Maiden Voyage (30 page)

“Forget it,” I said to myself, “I can't handle this yet,” and headed under reefed main east back toward the open sea.

The next morning dawned a little cloudy and overcast in spots, but with the security of an entire day's worth of daylight ahead and knowing that I could always turn tail again, I jibed around and resumed the search for the lighthouse. As the sun's fuzzy outline peeked momentarily through the clouds, I hastily grabbed a sight, calculating and crossing it with an RDF bearing received from the coast.

Until 9:00
A.M
., squalls and driving rain buried
Varuna
in sea water, obscuring my vision as I tried to scrutinize the horizon. Suddenly, I thought I saw a bird ahead. Keeping my eyes trained on the black speck, I realized that it was motionless and that the vague outline of a lighthouse base was emerging, growing underneath the bird and becoming a mini Eiffel Tower. I gasped, then shouted in elation, then gasped again.

“I found it!” I screamed. This was a moment of triumph and I reached down into the cabin and grabbed little Tarzoon, pointing his head in the direction of the lighthouse. He didn't like the rain, or the noisy squall that had just engulfed us and dug his claws into my arm and jumped back into the safety of the cabin.

The line squalls marched in one after another, intensifying as we sailed close-hauled past the lighthouse at midday, and by the time we reached the pass the wind was raging at 35 knots with gusts up to 45. Swirling currents and steep, confused chop made steering the boat an enormous effort as white water crashed and thundered against and over the exposed reefs on both sides of us. Instead of making progress, we seemed to be pushed sideways toward the reef with the endless squalls punching the lee side of the cockpit under water.

At the tiller, I struggled to keep control of
Varuna
, anticipating the waves and trying to steer her through them from the right angles. With the exhaustion of four days of little or no sleep and changing and reefing sails, every muscle in my body ached and my brain felt ready to burst from the pressure.
Varuna
was no longer able to make headway, but I thought that if I could only get one glimpse of the land that lay 30 miles away through the mist, I could find the energy
to carry on. But there was nothing, and the weather was getting worse. In despair, I turned
Varuna
back out to sea again.

Bouncing around for the rest of this day and night, I'd had all I could take—emotionally and physically—and swore by all that was holy that the only way I would leave Australia was on a 747. All I could remember were the head-banging days I had spent paralyzed with fear from storms, howling winds, the lonely and ominous nights, while being tossed around in a 26-foot cork on the world's largest ocean, praying that I would live to see land again. After all, what was I but just another human being on a planet that had too many already? When my emotions plunged into such an abyss, life didn't seem to add up to much anymore and I couldn't see the water for all the waves. On Tuesday, September 2, 1986, all I knew was that I was a very scared nineteen-year-old who wanted to quit the whole shebang.

September 3 dawned a sunny day.
Varuna
had been pacing like a mad dog at a closed gate and we were quite familiar with the area now. The winds were still strong, but at least the squalls had gone elsewhere, and determined to get in, I retraced our steps of a day earlier and found the lighthouse.

What a difference from the day before. The angry, gray, foaming-at-the-mouth waters were transformed into sparkling blue mounds with bubbly crests blowing up into a spray that shimmered like crystals. The sun, I knew, was a major factor in determining my daily mood. It was hard to dwell on black thoughts when the sun beamed warmly down on
Varuna's
deck, her sails, her wake and my face and everything began to emit a radiant glow. Even Tarzoon and Mimine came out to sit on the drying wood of the cockpit, watching me steer by hand past the lighthouse, playing with the waves and gusts. In the distance, to the right and left, the gentle crests of waves lapped over the reefs. I studied the compass to keep the exact course in the plan of approach that I had had plenty of time to mull over and memorize, and the beauty of the sunny morning erased my fatalistic gloom of the day before.

After the lighthouse and first major outcropping of coral heads, I steered into the well-buoyed system of pathways that run the length of the Barrier Reef, and headed for Cairns. Closing the distance toward the mouth of the Cairns River anchorage, we passed ferryboats bound for the outlying islands along with fishing and pleasure boats as the profile of the hilly green coastline became clear. In a cheery mood, I found myself waving in great excitement to the skippers of
other boats. Making a landfall had never been as major an accomplishment.

