gradually deepened, and this morning, we are sailing in 100 feet of water. Tomorrow, 120 miles west, it will be 150 feet deep. The next day, 300 miles from here, 200 feet deep.

Typically, after a day of sailing away from land, we find ourselves in water several thousands of feet deep. Throughout the Pacific, we sailed over waters tens of thousands of feet deep, so this Arafuran experience is a bit of a surprise, like sailing in a big bathtub. If you were to roll back time, over millions of years, you'd see thousands of square miles of flat, gently-sloping land settling and the sea waters rising to create this massive shallow sea. The shallow night waters are filled with fishing trawlers, dragging their nets across the bottom for shrimp., and laying miles of hooked lines for tuna and other surface swimmers. The shallow sea also means that waves and swells are more pronounced - and ocean currents stronger. There wasn't much wind, so we motored into a choppy sea with swells disproportionately steep and close together.

I was happy to crawl into the less-noisy forward bunk when my watch ended at 2 am. The first night on a passage is always an adjustment, as the body's circadian rhythms re-calibrate to the 4-on, 4-off evening watch schedules. Even the voyeuristic lure of Keith Richard's autobiography, Life, downloaded to our Kindle, couldn't keep me awake. Walk in, strip down, head on pillow, lights out.

But I did remember to ask Jennifer to wake me at 5 am or so, an hour early, to witness the total eclipse of the moon, cloud conditions permitting. Last year, we were in Tahiti to see a 99% eclipse of the sun - an amazing experience for both of us, and I didn't want to miss its celestial complement here in the Arafura Sea. Sure enough, after what seemed like seconds after laying my head down came the tap on the door and the gentle voice of my ship and life companion: "The clouds just cleared; it's getting darker."

I have written from time to time about the brilliant brightness of a full moon on an open, remote ocean, but need to remind the reader that for a few days each month, we can read by the light of a full moon, whose light also crowds out the star. Full moon = very few visible stars. Last night was no exception; on my watch, I was able to read the manual for our chartplotter - the display for our course and radar and other navigational information - by the moon's light, as I adjusted the radar to warn of approaching fishing boats. Only the brightest stars were, just barely, visible.

As a light sleeper - show me a sailor who isn't -- I wake easily, so after Jen's gentle wakeup call, I moved quickly to the helm station startled by a dark celestial dome of billions of stars that, a few short hours ago, were invisible. Hanging low in the western sky, just above a thin strip of dark clouds, lay a dimmed moon, its upper half smudged by what seemed like the thumb of God, reddish-brown and softened at the edges. Diametrically opposed to the moon, hidden by the earth, shone the still-invisible sun, its rays occluded by the intervening mass of the earth. Recipe for a total lunar eclipse? Take a long piece of string, attach one end to the sun, and the other to the moon, and pass the string through the center of this globe we call home. The night sky darkens and the stars emerge, and suddenly it's night like none other.

Unlike me and Jennifer, the gathering darkness in the lit night sky did not seem to interest the blue booby that surprised us by landing on our foredeck at dusk, its head tucked into its considerable body, sleeping (?) or perhaps just resting for another day of pelagic flight. A pair of boobys had circled our helm station at dusk, and one seemed to finally muster the courage to land for the night. They are big birds, with a broad wingspan and bulging breast muscles to keep them aloft for hours and hours at a time, swooping to snatch fish from the sea. Unmoved by the changing light conditions, the booby stayed asleep perhaps understanding that the darkening and the accompanying sudden appearance of stars and constellations represented no fundamental change in the universe - these stars and constellations are always in the sky - day and night, full moon or new moon. The moon was still there.. But to me, the smudged moon and the stars' sudden visibility reminded me that my perceptions are shaped by my position. Elsewhere on this globe, outside of the arc of the eclipse, the full moon shone brightly; what you see depends on where you are.

