Lionheart

Home > Other > Lionheart > Page 11
Lionheart Page 11

by Jesse Martin


  I was falling asleep by the time I got dressed. We got a lift back to the boat with Dad's friend. He said we could move our boats to the jetty of the Sorrento Sailing and Couta Boat Club, which had rubber edges on its poles to prevent damaging the boat. It would also provide some privacy for our work the next morning. I didn't realise, but the boat had a high profile after having been splashed all over the television news the previous night and in the papers that morning. With twenty sponsors’ logos plastered across it, it was not too hard to miss, especially if we'd stayed at the public jetty. It could have been like pulling into the villages in Papua New Guinea to greet the smiling villagers, and getting stuck for hours. We had some serious work to do the next day, and couldn't afford any disturbances by well-wishers.

  We thanked our new friend for his generosity. I don't think he realised how much help he'd been, and I shudder to think what I'd have been like if I'd got out the Heads that afternoon. Alas, there was not much time to consider the ‘what ifs’, for I think I fell asleep before my head hit the pillow.

  We woke the following day and immediately tackled the last of the jobs. I was working to the same schedule of the previous day, with the aim of catching the afternoon slack water at the Heads. Pulling in for the night turned out to be a bigger blessing than we'd thought. We realised that the boom brake was still at home, with the lee bunk sheets. The sheets attach under the bunk cushions and tie to eyelets on the roof at night so the sleeping sailor doesn't roll off his bunk. It would have been a disaster if I had left without them.

  Dad remembered they were still in his garage in Moorabbin. Things were looking grim. We needed someone to drive the 80 kilometres down the Peninsula. It was a Monday morning, so most people were at work, assuming I'd already left. Phil phoned his daughter's fiance, Guy. Over a mobile phone, Dad explained where the key to the garage was and where Guy could find the bits and pieces. After several phones calls back and forth, Guy found the gear and drove to Sorrento. He found some very glad and thankful people waiting for him. What a life saver! He stayed around and helped us finish things off.

  Dad and Phil made little brackets to hold things, tied down the wind generator with an emergency lanyard and decanted the diesel into the tanks. Guy, Ray and I unloaded all the food bags to dry in the sun and set to work finding the leak from the anchor well into the boat. A small electrical wire was found to be passing through the top corner of the well via a hole a fair bit bigger in diameter than the wire.

  A bit of Sikaflex (a heavy-duty silicon) on either side and some foam on the well hatch to make a better seal and things were looking pretty good. We had fresh buns and scrolls from Bakers Delight and newspapers delivered by our friend. It was funny to read stories about leaving on my trip around the world while I sat in Sorrento eating buns.

  The food bags dried quickly. We used thick, black gaffer tape to seal rips in some of the bags caused by the hectic loading and unloading, then repacked them for the final time.

  It was about 4.15 p.m. when the silicon guns and tool boxes were handed off Lionheart. Dad and the others stepped off and I followed them with handshakes and thanked them for their help. This was my second farewell, which I was able to do in my own time, the way I would have liked to have the previous day.

  It was decided Dad would follow me to the Heads in Bohemian on his own, while Phil and Ray got a lift back home with Guy. I started up the diesel engine for the second and final time while the guys untied me from the wharf. I eased the gear into forward and pulled away from the wooden poles. Phil and Guy were waving as Dad got Bohemian ready.

  Goodbyes were yelled: ‘See you in nine months’, ‘good luck’ and ‘farewell’.

  I found my way to the South Channel and started following the markers with Dad in hot pursuit. The moment of truth was fast approaching. I set the genoa and sat at the helm steering and watching the land pass by. It didn't take very long before I could see the exit to the Bay. The headlands peeled back and the opening slowly grew. My course was still about due west, towards the lighthouse, which I remembered I had to make contact with to ensure they witnessed my crossing. I whipped downstairs and got onto the VHF radio.

  ‘Lonsdale Lighthouse, Lonsdale Lighthouse, this is sailing vessel Lionheart, Lionheart, over.’

