Goodbye, Asia! (Yes, Kitty's still alive)

The update drought has finally ended...at least for the moment. I'm going to commit the atrocity of omitting about five months' worth of experiences, including Malaysia and Indonesia, from this already patchy narrative. Apologies abound, but what can I say? Ship to maintain, watches to run, reefs to study, islands to explore, people to meet...

I'll pick up at the end of our Southeast Asian leg, when we left on the voyage to Papua New Guinea. The following is an account of the voyage that ensued.

~~~~~~~~~~~~

Sealog

Ambon, Indonesia to Alotau, PNG

11 March - 6 April

2000 nautical miles

11 March

Rainy, gray morning to start the voyage. On the 8-12 watch...the best for a normal sleeping schedule. The day looks better than yesterday, though--dragged anchor in 30 kn winds yesterday evening. Time to get out of Ambon, genuine hell-hole of the world. Indonesia, though, has been a truly remarkable time.

15 March

These are the doldrums...flat calm ocean, no wind. They did, however, afford the opportunity for swim stops yesterday and today. They say meeting a shark in blue water is a rare experience, and though I didn't meet a shark (thank goodness), I saw something that was probably about as rare. Yesterday about two minutes after I jumped in I spotted a manta ray floating gracefully towards me. It wasn't very big--maybe 3-4 feet across, but it was beautiful. I was up near the bow while most folks were back at the stern. The ray slowly came towards me, a couple feet under the surface. I stayed as motionless as possible, but unfortunately by then some other people saw and started swimming and splashing noisily towards me, and the manta gracefully turned, swooped under the ship and disappeared into the deep blue distance. They are intriguing creatures, indeed.

18 March

A couple days ago we spent several hours drifting on a flat calm ocean. On a whim, I decided to drop my hydrophone into the water and listen while sitting on the bow watching the sunset. Most of what you hear underwater is a cacophony of clicking and crackling, made, I think, by many tiny reef organisms (we were drifting a couple miles off a reef patch). After about 20 minutes or so of getting used to this soundscape, I heard something different, below all the crackling. It sounded a bit like a foghorn echoing underwater from far away, but I'm sure it was a whale. For the next hour and a half or so I listened to this sound get closer, then farther away, then become more frequent after sunset. At one point I heard two sounds, slightly different pitches, at the same time!

That night the wind picked up and we were able to sail for several hours. Shortly before 2300 a pod of around 20 dolphins surrounded the ship. The night was cloudy and, consequently, completely dark, but blue, pink and white biolumninescence filled the water churned up by our bow wave as well as the trails of the dolphins. Not only would we hear the dolphins blow, we'd see their paths illuminated underwater and their black outlines silhouetted when they leaped out of the water, riding the bow wave of swirling bioluminescence.

21 March

It's equinox, and a great excuse for a party on the sea! What do you do for a party at sea, you ask? Let's turn the beautiful pilothouse polished wooden floor into a ping-pong court, construct a few paddles, string up a "net", and hold a floor pong tournament! And at the same time, we can get several computers up and running with pinball, and the highest scores at the end of the day play in the finals up on the big screen--cool! (And it hasn't even been two weeks at sea...sigh...but it was actually a really fun afternoon--really!)

24 March

Swells overpowered light wind, sending the big jib crashing in and out against the shrouds. Decided to switch out the big jib for a smaller one, reasoning that the smaller one, lighter and not wide enough to reach aft to the shrouds, might stay out better under these conditions. Success! Crashing wear and tear on the sail minimized and frazzled nerves from crew somewhat alleviated.

25 March

The Sea, our great master, accepts no bad art. Today, without warning, the mizzensail came crashing down. The culprit? A halyard line completely chaffed through. Nobody was hurt, and the sail is fine, but we're one halyard down and in a bit of a tough situation with no easy way to restore the mizzensail to functional.