I watched the earth's shadow pass downward across the face of the moon, surprised at its lethargic motion. We circle the sun every 365 days, so the earth moves at a staggering 67,000 miles per hour. At that rate, surely the shadow should zoom across the moon - but no, we are talking major league distances here, where time seems slower. Galaxies take millions of years to slide into other galaxies, we're witnessing events today that occurred billions of years ago in the distant reaches of the universe, so what's so unusual about an earth shadow that oozes slowly down the face of a rocky, crater-strewn moon?

Celestial events play out slowly - a month or so ago, three planets were in close proximity in the dusk's eastern sky, and stayed in proximity for a few weeks. The sun, in its daily passage, hangs at it zenith for a few minutes - allowing sailors of yore to take accurate sextant fixes of their longitude. In fact, none of these events - galaxies, planets, our sun's movement - take any longer than they should ∑ the sun moves as quickly at its zenith as it does in its nightly race below the horizon ... it's our frame of reference that lends the illusion of speed, of slowness.

We left our homes, communities, jobs, and families about 18 months ago, and expect to return home in a year or so more. Sometimes this seems like a long time to be away from everything - we're missing out on family events, graduations, medical procedures, reunions, and the usual comings and goings. Employment prospects may be more limited than had we stayed in place. On melancholy days, we feel like we've been gone a long time, that we're missing out on many important events and opportunities, that life back home is passing us by. But here, on an overcast morning, with the blue booby finally flown off in search of food, and the horizon dotted with fishing boats, the memory of a sluggish lunar eclipse reminds me that time passes more slowly than we expect; change happens less quickly than we fear. The universe moves to its own time.

More generally, the solitude of oceans keeps me in this natural frame of reference, and I am at peace knowing that what I expect is not necessarily what I see, that what I see is not necessarily what I expect, and that what I expect or see is necessarily what I will experience. An hour after the eclipse, at the beginning of my morning watch, I woke up recalling the lunar eclipse - not as darkness, but as a red-smudged shadow sliding slowly down a darkening moon, moving at the same speed as the sun's edge always moves across our earth. Dawn, sunrise, morning, on to sunset and dusk of night.

I awoke to a rising sun, comforted in the way an ocean passage returns me to a pattern of natural rhythms, of gradually-sloping ancient sea bottoms, bringing me back to days when continents were joined, as waves and swells move smoothly underneath small vessels, underneath sea birds endlessly aloft, and the ever-present stars emerging momentarily from the transient darkness occasioned by three celestial bodies aligned for a brief moment.

This morning, I accept that we'll be getting home next summer and I'm reassured that things happen at their own pace, that we are always in the right place at the right time. Our families, friends, and communities will have changed, but not dramatically. We will have changed. We're all moving at the same rate as ever before. It's a big, slow universe we inhabit, filled with passing surprises that unfold exactly when and as they will.

Indonesia Bound

After a longer-than-expected stay in Australia, ile de Grace is headed to Indonesia, via the Banda Islands, Ambon, and then the northern coast of the islands of Flores, etc., arriving in Bali by early August.

Internet access is spotty across Indonesia, but we will try and provide updates as possible.  In any event, you should be able to track our daily progress using one of the two tracking systems located on the left-hand side of the blog's webpage.

We hope our friends and family are enjoying their summer, and look forward to hearing from many of you via blog "Comments" and/or emails when we arrive in Bali.

King Henry VIII

In Vietnam, we purchased a copy of the TV series, The Tudors, chronicling the tumultuous reign of King Henry VIII, founder of the Church of England.  Having previously read Wolf Hall, the Booker Prize-winning historical novel of the King’s early reign, told through the eyes of the famous regal advisor Thomas Cromwell, I watched the series with special interest.  We spent many a night watching the King work his way through his many wives, and we gained a deeper appreciation of the founding of the Church of England.

Today, we attended the local Anglican church on Thursday Island, drawn to reports of its spirited singing.  Last week’s mass at the small Catholic Church, while noteworthy for the priest’s  courageous sermon challenging the conditions at the nearby Australian detention center for political refugees, contained little in the way of singing, so we thought we’d give the Anglicans a chance.  Here, the Catholics mostly attract the descendents of the early Portuguese divers that came for the pearl diving; the Anglicans, arriving with the London Missionary Society in the late 1800s, seem to attract the native Torres Strait islanders.  The relations between the two churches are more than cordial, a far cry from the enmity and hostility in the King's time, and, even dare I say, when the competing missionaries arrived on these shores.

