Adrift Part 2
1981
At dawn and dusk I looked for land, even though no land could possibly be near. And during the day I looked for ships, even though we were far from shipping lanes. I do not pretend that I would not have welcomed rescue, but I was being compelled to live up to my admonition to save myself, to rely on no one. For the present the wisest action was no action. Enforced passivity is one of the great facts of being adrift. Uncertainty about duration is another. At any moment a ship could appear; or I could drift for months, slowly dying.
On this morning, Tuesday, May 20, the tenth day of living in the nine-foot inflatable, there were not even any good imitation cloud islands in sight. For more than an hour I sat on the side of the dinghy, more comfortable than when I was lying on the now saturated and rock-hard clothes bags in the bottom, which still was better than lying in the permanent pool of water beneath them. I had nothing new to look at, nothing new to think, nothing to read. The sun rose steadily; waves slopped over CHIDIOCK one hundred feet to windward; the wind blew at fifteen knots from the east-southeast; we continued to drifting west-northwest at about one knot. Everything was as it had been the day before, and the day before that. Ironically, good weather settled in two days after the swamping, and we were missing fine sailing. I knew that if this wind carried all the way to Port Moresby, CHIDIOCK would have made her fastest passage ever.
I had had more than ample time to consider what we had struck and was reasonably certain that it was inanimate rather than animate. Great flukes towering over me would be a good but untrue story. No, it had been a log or tree or, as I was inclined to believe, a container washed from a ship. CHIDIOCK’s hull was unmarked, but with a draft of only ten inches that was to be expected. Only the centerboard had hit, and it had not sustained serious damage.
I glanced at my watch. 9:07. I could wait no longer. Time for the big event of the day.
Sitting down on the yellow plastic clothes bags, I studied the waves. They were only three feet high and rarely coming aboard, but I was acutely aware that whenever I opened the three layers of plastic bags protecting the ship’s stores, I was risking a month of life. Quickly I grabbed a handful of broken cabin crackers and the jar of raspberry jam, the joy of my existence.
Long ago the sea imposed on me the habit of eating fast. Aboard CHIDIOCK it was a matter of getting the food in my mouth before a wave ruined it. But being adrift effected a cure. I chewed each crumb slowly, completely, and those big enough to dip into the jam, even more slowly and more completely. I loved that jam so much that I could not bring myself to ration it. When it was gone, it was gone--probably in ten more days.
The last cracker crumbs eaten, I could not resist one last finger full of jam. I licked my finger clean before reluctantly returning the jar to the food bag. I waited a few more minutes before lifting the water container for my two morning sips. Sips, not mouthfuls, though occasionally the dinghy jostled when the container was to my lips and I swallowed more than intended. I was angry when this happened. I did not want to cheat. Jam was one thing, water quite another. As never before, I realized that the problem with the world’s resources is distribution. A few too large sips meant a lost day of my carefully measured life. I might reach land in a few more days or weeks. A ship might appear at any minute. But if not, I intended to be alive a long, if miserable, time. A minimum of sixty days, ninety or a hundred or more if I was able to catch rain.
On May 17, the first day I made any notes after the pitchpole, I wrote, “I will be alive in July. But June is going to be a long month.” Two sips of water and two sips only. Each held in the mouth, savored, swished about, swallowed. They were gone. The long day loomed before me.
I tied down the water container and covered it with a corner of the tarp. There were three quarts of water left in that container, rainwater I caught by spreading the tarp between my feet and shoulders during a brief squall--a lovely few minutes.
We had not had much rain. Only that one squall was catchable, combining heavy rainfall with an absence of breaking waves that would spoil the water before I could scoop it up with a jar lid. In that squall I caught almost a full gallon of fresh water, in addition to drinking my fill. Another change: when sailing, I used to dodge squalls. Now I dreamed of them. I also dreamed of fountains and running water faucets and iced tea and drinking from a hose on a hot summer’s day, and worst of all, of the half-full pitcher of Chapman’s I left at the Royal Suva Yacht Club. I found that incredible. How could I possibly have done such a thing? I vowed I would never again leave a drink undrunk. And then I realized that I might never again have the opportunity.