You see, the halyards run up through the mast, along with a bunch of disused electrical cables, so we can't actually see what the line chaffed on inside there. Eibes worked out where the chaffe occurred, and suspects it was either that the line somehow became entangled in the cables with all the rocking back and forth we've had on this voyage (it's been very swelly) and the cables sort of sawed through it, or, it's possible that a couple bolts are sticking out on the inside of the mast from the lazy jack blocks that are bolted on the outside of the mast. Either way, we have to try and eliminate all possibilities, because of course, it's just going to happen again when we replace the halyard.

As is, though, we're sailing without the mizzen. It works remarkably well, though, considering the mizzen and the jib are the two most critical sails for balancing the ship. We still managed nine knots when a force five sqall blew over this afternoon.

27 March

Wow, long time. I think this officially marks the longest I've been at sea. Tomorrow we're scheduled to arrive in Hermit Island, PNG--making a two-day stop both as a diversion (Heraclitus went there several times) and a necessary place to make repairs.

28 March

Today I felt how fragile our existence here on the sea really is. Cloudy, stormy day; wind picked up to force six at the last part of my watch. Couldn't make it to Hermit, of course; anchoring was not a possibility. Sails straining and puckering to their limits, holding breath with each gust, gazing up at the shuddering rigging. Waves splashed up over the pilothouse, a couple crashing full force on the windows. Imagine 500 garden hoses spraying full blast straight at you, and you get the idea. And the swells, we're talking 12-15 footers. They roll towards the ship, towering over you standing on the aft deck, then send the stern rocketing upwards into the sky as they send the ship reeling. Those are the benign ones. Take them on the beam and they spell near disaster, as we found--threw the ship over on its side, tossing even the most carefully shipshaped items across rooms. Water from wayward waves burst through every conceivable crack and cranny in the ship--through hatches, air vents, you name it.

Spent a chilly hour gripping the railing on starboard side, watching the wind for the helmsman in torrential rain and gusting wind. Every now and again a wave would splash up over the deck and wash over my head, the seawater much warmer than the ambient temperature. They actually made for welcome relief from the cold.
Watch change...now on the 12-4--the dog watch.

29 March

Weather's calmer...sea reflects a dark gray/moss green color. Day is cloudy but bright.
By evening, we know something's brewing again. Giant electric storm lighting up the sky high in the clouds is visible ahead of us for four hours before it hits. Eerily light breezes keep us moving. Rain starts at about 2300 hrs--sheets of it. By midnight, no wind, plenty rain. We're in for a soggy four-hour watch.

30 March

This morning gray, calm and still--a welcome relief from the roller-coaster weather ride we've been on for the last three days.

In the distance, floating in our patch ahead, appeared a small local boat. As we motored closer,we could see the boat was loaded to the gills with people, hanging off the sides as well as covering the roof of the pilothouse. They waved to us, not just with arms but with t-shirts and pieces of material or rags--wanted us to stop and talk. Shark finning? We've met plenty of these boats around PNG before. Fishing? Why would they call us over?

They're in trouble. Engine won't start, need help. So many faces--maybe 20?--looking at us from this tiny rusting wobbly boat scarcely 1/4th the size of Infinity.

Zodiac down in the water, engineer and a couple others from our boat drive over to see if they can help. They come back with the story about an hour later. These people have been stranded, drifting, for two weeks. There are 43 of them, men, women, children, and even an infant-in-arms. They're from one of the outlying islands and were headed back to their island from the mainland after a shopping trip to one of the larger cities. This made their luck--because they had just stocked up on food to bring back with them, they had not gone hungry during the two weeks. They had, however, gone three days without fresh water at some point (though this is where the stormy weather--however awful--had been a blessing bringing rain).
The captain of the boat and most of the crew had evidently left in a small boat to go for help a number of days ago. The boat's two-way radio had died early on, but through an AM/FM radio they've heard that a search is underway and an advisory out for boats in the area to be on the lookout for them. A few days ago they heard a small plane circling above them. They tried to signal, but the crummy weather must have prevented them from being seen. Also, they're a tiny speck on the sea--it was only by pure chance that we passed within half a mile, close enough to see that they were in distress. More recently, over the radio they've heard that they've been declared lost at sea and given up for dead.