The church was built around the time of a major tragedy in the Torres Strait – the sinking of the ship Quetta, and thus the church is named the All Souls St. Bartholomew Quetta Memorial Church.  A number of the ship’s relics, including life preservers and coral-encrusted portholes, are displayed inside the church.  Arriving early, we turned to the Book of Prayer, and, in the back, in King Henry's English, were listed the articles of faith of the Anglican church, reproduced as originally drafted and initially approved by the King, “his” bishops, and his council.  I was struck by one of the Articles in particular:

It is not necessary that Traditions and Ceremonies be in all places one, or utterly like; for at all times they have been divers, and may be changed according to the diversity of countries, times, and men's manners, so that nothing be ordained against God's Word.

As in many of the island churches we’ve visited during our trans-Pacific, this acknowledgement of the “divers Traditions and Ceremonies” manifested itself in the choice of musical instruments and songs.   We noticed several long drums laid out on the floor between the pews, each gaily painted and with a stretched crocodile skin as a drumhead.  Once Mass began, several of the older women began to beat the drums, as the congregation, led also by the elderly women, filled the church with strong, sharp voices.

Here, the songs were largely sung in Creole, the common language across the many island dialects of the Torres Straits.  The Bishop took his role as leader of his church seriously, and we were quickly swept up in the obvious joy and passion of these islanders.  I took the liberty of discreetly filming one of the songs, included below.

Later, we enjoyed another post-church session by Seaman Dan, and Jennifer remarked how the singing at church reminded her of the music at the Comanche reunions she used to attend during her summer childhoods in Walters, Oklahoma.  On her father’s side, Jennifer descended from Cherokee forefathers and mothers, and these summer reunions retain a special place in her memories.  In fact, there seem to be many parallels between the natives that settled America and the Pacific Islanders in their love of music as well as their cultural and spiritual attitudes.  Perhaps anyone who takes a stewardship – rather than ownership -- view of the land adopts a set of consistent values and behaviors. 

We've enjoyed our time here immensely; it has served as a useful antidote to the city-based attitudes of Cairns, where it seemed the magic of our Pacific crossing was slowly wearing off, a victim of the relentless commercialism, consumerism, and capitalism of city life in any developed country.  In a few days we leave for Indonesia, a country of 17,000+ islands, 700+ languages, and, for us, exposure to Islam.  I wonder if and how music plays a role in that "divers" country's dominant religion?  

(Surely King Henry VIII would have been at home in a religion that condones multiple wives ... as long as the man can afford more them ...  not an issue with the King!)

TI Time

There’s island time, and then there’s TI time.  We’ve been anchored off Thursday Island, known in these parts as TI, for a week now, and we’ve adjusted.  The narrow strait that lies between the northern tip of Australia and Papua New Guinea – the Torres Strait, named for the Spanish explorer Luis Valdez de Torres – is home to dozens of continental islands, coral cays, and volcanic islands, with TI being their administrative and commercial center.  It’s a tiny island, dwarfed by the larger, adjoining Horn Island, home to the converted WWII air strip that welcomes a few flights daily to and from the mainland.

Around here, most of the locals live on one of the surrounding islands, and travel to and from here in their “tinnies,” the Aussie name for the ubiquitous open-topped aluminum boats with outboard engines that ply the coral-crusted waters of the eastern shore of this island continent.   Distances are measured in cans of gas, with each can holding about 20 liters.  Yesterday, we met Norman, an old but physically imposing Torres Strait islander here for medical attention.  He cut his foot badly climbing the ladder into his tinnie after a morning of diving for lobster.  With an alarming Don King-like shock of frizzy bone-white hair, a mouth that seemed to have lost all its teeth, and accompanied by a small, scruffy mutt, he told us he came from Moa, about 2 cans away. 