When I left Suva on May 7, I had twenty-one gallons of water aboard CHIDIOCK; when I settled into life aboard the inflatable on May 11, I had two and a half gallons. Six gallons were lost the first night out, five gallons on the night of the pitchpole. At a generous estimate, I drank a gallon and a half between May 7 and 11. I could not help but wonder at such extravagance: had I ever really used half a gallon of water a day? That left six and a half gallons unaccounted for. I did not even bother to calculate how long I could live with that extra water: for practical purposes, forever.
Despite my meager diet, food was not a problem. I was not much bothered by hunger. I recalled a Kafka story, ‘The Hunger Artist,’ in which the main character makes his living by performing fasts as a carnival sideshow. I too did not experience hunger after the first few days. But water was life, and I did not have eight and a half gallons of water on May 11, I had two and a half . With the rain, ten days later I still had two and a half gallons. But what had happened to the missing six gallons? Leakage? Evaporation? I do not know.
The solar still was a disappointment. As a test I once used such a still successfully, but now that it mattered, I could not get it to produce fresh water. And after I caught rain, I threw the still away.
The sun was warm enough for me to strip off my clothes and air my body. I was wearing the foul-weather gear and the same shorts and shirt I had on at the time of the pitchpole. Digging into the clothes bags for a change was futile. Everything was wet and never really dried, but my skin felt better for being exposed to the sun.
My tan was uneven. Hands, feet, and, I supposed, my face were dark brown; but most of the rest of my body was fish white--where it was not red with saltwater boils covering my forearms, buttocks, calves, and feet. A couple of spots on my buttocks, both elbows, my left wrist where my watch rubbed, and both feet, were ulcerated. Ointment helped, but I needed the miracle of being dry.
I looked over the side and tried to judge our speed: a knot? a half knot? The difference was significant: One hundred and sixty-eight miles a week or only eighty-four. I no longer needed to check the two compasses for our course: 280º True, just north of the sun’s path, and unvarying for ten days. I feared any wind shift. I realized that in some ways we had been lucky--if unlucky to hit whatever we hit, then lucky to have done so three hundred miles east of the New Hebrides rather than west. And lucky to have steady wind blowing us in the right direction, even though such wind was to be expected in that part of the ocean. And most of all, lucky to have it happen this year when I had a good dinghy. I could have stayed alive aboard CHIDIOCK, but the effects of exposure and the suffering would have been much worse.
A wave halfheartedly splashed aboard and soaked me, and I shifted to the other side of the dinghy to face the sun. From its height I knew it was nearly noon. I leaned over and opened the navigation bag, took a vitamin pill from the bottle, and closed the bag. Of all the things lost, I most regretted losing my sextant. It was a World War II Navy model manufactured by David White, two years younger than I was, and bought second hand for less than $100. It had taken me around the world, and I was fonder of it than any other possession. Everything else I needed to determine our exact position was in the navigation bag. In this, as in many other ways, the transition from yacht to dinghy was easier for me than it would have been for someone aboard a conventional craft. I was used to living in the open.
I put the pill in my mouth, lifted the water container for a single sip, and swallowed. Lunch.
Tomorrow there would be more. Cans were rusting and would
have to be used. The labels had come off the cans, but by shaking them I could usually guess the contents. Half a can of fruit cocktail for lunch, with the other half for dinner, which meant the only water I would use would be two sips in the morning
My liquid supply was:
2 ½ gallons of water
7 cans of fruit
3 cans of vegetables
10 small bottles of Coca-Cola
My liquid ration was less than one cup a day, six sips, or only five, depending on self-discipline at noon. I knew there was a possibility of kidney damage, but so far my kidneys functioned. I remembered Bombard’s book about drinking sea water while drifting across the Atlantic, but I was not tempted to do so.