Whoa. What to do? In the distance is a passing container ship--one of these monsters visible from ten miles away. We radio them and ask if they can help us contact the nearest port or some authority that could send help. The voice on the other end is Asian, perhaps Korean, and doesn't understand English so well. We finally make it clear that we are giving them the position of a boat in distress and need help. The cargo ship is, actually, aware of the advisory out on the missing local boat, and they seem to understand we've found them. They've been getting closer and closer to us, seem to be coming our way. Do you see us? We're the sailing ship just off your port bow drifting with a local boat, and we need help.

We don't see you, we don't see you. Uh, sorry.

After a bit more talk we ask the name of the cargo ship. The radio goes silent. Hello? Cargo ship in the Vitiaz Straight, cargo ship in the Vitiaz Straight this is the Sailing Vessel Infinity, Sailing Vessel Infinity, do you copy, over? By now they're passing us within three miles--no way they can't see us or hear us on the radio, especially since they know, without a doubt, the urgency of our situation. To turn your back on a vessel in distress is the worst possible offence in maritime law, to say nothing of the moral implications. Unfortunately, however, small local boats like this one go missing fairly frequently in this part of the world, and for a billion-dollar cargo ship on a tight shipping schedule to dilly-dally around helping such a boat would, well, mess up their schedule. By now they've passed us and are disappearing off into the distance. Nothing more heard from them.

Right. By now, four of the guys from the local boat are on board down in engine room, working with our engineer on their starting motor. We've got four of their batteries hooked up to our chargers and still trying to figure out how to proceed. We've given them water, more food that they've asked for and some medical supplies. A couple hours later we see another cargo ship in the distance and, again, try to contact them. This time a Chinese voice comes over the radio, and asks us how they can help. Within half an hour, this cargo ship has contacted the maritime authorities in Port Moresby on our behalf and told them our position and situation. They'll be sending a rescue tug out this evening. All right!

The afternoon stretches on, beautifully calm and sunny as we haven't seen for several days, as we drift next to this boatload of visibly exhausted people. What they must have been through I can't even imagine. There is no cheering or jubilant celebration but tangible relief radiating from their wide smiles as they gaze at us, and us at them, across the water.

A small plane approaches, then circles three times, each time lower and lower until we can see the pilot. The plane flashes its lights; they've seen us.

Batteries now charged, and now some progress made on the starting motor, so they're heading back to their boat to try the engine again. We wait and watch. Hvraah-rooom! and a big cloud of exhaust shoots out the side the the small boat. Engine started! Yeah!

Their engine's now running, but even so we suggest that they stay in the same spot and wait for the rescue tug, in case the engine goes again. We'll stay with them to make sure the tug shows up. By now it is dark, and we've been drifting with this boat for 10 hours.

I didn't stay awake to see the farewell scene; had to get some sleep before watch. By the time I was up at midnight, though, we were motoring away, the red and white vertical lights of the tug growing smaller and smaller behind us. It had showed up at 2330 and was now towing the boat to Madang. These people's ordeal would soon be over, and we were back on our way.

1 April

Midnight watch began with ominous clouds, and by 0200 rain looked imminent. I'd just finished the hourly checks when a strange knocking noise started in engine room. Rushed down, room filled with hazy exhaust. Down into idle neutral, get Carol (engineer). Not good. Engine off. Rain begins. Drifting with a 2kn current back towards the Vitiaz Straight. Again, not good. When engine doesn't work, go to other propulsion system--one that is far older than diesel power--wind power. Sails up, but light wind and lack of mizzensail make a decent course impossible against the current. Downpour steadily getting stronger as more clouds approach.

Wind momentarily dies, then shifts without warning; we tack. While sorting out the sails, wind abruptly jumps 180 degrees and we gybe, and then again, as the wind continues to dance around the compass. Quite the maneuvering practice for my watch--I'm trying to helm by the ever-changing wind while directing Matt and Riley in sorting out the jib sheets. Another 15 minutes of mickey mousing around and the worst seems past; we can steer a constant course again through the steady rain.