Norman sat under a corrugated roof, flanked by two long-dormant rest rooms at the small beach overlooking the Horn Island ferry dock.  Earlier, waiting for Jen to return from TI on the ferry, I watched a battered yellow ferry make three trips across the channel, bumping the dock each time to discharge dozens of uniformed kids, happy to be home after their day at TI's primary school.  A few jumped on bikes that leaned, unlocked, against the crude fence that kept people on the dock, while others were picked up by parents in cars.  Most walked or skipped in pairs down the gravel-paved roads, just like kids everywhere.  One or two hung back to watch the 3 foot baby crocodile that skittered along the mud banks, snapping up small fish here and there. 

The Australian Jabiru stands over a meter tall

The tides rise and fall twice daily, revealing and then concealing vast mud banks that become the feeding grounds for birds and amphibians alike at low tide, when the water level drops about 6 feet.  We watch cranes lift their spindly legs slowly as their long bills glide mudward to snatch food from the glistening mud, as the tidal current races by just a few meters away, tugging our boat at its anchor.

We asked Norman about crocodiles; he introduced himself as the last living skipper of the traditional pearl luggers that sailed these waters for decades, a claim we could not dispute since to every appearance, he belonged at the helm of a traditional sailing boat.  He assured us that the only thing he’d ever been bitten by was the prop on his tinnie, and that, in fact, “the crocs around here are afraid of me!”  He leaned forward, held out his arm, and related how one time, he stood face-to-face with a croc just “this far away” and said “scat!”

We spent some time with Norman; he was waiting on the tide to lift his tinnie off the mud flats; having spent a few weeks in the hospital, he was discharged (one imagines against medical advice) to find a small leak in his tinnie.  Unfazed, he related how he planned to get back to diving as soon as the bandage came off, and that he needed to get back to Moa for the ‘tombstone opening’ of his father’s grave.  Traditionally in these parts, the tombstone of a deceased person is kept covered for a year after death, and then unveiled in a formal ceremony.  This morning, his boat was gone, and we wish him a safe voyage back to Moa.

Sailboats come and go in our little anchorage; the other night, we hosted four boats worth of crew for a dinner party in ile de Grace.  Freshly-caught tuna on kabobs, rice, and lots of wine and beer and the sharing of stories about passages and anchorages near and far – lovely evening, and a reminder of why we love to cruise.  Most boats are headed to Darwin, about 750 miles west of here, and the launching point for a popular sailing rally to Indonesia.  It leaves Darwin too late for us; we need to be out of Indonesia by late August in order to get to South Africa before the southern Indian Ocean cyclone season.  In one way, we’re in a hurry, compared to these sailors.  But then again, we’re happy sitting lazily at anchor here, at Thursday Island, living on TI time.

Seaman Dan

At the Torres Hotel bar, self-described as the Top Bar in Australia (its location on Thursday Island places it  at the northernmost tip of this island continent), one of the oldest surviving native pearl divers -- 83 year old Seaman Dan -- holds court Sunday afternoons after church, playing an Ibanez electric jazz guitar and singing a mix of self-written and standard favorites.  His great-grandfather sailed here from Kingston, Jamaica, via Nuie, with the London Missionary Society, evangelizing these remote islands in the interests of Christianity.  In the late 1940s, at the age of 18,  he became a shell diver -- from the late 19th century the pearl shells were more valuable than the pearls, with the world demanding fancy buttons made from the iridescent oyster shells.  Divers would descend to depths of 60-180 feet in search of the increasingly rare shells, and Seaman Dan's on-and-off diving career lasted just 7 years before the combination of fewer shells, the introduction of plastic buttons, and a case of the bends convinced him to adopt a new vocation.

Songs of the sea and the girls left behind were important moral boosters at sea, and were always a part of his life back on the island.  Somewhere along the way, Seaman Dan learned to play the guitar.  During World War II, he was exposed to the Delta Blues from African-American soldiers stationed in Cairns.  His songs and his style also reminded us of Willie Nelson's Stardust album.