Each can of fruit or vegetables would provide liquid for a full day: ten days total. The water on hand would last at least forty days, and surely in these latitudes it would rain often. But I did not count rain in my calculations. Rain was a gift. The Coca-Cola, which I considered more secure in bottles than the water in plastic containers, was to be used last. Ten bottles for seventeen days, two days each for the first eight bottles. I had decided I would drink the last two bottles together. Once before I died, if only for a few minutes, I was not going to be thirsty.
My food supply consisted of:
5 cans ravioli
4 cans beans
1 can hot dogs
3 cans tuna
4 ½ packages ship’s crackers
3 boxes Muesli
½ jar jam
10 packages freeze-dry dinners
4 packets powdered milk
1 jar peanuts
1 can peanut brittle
1 bottle vitamin pills
Each can made two dinners, and the hot dogs would make three. I could stay alive a long time just on the crackers and Muesli. The peanuts and peanut brittle would keep me going for weeks. And with caught rain, each freeze-dried dinner would last three days and each packet of milk, a week. Without rain the freeze-dried food was useless. I had eaten freeze-dried food without cooking, and I tried to eat some without water. It simply could not be swallowed. And probably it would have been counterproductive, drawing liquid from my body.
At times I wondered if I was being too hard on myself, particularly toward the end of the first week, when my body strongly protested the new regimen. The odds were very good that I would come upon land within a month. And for a drift of only month I would not have to ration much of anything. But if I did not come upon land, if the wind changed, or if I did see land but was unable to get ashore and had to continue to Australia, I was determined to last the course. I felt stronger that day than I had a few days earlier. In fact, I felt that for each of the past three days I had made some gain, however small; that I was reversing the inexorable slide toward death.
To escape the blinding heat Saturday afternoon, I had swum from the inflatable to CHIDIOCK. Already I had lost weight and strength, particularly in my legs. Back aboard CHIDIOCK, I made another search of her flooded interior and discovered treasure: two bottles of Coca-Cola, a knife, a tube of Desitin and one of sun-screen, a pair of shorts, a mismatched pair of thongs, a hammer, and a plate.
The knife had a bottle opener, and I immediately drank one of the Cokes. The other bottle still put me two days of life ahead, and the warm, sweet liquid did me a world of good. I pulled the inflatable to CHIDIOCK and transferred everything except the hammer and the plate.
Small fish, some electric blue, some almost transparent, swam inside CHIDIOCK. Someday, I thought, I may have to eat you.
The next day I again returned to CHIDIOCK, this time to try to bail her out after passing the tarp beneath the hull in an attempt to block the centerboard slot from below. The seas were calmer than at any time since she swamped, but it took me most of the morning to tie the tarp in place. I still had nothing suitable to use as a bailer. First I tried a plastic bag, which was worthless. I looked around and saw the plate. As a scoop it proved effective. I was able to move a considerable amount of water with it, but unfortunately not considerable enough.
Before untying the tarp and returning to the dinghy, I inserted the rudder and untangled the mainsheet and halyard. When I raised the torn sail, CHIDIOCK responded by gracefully rolling onto her side and sailing for the depths. Less gracefully, I leapt clear. She righted herself and I scrambled back aboard and was able to turn her downwind before she could repeat her new trick.
Grossly, very, very grossly, I was able to steer with great sweeping movements of the tiller, which was underwater. In an hour I might change her position by a hundred yards. But if I sighted land, even such limited control might make a difference. Inordinately pleased, I furled the sail and dropped the rudder back into the gaping aft locker before returning home.