  ‘Lionheart, Lionheart, Lonsdale Lighthouse, go to channel six one, over.’

  I changed the channel, then repeated my call. ‘Lonsdale Lighthouse, this is Lionheart, over.’

  ‘Yes, Lionheart, go ahead.’

  ‘Oh hi, I'm just calling you up to check whether you were ready to record the time I cross the starting line? Over.’

  ‘Roger that, Lionheart. We know what to do. You should be there in about 20 minutes. Good luck with it all.’

  ‘Roger, thanks for that. Bye.’

  I came out on deck and nudged the tiller a centimetre or two to starboard which would start the slow arc out the heads and into Bass Strait. I was suddenly rounding the last corner and lining up for the home straight... to the starting line.

  I was on a starboard tack so as I came around closer to the direction from which the southerly was blowing, I winched the genoa in tighter and began getting the mainsail ready to be hoisted. It was very important to me that I cut the motor before I crossed the line to ensure I sailed around the world without using any fossil fuels. Yet I had to make sure not to cut it too early and lose manoeuvrability near any rocks or currents.

  The swell from the ocean beyond the Heads was becoming more noticeable and caused the sun to disappear between great slabs of water as they rolled by The sun was huge and a very rich colour. It was getting closer to the horizon, lighting up the nearby coastline that guarded the bay like castles.

  I looked back and saw Dad on Bohemian ploughing into the swell. He was travelling much faster than me, so he was doing laps around me, yelling instructions. I went forward to the mast and connected the halyard to the mainsail, to pull the sail up the mast track, and undid the ropes tying the mainsail to the boom. I looked over to the west and identified the lighthouse, then swung my head 180 degrees to the east.

  At that moment my heart missed about three beats when I realised I was just about between the two heads of Port Phillip Bay. I cut the motor and, for the first time, at 5.36 p.m., I heard the sounds of my new home for the next eleven months. No gun shot to mark the start, and no spectators. Just my Dad somewhere around me on his small catamaran, a distant observer in the lighthouse, and the setting sun to witness what was the biggest moment of my short life.

  CHAPTER 5

  Reality Bites: Australia to New Zealand

  It was a wrenching moment. I was thinking that could be the last time I would see him.

  – Kon Martin

  The wind slowly died after Dad turned back for Sorrento and I was left out in the cockpit steering Lionheart, trying to get as much distance between me and the land as possible. I felt stunted as I sat there with the sails jarring the rig as the roll from the swell lashed the whole boat.

  It soon got dark, and I could still easily see the lights of land and was passed by the Spirit of Tasmania passenger liner on its way to Devonport. I sailed for about six hours, until I could take no more, at about midnight. I was so tired, but I had to set the radar on guard alarm. I hadn't had a chance to have a look at it before I left Melbourne, but now I was forced to. I was in a very busy shipping area, so I had to have the radar on all night. It's amazing how quickly the human mind can learn when it knows there's a point to it. In my case I knew I could go to sleep once I worked out how to set the alarm. This handy function woke the radar up every ten minutes and did fifteen sweeps of the horizon. If anything was detected, such as an oil tanker, it set off an alarm that would hopefully wake me. I fiddled about and it didn't take long to set it up. I crashed onto my bunk and lost consciousness.

  I woke the next morning to a slight breeze that picked up as I set my course and got the wind vane, which kept the boat on course, working. What a great feeling it was
to be moving comfortably and in the right direction away from land. The wind got to about 15 knots, so I put a reef in the mainsail and pulled a bit of the genoa in. I was winching the mainsail down a bit when I noticed the sail sliding straight off the mast track—another little detail we'd forgotten to attend to. I put a split pin stopper through the mast track so the sail wouldn't slide right off the mast when it was lowered. I put the slugs back into the track and raised the sail again before getting up there with the hand drill and bending the split pin once it was in place. I put the tools away and completed the reef (that is, reduced the sail area) from the cockpit with a satisfaction that made me grin from ear to ear. I knew this feeling was why I wanted to sail solo around the world. The satisfaction of self-sufficiency. Whoooo hooooo!