Today, Sunday, fueled by a steady supply of "firewater" (his word -- we watched the bartender pour generously from the vodka bottle), he regaled the locals with songs like Island Girl, TI Blues (TI being the local's term for Thursday Island) and old favorites like Summertime from Porgy and Bess.  Though he recorded his first CD at the age of 70, he is now considered an Australian musical treasure.  We took a video of one of his songs, and also recorded him sharing a story from his diving days.  Enjoy.

(Pardon the low quality image; the internet is REALLY slow here, and we compressed to minimize upload size.)

Protein

Brother Stephen, with a large mahi-mahi

After some 150 days and nights of use, our two fishing reels were showing signs of wear.  The drag controls were difficult to adjust, so that big fish might easily swim off with all of the line, and the clutch buttons, which control whether the line goes out or in, were cantankerous.  We had caught a lot of fish on the two reels, starting in the Bahamas, and with my brother Stephen leading the way, we managed to keep our freezers stocked with fish for a good part of the first leg of our Pacific crossing.  It was time for some repairs, so while in Cairns I had the reels serviced, and now they work as good as new.  Also, we replenished our supply of fishing line, with another 400 yards of 80 pound test monofilament on board. 

We left Cairns with just a small amount of frozen chicken in our freezer and a dozen cans of black beans, so we need to fish to supplement our protein stocks.  We don’t fish for sport; we fish for food.  Thus, the 80 pound test line – no need for the thrill of working a fish to the boat on light tackle, letting it run and reeling when the fish turns to the boat or tires.  No, for us, it’s just a question of how efficiently we can haul dinner to the back edge of the boat.

Nonetheless, there’s a certain thrill in hearing the buzzed clicking made when the line starts to run out, the hook on the end embedded in an unknown fish’s mouth.  We can’t easily and don’t often try to slow the boat down when we have a fish on the line, and our routine is just that by now.  I strip down, Jennifer gets the gaff ready (a semi-circular sharp hook on the end of a sturdy rod that is used to grab – impale is the more accurate description – the fish when it is alongside the boat), and I reel the fish in, often requiring considerable strength and endurance to overcome the fish’s natural reluctance to be pulled against its will.

Once aboard, I get intimate with our future meals in a way that forces me to appreciate the essential “fishness” of the fish.  Lately, we’ve been catching tuna; for awhile it was mahi-mahi.  The tuna is all muscle, and resembles in no small way a torpedo with a slim head, narrow tail, and a massive hunk of deep red muscle meat in between.  The one we caught the other day was a full 3 feet long, and its strength, first in resisting being reeled in, and then in fighting our efforts to land it onto the stern, was a reminder that these fish we catch for food are, however motivated, driven to live.

Tuna steaks and filets,from a small tuna

So it is with some misgiving that, once landed, I attend to our protein needs (and desires, I suppose, since it is possible to be a vegetarian ocean sailor).   I kill, gut, and fillet the fish for subsequent consumption.  We don’t catch and release on ile de Grace for the simple reason that we don’t fish unless we need the meat.  So every catch requires a kill, and it’s an action worth reflecting on, this taking of an animal’s life.

They say that anyone who ever visits a meatpacking plant becomes an immediate vegetarian, and that anyone who contemplates seriously the oneness of the universe, and appreciates the connectedness of all things with beating hearts cannot, in good and complete conscience, kill an animal for any purpose.  To me, I think the lines we draw between plant and animal, between mammal and insect, between the one-celled organism and a complex life form can, from the perspective of an unseeing life force (or God if you will), who gives life to all of these entities, can seem a bit presumptuous and self-serving. So if we have an imperative to sustain ourselves, it may be that the moral distinctions we draw as humans ... between vegetable and animal, between fish and meat, between dairy and non-dairy ... are perhaps less meaningful than might meet an all-seeing eye.   (Of course, I am well aware of the efficiency arguments against meats, which required many times the energy and protein to create a mass of animal protein -- that strikes me as a more compelling rationale to favor more efficiently-produced forms of protein.)