But what about the engine?

2 April

It's an exhaust pipe problem--bolts holding pipe to engine have broken. They'll have to be replaced, along with a couple gaskets. Carol and Eibes are on the case.

Another oceanic hawksbill turtle appears at the stern, accompanied by a school of triggerfish. This is the third of the voyage that has done the same--hanging around back there for a ride? This one pops its head up now and again, lazily floating inches from the back of the sugarscoop.

I'm recruited to cut new gaskets...woo-hoo, engineering team for a day! By afternoon the pipe is ready to be fitted back and bolted to the engine--no small task. Think several hundred pound pipe, sort of a U-shape with a tail pipe coming off the middle of the U, and both arms of the U must fit, exactly, to the pipes on the engine, itself. Four of us struggle for three hours trying to lift, push, and pull the pipes into place so we can fit new bolts through. A few bruises, brushes with nasty fibreglass, and well-placed mechanical huggers/straps later, we have it bolted back to the engine. Test the engine, and no knocking sound! Good day's work!

3 April

My heart stops. Tsunami? Gizo? No, must have been a bad crackling of the radio that made me hear that. It's 0100 and I'm tuning into the BBC, but I can't believe what I'm hearing. Epicenter 50km away from Gizo, Western Province, Solomon Islands.

The satellite phone rings. Call from LA, giving us the same news we've just picked up on the radio. Are we ok? Sure--haven't felt anything out here, miles from land. Where are we? We are...across the Solomon Sea, directly, from Gizo--about 300 miles away.

But we're not so worried about our own situation--we're pretty safe. All thoughts are on Gizo and the friends we have there. Almost exactly one year ago we were there--it was the third or fourth time for Heraclitus--anchored just off Mbambanga, a tiny flat island a couple miles away from Gizo, where we know the village well. Radio reports state that some people had enough warning to climb to higher ground, but these people would have had no place to go...
And, of course, Eddie's family...

(Over the next couple days we heard that Gizo town was flattened, but one of the worst hit places in the region was the island of Simbo, south of Gizo, right near the epicenter, where at least half of the confirmed deaths occurred. Simbo is the home island of Eddie Zuna, who sailed on Heraclitus for four and a half years, and was second mate when I joined. Last year was the first time Eddie had been home since leaving to sail with Heraclitus. We joined his family and village in a huge celebration of his return. Currently, Eddie is not in the Solomon Islands, he's out at sea on Heraclitus. The distance probably only makes things worse for him, though.)

The Milne Bay region of PNG gets some press, as five people were swept out to sea in the tidal wave. They lived in the Rossel Islands, at the eastern tip of the archipelago, where we spent two weeks last year getting ready for the voyage to Australia. For now we're not headed out there--we're going inside Milne Bay, to Alotau, but who knows what we'll find when we arrive?

PCRF on AsiaOne

In Singapore some folks from an internet magazine came onboard and did a short video on us...check out the link (click on the title of this post) if you'd like to see Infinity (and me!) in Singapore.

(You have to wait through an annoying car ad to see the video.)

Singapore

Six months ago, I had decided Singapore would be my final stop with PCRF. Heraclitus was due there for a drydock in August 2007, and, after completing drydock, this was to be my point of departure.

Little did I imagine I'd be there before the end of 2006, however, participating in a drydock-like experience on a whole new ship! Well, I can now say I've been there and done that (but Singapore, obviously, is no longer my point of departure, at least not this year). Infinity never physically came out of the water (validating the "dry" in "drydock"), but the work we put into her rivaled what, I'm told, goes on during the genuine experience.

And what an experience it was...from removing and cleaning seized turnbuckles (how many crewmembers does it take to loosen a turnbuckle? Would you believe up to six?), replacing all the shrouds (that's about 20 steel cables, ranging in length from around 30 to 120 feet), onloading and storing an outfit of safety equipment (liferaft, fire extinguishers, lifejackets), installing a brand-factory-new generator, modifying the anchor winch, bringing our new dive compressor up to speed and a host of other engineering/electrical/plumbing projects...the worklist goes on (and on, and on).