From the beginning of the drift I held on to the hope that I could save CHIDIOCK TICHBORNE as well as myself, though I knew the odds against her were very long. That was one of the reasons I kept the boats tied together, even though the dinghy would drift faster by itself. I also thought that both boats together were more likely to be seen than either alone; and that, however unpleasant, the swamped CHIDIOCK TICHBORNE was someplace to go if the dinghy deflated. Now the odds against CHIDIOCK TICHBORNE seemed slightly reduced.
By mid-afternoon the sun was hot. I took the spare pair of shorts, dipped them in the sea, and put them over my head. I had already draped foul-weather gear around my shoulders for shade. Unwashed, unshaven, uncombed, covered with more boils than Job, and with a pair of shorts as a turban, I was ready for the cover of GENTLEMEN’S QUARTERLY.
I found myself speculating about other solo sailors who have been lost at sea: Slocum, Willis, Riving, Colas, Piver. I wondered if they died quickly or slowly. There had been times when I thought I was going to die at sea, but always death would have been quick. Now I was on the edge, not for a few minutes or a few hours, but weeks, months. Already my tongue was thick, my lips pasty. I wondered what it would feel like to be thirsty and know not that there was water that should not be drunk, but that there was no water. It was not death I feared, but the suffering along the way.
My initial reaction to being adrift was one of apathy laced with depression. I did not care about the voyage or the challenge of the sea. Sailing had brought more pain than pleasure. If I survived, I would go ashore and fine a life with a little comfort--the old chimera: peace, rest, ease. Surely I had earned them.
But after a few days of this, I knew that if the sea did not kill me, and if it were possible, I would sail on. If CHIDIOCK were lost, I would try to replace her. I would not, however, sail indefinitely from shipwreck to shipwreck. At a certain point, and I would know when, such a voyage would become absurd rather than honorable.
The terrible thing about the sea is that it is not alive. All man’s pathetic adjectives are false. The sea is not cruel or angry or kind. The sea is insensate, a blind fragment of the universe, and kills us not in rage, but with indifference, as casual byproducts of its own unknowable harmony. Rage would be easier to understand and to accept.
Whenever I thought of death, and obviously I thought of it often, I also thought of Suzanne--not really an unflattering association. I was thirty-eight years old. No man in my family had lived to such an age for generations. I had accomplished some of what I wanted to with my life--not all, but more than most men. And for me dying at sea had long been accepted as an occupational hazard. Of all the shore offers--the places I had not seen, the few friends with whom I would like to share some conversation and a bottle, the music, the books, the paintings--most of all, I would miss Suzanne. I had never loved her more than during these last days, when the contrast between the happiness we had shared and the bleak reality of the present was so great.
When I left Suva I had not realized that it was the very day on which four years earlier I left Auckland to sail for Tahiti in EGREGIOUS. I had not known then whether I would ever see Suzanne again. Now, for quite different reasons, I also did not know if I would ever see her again. I was glad that I was not yet overdue, that she would have no reason to be worried.
Something on a nearby wave caught my eye, something brown and round now hidden in a trough. Then, there it was. It was going to drift past. Terribly excited, I dove over the side and started swimming.
When I had the coconut safely in the dinghy and held it to my ear, I heard the glorious sound of liquid. With the blade of my rigging knife, I cut away the husk, and with the fid, I punctured two of the eyes. Normally I am not fond of coconut, but the slightly sour liquid was ambrosia. I took two big swallows before draining the rest into a jar, almost two cups. And there was more moisture in the meat. But how to get to it? I recalled the hammer on CHIDIOCK and pulled us over. With three blows, the shell cracked apart: days and days of life.
Half an hour before sunset, I ate a dinner consisting of the last half of a can of tuna, washed down with coconut milk. Despite the can having been opened for twenty-four hours, the fish did not smell bad. And I would have eaten it anyway.
In the last light, I searched for land. There was none. I wrapped myself in the tarp and tried to settle in for a long night of broken sleep. My thoughts were the same as they had been last night and the night before that. How many more long days and nights: four? forty? a hundred and four? And what was the end: an island? a ship? death?
I drifted on.