The concept of sentience as a discriminating characteristic seems amorphous; who are we to understand the “thought processes” of non-human life forms?  For me, here, on this boat sailing around the world, attuned closely to the daily rhythms of nature, I try to behave with a sense of profound respect, self-aware purpose,  and gratitude for the gifts of these millennia of evolution.  In matters large and small, we make judgments as to how we treat the ecosystem around us. We pass sea water through our watermaker, and strain out microorganisms.  We fish only until our protein needs are met.  We rely on the wind as much as possible for our propulsion.  We anchor over sand, and avoid fragile coral.  We collect only washed-up sea shells.  We support local vendors.

One of my favorite authors, David Quammen, writes of his own ambivalent feelings when he was a trout fishing guide in Montana, and writes that as often as he practiced “catch-and-release,” he feels an obligation to kill a fish now and then. In his words:  “(o)therwise, he can too easily delude himself that fly fishing is merely a game, a dance of love, played in mutual volition and mutual empathy by the fisherman and the trout. … For them it not a game, and certainly not a dance.”  I don’t fish for sport – even if I could justify it intellectually, the thought of fishing makes me tremble with prospective boredom. 

But fishing for food – that’s a vocation I try to undertake with self-awareness as to its purpose and effect, and with respect.   But achieving an intimate awareness of the ecological and moral cost of our need and desire for animal protein does not come easily.  Quammen recalls a scene from an early Faulkner short story, "The Old People," where the blood from a fresh-killed deer is smeared on the hunter's face, and the hunter later reflects:“I slew you; my bearing must not shame your quitting life.  My conduct for ever onward must become your death.”

Powerful words, and words I recalled today as we pulled up to the dock here at Thursday Island alongside a Torres Strait Islander whose forefathers have lived and fished these waters for millennia.  As part of their cultural prerogatives, they are exempt from fishery regulations that otherwise forbid the capture and killing of the magnificent green sea turtles that breed here by the thousands.  In the foredeck of his Boston Whaler, freshly captured, lay a sea turtle, trussed and secured to the floor, easily five feet long and three feet wide.  I spent some time with them – Alex, Gordon, and their mates, and learned that the turtle was caught a few hours earlier, on their trip over from their traditional village on the mainland, and would, once killed and dressed, feed three families for a week.  In the words of one, “When we need more food, we go and catch more turtles.”  Considering my response to this turtle's plight, I was forced to juxtapose the morality of their capture of a robust but ecologically vulnerable species – the green turtle -- and my capture of a robust but (less) ecologically vulnerable species – the tuna.

Even if the shrimp fishermen of the Great Barrier Reef kill thousands of turtles by accident in their nets, the proximity and immediacy of this act of protein capture was a bit unsettling, and led to me reflect further on my own practices when it comes to food.  For the most part, these descendents of the original inhabitants of these waters exercise their rights and privileges to harvest food from the sea in a responsible fashion, and their traditional practices recall other native peoples from other parts of the world harpooning whales, killing seals, and catching salmon – both in substance and in resulting controversy. 

I can only hope and expect that in catching and killing these paddling creatures, each to my mind no more or less amazing than a 3 foot tuna caught off the back of my modern sailing boat, that they too resolve that my bearing must not shame your quitting life.  My conduct for ever onward must become your death.

*************************************

For more reading, try any of David Quammen’s books, especially Monster of God, a detailed examination of mankind’s hostile and ecologically perilous infatuation with the largest man-attacking predators on earth, the tiger, the crocodile, the bear, and the lion.  The essay referenced above comes from Quammen’s book, Wild Thoughts from Wild Places.  For a sobering assessment of the impact of our need for, and efforts to expand the supply of, sea-based protein, see Paul Greenberg's mesmerizing Four Fish.

A Few Administrative Notes

At the risk of telling our faithful readers what they already know, we've added a few features to our blog in the form of options down the left hand side of the screen:

• You can now sign up to get our latest posts sent directly to your email address, making it easier to keep track of our voyage.  It's easy and reliable, and the email includes the post's pictures.