Six hours after passing Grafton Lighthouse, we motored past the outlying sailboats at anchor and headed toward the docks. Tied alongside an official-looking launch was the familiar rugged shape of
Akka
, and
Varuna's
engine puttered up to her companion.

“Olivier!” I called. His blond head popped instantly out of the companionway and his body followed in the mad rush to get on deck.

“I
blong
you!” he shouted elatedly and signaled for me to pull up against
Akka
. “Perfect timing,” he called. “I just arrived and customs, immigrations and quarantine are already here.”

Michel's cry over the calm waters the next morning heralded his arrival; Christoph arrived a week later. Together we explored Cairns, which could have come straight from the script of a spaghetti Western. The rambling buildings stretched the length of arid, hot pavements, and inside, fishermen, charter-boat crews, plantation workers and ordinary “blokes and sheilas” gathered in the cool interiors of bars that often had bands playing folk, rock or country music. It was the beginning of summer Down Under and already I could appreciate that people could find solace only in an icy mug of beer. I preferred Coke.

I gave up the idea of abandoning the rest of the trip. When it actually came down to it, I couldn't picture myself quitting the biggest and most important thing I had ever started, emptying out
Varuna
, packing my bags and heading home. She
was
my home.

That resolved, I faced the fact that I was definitely behind schedule. We were already well into the middle of September and there was no way possible to make it to South Africa and the Cape of Good Hope before the December hurricane season. Fears about the weather set me to entertaining thoughts of how the time schedule could be gracefully extended. We still had to cover 450 miles of Barrier Reef up to Thursday Island in the Torres Straits, then sail the 6,500 miles of Indian Ocean to South Africa. Because of the hurricane risk, I would have to forgo Christmas Island, Mauritius, Reunion and Madagascar and sail the entire 6,500 miles nonstop in order to get out of the danger zone as fast as possible.

The idea terrified me. I didn't know if
Varuna
could take the wear and tear of the moody Indian Ocean and I didn't know if enough food and water for the two solitary months could fit aboard. And above all, staring at the endless expanse on my charts, I didn't know if I could handle leaving Olivier so soon after finding him.

Being with him and the two other Frenchmen was a blessing. In
the evenings, after working on the boats, we four sat together either on
Akka
or
Adonis
, preparing meals and talking about the future. I wasn't the only one who had decision-making problems in that department, and in the cabins of our boats, we thrashed them out into the wee hours of the mornings, throwing out suggestions and giving each other advice. Cairns was the end of the South Pacific and of an old way of life. For each of us, a new course had to be plotted.

Australia was the last port of call that Michel wanted to risk with
Penelope
. Between Vanuatu and Australia, she had been knocked down by a rogue wave, her cockpit lockers robbed of their covers and inhabitants and her interior swamped. The knockdown had shaken Michel, and he decided that
Penelope
had fulfilled her destiny. Christoph asked him along for adventure
à deux
in Papua New Guinea. But first they had to make some money by picking tomatoes, and they calculated the months needed at labor and the profits they could make from exporting Australian wine to other islands.

As they planned and schemed together, Olivier and I also discussed our own alternatives. He had to get back to Europe and I to America. South Africa was not the only route available. I could also head toward Sri Lanka, up the Red Sea, through the Mediterranean, then across the North Atlantic to New York. This dovetailed with Olivier's plan and was almost 3,000 miles and one month of sea time shorter than taking the southern route around South Africa's Cape of Good Hope. Our timing, as far as the seasons were concerned, would be perfect, even to the point of allowing a month's break in Sri Lanka. Once in the Mediterranean, Olivier could leave
Akka
in Malta, and the Med and Atlantic would be
Varuna's
last oceans to cross.