All ship's work and no play was not the full-time tune of our four-week stay in Singapore, however. In fact, I've never been with PCRF during another time when we hosted so many events (ok, parties) onboard...not just becuase we like to have a good time but because we were extremely fortunate to have many generous people and companies sponsor us, donating goods like previously-mentioned, brand-factory-new generator, outfit of safety equipment, all-new shrouds, etc, etc. Even our docking fees were donated, as we were hosted and sponsored by Raffles Marina (which, I'll mention, is now the official home port of PCRF due to a long-standing relationship). We held open houses (well, "open ships"), cocktail parties, movie screenings, tours, school-group presentations, all events connecting us with more and more people interested in what we're doing.

As has happened in past ports, I left Singapore with tremendous respect for people and cultures I previously knew nothing about. During our stay I came to know top brass in energy companies, liquid petroleum gas tanker and oil drilling rig captains, superyacht officers, commercial shipyard managers, and other driving forces behind Singapore's shipping and marine industry. Not the kind of folks who are enthusiastic about saving coral reefs, right? Wrong. These people and their stories demolished plenty of my own illusions about worlds I never bothered or had the opportunity to investigate beyond superficial stereotypes. These were the people donating goods, expertise and advice to our expedition, and they gave us overwhelming support and good wishes for our endeavours. Again, the window of my perception grew a little wider thanks to these people.

Despite the continued support and enthusiasm from the folks we met in Singapore, after four weeks it was time to move on. So we did...on to Pulau Tioman, Malaysia, where we'll be until mid-November. Infinity will be back in Singapore at Raffles Marina, though, in two years' time. Will I be back? I really can't say...

Pictures of Infinity

View forward looking across the main meeting room.




View across the main meeting room towards the galley.



The fo'c'sle before it became a storage area/dump site


"Paradise"...view from the student dorm room looking forward into the fo'c'sle.

Infinty: under construction!

We reached Infinity...and it's under construction.

A bit of an introduction: the owner of the ship, Clemens, has spent the past three months here remodelling the entire inside. With a team of five Thai carpenters he's been building new bunks, and cabins, putting in new showers/sinks/heads, redoing cabinetry and installing all new inlaid-wood flooring. Impressive? You bet--this place is going to look grand when it's finished--but it's not quite there yet.

When we arrived on the ship a thick blanket of sawdust covered absolutely EVERYTHING inside. Piles of lumber and wood debris, power tools, extension cords, and all sorts of other construction mishmash filled just about every square inch of floor space of every room, cabin, and storage space. Hmmm...going to take a bit of work before we can live here.

Circumstances as they were, we rented a house just off the beach near the ship to sleep, as the construction zone wasn't the greatest place to put 12 newly-arrived people plus luggage. Right to work we went, sanding floors and woodwork, caulking corners, priming, painting, varnishing, sealing, and otherwise finishing the interior carpentry work in the main living areas so we could move in. (The Thai carpenters completed the rough woodwork, and our crew jumped in on the finishing stages.) A week and a half later two of the living spaces are completely finished (well, except for a new ceiling, which will come later), the cabins are all inhabitable (though still needing sanding, varnishing, painting, which will come in the next few weeks), the galley is almost usable (we're still eating Thai take-out every lunch and dinner--mmmm, spicy food!), and the main meeting space/room is mostly finished and usable. Beginning to look like home!

What's next? Continuing on the sanding/varnishing/painting front, plenty of plumbing to complete, becoming familiar with systems (generator, power, main engine, etc.) and sailing of the ship, and a few exterior construction projects. We'll probably leave Thailand in a couple weeks, bound for Singapore, where we'll reunite with a shipping container full of goods from our old ship. Until then, though, Phuket is not a bad spot to live and work, at all! (Pretty darn ideal, actually--quiet bay, beautiful tropical sunsets, great swimming straight off the ship, delicious food, cheap prices, the list goes on!)

Tally ho,
Kitty