• You can also help spread the word on Facebook, using the clearly-labeled icon on the left. We appreciate any "sharing" you might do; the more the merrier!

• You can track our progress in two ways, by clicking on either the first or last "Link."  The first animates our entire trip to date; the last displays recent position updates and a short descriptor of the latest port or passage.  We try and update these daily while sailing -- no real updates when we sit in one place.

We love comments to our blog -- it gives us the energy to maintain the blog, so please feel free to comment.  If you want to contact us directly, include your email address in the comment, and we will NOT publish it, but, instead, will email you directly from our email address.  We try and avoid posting email addresses on the blog since spamsters are always trolling for new addresses to harass.

That's it -- be well everyone, and we hope to see more Facebook "shares" and more visits to our position trackers and more comments!

Crossings and Passages

Cape Tribulation

As we made our way north from Cairns, on our way to the tip of Australia and then to Indonesia, we made a series of day and overnite sails, and I was struck by the way sailors talk of passages and crossings as they describe their voyages. Typically, a passage is any multi-day trip between ports, and a crossing is when one, yes, crosses a major body of water. Thus, Jennifer can be said to have two “crossings” under her belt, since she has sailed across both the Atlantic and Pacific oceans. Together, she and I have undertaken many “passages,” notably the 3000 nm trip from Galapagos to the Marquesas. On our northing, we undertook a few shorter, land-based passages and crossings, which reminded us of three ever-present features of the Coral Coast, as this part of Australia is known: Captain Cook, the exuberance of nature, and the wildness of this coastal terrain.

Boulder hills at Bathurst Bay

As we sailed along the desolate and rocky Northern Queensland coast over the last week or so, we headed northward into a steadily compressing area of water between the mainland and the world’s largest living organism: the Great Barrier Reef (GBR). In 1770, Captain Cook, whose voyages, passages, and crossings we have been tracking ever since we reached Tahiti, sailed these waters as well, and found himself inside the GBR headed north, as we did. Unlike us, he lacked charts, GPS, and depth soundings. In fact, Cook realized only very late that he was inside the reef, as he began sailing along the coast in Sydney, in what he named Botany Bay, and, hugging the coast as he sailed north, Cook was largely unaware of the Reef’s existence. He sailed north oblivious to the reef’s gradual westing, steadily squeezing his ship between the land and the treacherous shoals.

Keepin' Cool with 12v fan and Icey Pops

By the time we reached Cape Tribulation, the inner reef had narrowed significantly, and we were happy to rely on modern charts, our GPS, and the depth sounder. Left, you can see that one of the crew benefited from her own personal fan, while enjoying a frozen fruit juice stick. Clearly, Cook had it rough, even without considering the navigational challenges on sailing inside the reef.

Later, we’d hear a fisherman say that north of here, “the paddock gets smaller.” Increasingly, the passes between the massive inner reef, which covers 2000 km of the northeastern Australian coast, and the adjoining ocean become few and far between. Back in 1770, Captain Cook’s luck finally ran out, and his ship, the Endeavor, struck a reef which now bears its name. He spent the next six months in repairs, and then began to feel his way out of the GBR, stopping at a small hilly island from which to examine ways out of the “paddock.”

We stopped at this island on our way north, named Lizard Island by Cook after the many 3-foot reptiles that inhabit the island. It’s a lovely place, with a resort and a separate, well-protected bay for the cruisers that visit during the winter dry season when the trade winds blow steadily. We took an afternoon to cross the island’s ridge to the 1110 foot “Cook’s Look.”

Watson's Bay, Lizard Island

It was a steep walk, and we managed to keep an eye on our boat as we climbed – we’re the catamaran in the foreground. You can see the reefs that curl into the bay; we spent the prior day snorkeling, and were astounded at the number and size of the clams in the reef. These were the same clams that Jennifer harvested, cleaned, cooked, and ate while we were in Manihi (see this post), but here, the protection of the national park that surrounds Lizard Island led to the surreal underwater sight of clams easily 4 feet in diameter, surrounded by sea anemones that were equally outsized – some approaching 8 feet in diameter. Nature, unchecked, can generate astonishment.