The day after these plans were hatched, we rushed to a ship chandlery and bought up all the charts to the Northern Indian Ocean and the Red Sea, as well as a guidebook with all the information on harbors, anchorages, provisioning, visa laws and lists of all the postal general deliveries. I was elated. I didn't have to race up the Barrier Reef alone. Until we reached Malta, which seemed so far away, Olivier and I could rendezvous in different ports, and at sea I would always know that he was living through the same conditions as I somewhere in the general vicinity. Our awareness that we would no longer be alone in every sense of the word unleashed new energy in us.

On September 19, Olivier and I said goodbye to Michel and Christoph, hollering good luck to one another, and motored out the channel for Cairns River. Our little singlehanders group was dissolved.

•   •   •

The Barrier Reef is a vast labyrinth of small islands and line reef formations that lie scattered for 1,250 miles along the Australian coastline from Brisbane to Thursday Island. To guide the heavy shipping traffic that arrives and departs from Australia's east coast, a water-highway channel rigged with buoys, cans and lighthouses stretches the length of the reef. We planned to sail by day and anchor at night.

For eighteen days,
Akka
and
Varuna
wove in and out of what looked on paper like an endless latticework of coral heads for almost 400 miles up to Thursday Island and the Torres Straits. Each buoy showed up as the last one disappeared behind, and we followed the dots around headlands while weaving in and out of small islands. Whenever we made landfall, Olivier would anchor first and when
Varuna
arrived, I would tie up alongside, eliminating the tiring morning exercise of lifting anchor.

Olivier was in heaven, gathering up more shells to add to his collection, while I made pizzas, and together we scrutinized the beaches in search of a perfect nautilus shell, without which he refused to leave the continent. The trade winds blew fairly steadily from the southeast except for a few days when we holed up in anchorages to wait out blows or calms. To my eyes, and from any point of view,
Varuna
and
Akka
were the perfect couple floating on the opal lagoons—the dainty little scarred lady next to the rough and rusty adventurer.

Tracing the Queensland coastline, we awoke at six every morning, followed the shipping lanes and pushed onward, passing Aboriginal reserves, frontier towns with hitching posts for horses and campgrounds for bird lovers and animal watchers. We sailed past large sandy hills, dunes and mangrove banks. For a freak oasis in the middle of sand and brush, the steamy rain forest of Cape Tribulation jutted out, propped on a peak. A couple of miles farther north, the beige-and-brown hues of the desert recommenced.

We anchored for two days in the shelter of Lizard Island, and with mask and snorkel and my Tahitian spear gun, I went fishing. Paddling about, I could see bright, sky-blue parrotfish and black-speckled red groupers scurrying away in my path as the mouths of huge clams closed when my shadow covered them. The coral formations were like forests of underwater cactus plants; prickly and smooth, bulbous and scraggly, tubular and lacy, they stood undulating with their arms stretched upward to the surface. The ones on highest ground were a dark brown color from exposure to air at low
tide and the lower ones were pastel shades of purple, red, yellow, green and every other color, with schools of tiny fish scurrying about in formation—in and out, in and out.

The tail of a fish fluttered from behind a rock. I took in a deep snorkel breath and jackknifed downward. Passing over, spear gun at the ready, I aimed at my prey, and the elastic shot the spear forward through the water, piercing the flank of the unsuspecting fish. Later on, when we went to ask a neighboring boat if the catch was safe to eat, they said the area was an underwater reserve. The poor fish had thought he was safe from human predators and had gone to sleep under the rock, until I had to come along. I never speared another, and we ignominiously carried on.

With the tedium of the hot days, I sat in
Varuna's
cockpit religiously crossing off each landmark we passed and in between times, wracked with boredom, plucked each and every hair out of my legs with tweezers. Sometimes, Olivier and I would close the distance between the boats to talk or to show each other the huge legal mackerel we were catching on trolling lines.

On October 6, we arrived at Escape River in one piece, our last anchorage before Thursday Island, and in time for my twentieth birthday the next day. One year earlier, I remembered, I had been in the middle of the South Pacific on my way to my first South Seas landfall, wondering how I would ever get through the next couple of months.