From the top of Cook’s Look, we could easily see the several narrow passes that gave the Endeavor safe passage out of the GBR, and we came to appreciate more fully the nature of early sailors’ challenges in navigating new waters. This will be the last we see of Captain Cook’s historic voyages; Captain Bligh, of Mutiny on the Bounty fame, explored the northernmost waters of Australia.

A few days later, we found ourselves anchored at Cape Grenville, in Margaret Bay. We had heard from the same fisherman who warned us of the shrinking paddock that there was a path through the headland to a southern, windward shore that was great for beachcombing. We were a bit apprehensive to go ashore, since these waters and shorelines are filled with salt-water crocodiles; our rubber dinghy would be no match for these creatures, and walking ashore has its own risks, obviously. However, we were lucky to be anchored next to a couple, Tony and Chris, who also wanted to cross the headland, and had more experience in traversing Australian bush (they also had an aluminum dinghy, which Aussies, in their inimitable slang, call a “tinny.”)

Tony (center) and I carried a long stick, and Chris (right) slung a baseball bat over her shoulder, and, thus armed, we made our way across a mile of swampy overgrown bush, our sticks probing the tall grass to scare off any snakes. On the way, we saw some quintessential sights, including some lovely blossoms and the common termite mounds.

Crossing Cape Grenville; termite mound, with Tony on left.

Crossing Cape Grenville; lovely blue lotus flower in swamp

Cape Grenville; blooming shrub

Once on the southern shore, we encountered the usual evidence of man’s presence: thousands of pieces of plastic – flipflops, bottles, fish buoys, polypropylene line – as well as the detritus of nature: logs, coconuts, shells, vines. It is so disheartening to witness huge amounts of plastic wash up from the ocean. We brought a bag for such trash, as we usually do when we go ashore, but the amount here would have filled several large dumpsters. We walked along the mangroves, picking our way through the branches, keeping our eye out for “salties,” as the crocs here are called. It was a lovely “crossing,” and after a post-hike rest, we hosted Tony and Chris for dinner on ile de Grace, serving barbecued fresh tuna, caught the day before on our way north.

The following day, we left Margaret Bay in 25 knots of southeasterly wind, and, under a reefed jib, said goodbye to our new friends Tony and Chris, who were taking 6 months off from their jobs in public health to sail the Coral Coast. Not twenty minutes later, the fishing tackle began to bend, and I stripped down (cleaning fish is a messy business, so forgive the garb), and hauled in a massive tuna – measured at 36 inches, which will provide us with at least 6 dinners … our freezer is now full, so no more fishing for a while.

Up here, in these rarely-travelled and clean waters, the reef is rich in fish and shrimp. Solitary fishing boats ply these waters by day (fish) and night (shrimp), and spend weeks filling their holds before steaming south to Cairns to sell their catch. For provisioning, they rely on the “barge,” a grocery store of sorts, that sails up and down the far north Queensland coast on a regular schedule, delivering fuel, water, and supplies to these solitary hunters. In fact, our friends Tony and Chris also have an account with the “barge,” and can make a call to the Woolworth’s grocery chain in Cairns, order a bit of this and that, and ask that it be delivered to the “barge.” Two or three days later, the order appears on a barge anchored in a convenient cove.

Yesterday, we arrived at Thursday Island, the northernmost port in Australia and just a handful of miles south of Papua New Guinea. The tidal currents here are extreme, as tides from the Coral Sea meet tides from the Arafura Sea, and we anchored in a 3 knot current and spent the night alert to the possibility of our anchor giving way, as the currents swing back and forth, streaming past at 3-4 knots. Happily, it was a quiet night, but when we woke this morning we were once again reminded that we were in an alien environment: a 5 meter “saltie” out for its morning swim just 30 meters from our boat. Keep your arms and legs inside the ride at all times!

It was a lovely sail north, with a few overnight passages, and several “crossings,” and after a week of some domestic business, we’ll leave for Indonesia.

At anchor, looking aft from our main cabin/salon