  The wind died down again and kept picking up for short intervals only. When I was not moving I began to get very frustrated. It was a feeling that was to grow with the trip and nearly consume me at times.

  I tuned into the weather reports on the VHF radio and heard that there was radio traffic being held for Lionheart Victor Hotel Alpha India. I went to channel 26 and called up Telstra Radio, who asked me my vessel's name and call sign.

  They told me I had a call waiting from a Louise Martin. I took the call immediately and in a short while I heard Mum's voice coming through the speaker. It was so good to hear her voice. I asked about what was happening at home and she asked me how I was going. I didn't have a great deal to report other than how we stopped overnight in Sorrento before leaving and that there wasn't a great deal of wind around.

  Mum, Andrew, Gran and some others had actually driven down to the Heads to watch me sail through that Sunday afternoon. When I failed to turn up they presumed I'd stopped with Dad, so they trudged off home again.

  Wednesday, December 9

  I feel worst in the morning cos everything is quiet and I'm salty and half asleep but during the day there has been heaps to do.

  It was my third day at sea when it all hit me. I suppose it was inevitable, and I still can't quite put my finger on it. The afternoon sun was beaming through the portholes and bringing the teak cupboards to life in the most beautiful colour, while the boat gently rocked to and fro on the flat ocean. There was not a breath of wind. The music of Enya, combined with the beauty and the overwhelming loneliness, brought all the emotion of the previous few months to a head. I sat at the navigation table crying like a big baby, sobbing and wailing. But they weren't tears of sadness or pity—they were tears of realisation at my new life.

  I'd say the frustration of not moving added to the tears, but I mainly put it down to the incredible shock. I'd always been so busy doing something back home, that to have nothing much to do left me feeling empty and frustrated. Add to this the news I was getting about my mates spending boiling hot days at the pool talking to pretty girls, and it's not surprising I felt the way I did. The crying bouts came and went—you can't physically cry 24 hours a day.

  The first few days were spent cleaning the boat, catching up on sleep and doing odd jobs while I wallowed with hardly any wind. I'd worked out the guard alarm on the radar and was getting used to the power consumption meter.

  I was living on mostly lolly redskins, lollipops and chocolate. My food rations were still safely stored in the bow. When it came to start them, three days out, it was another milestone that marked the beginning of the voyage and made me feel I was really getting into the trip.

  Thursday, December 10

  Wind picked up a lot and stayed at about 20-25 knots for most of the day. Got two reefs and small amount of genoa out. Spoke to Megan, Ed, Mum, Andrew and Dad in the morning. Have just spotted Tasmania. There is a front coming through soon so I'll head out to try to get some sea room. I'm moving about the cabin naked cos I don't want to wear clothes as I'm constantly lying down in my bunk and don't want to get it all salty.

  I was getting relatively close to land again, the west coast of Tasmania, and the predicted forecast was for a front of about 30 knots that would be blowing towards the coastline. I had to make as much distance away from there before the front came through. With the 20—25 knots of wind, the swell built up and water splashed over the foredeck. It was the first time since the anchor well problem in the Bay that I encountered wet conditions. I realised I had a problem with more leaks. The bilge constantly had water in it, and I had to turn off the bilge pump's float switch because it was being activated every 60 seconds to pump only three times. It drove me mad with its high-pitched alarm. I just had to remember to pump it out every day, before the water started seeping through the floorboards.

  The leaks presented the first psychological hurdle I had to encounter before I was happy and settled. Leaks weren't life-threatening at all, and I'd have had to be unconscious for about a week before the water level rose enough to cause any serious dangers. But they were always there and I couldn't escape them. When the wind was more than 20 knots the deck joins started to trickle tears of salty water down the inside of the hull. They didn't look like much, but there were obviously enough of them to allow the water in.

  I very much wanted to keep the inside of the cabin safe and dry, somewhere I could retire to when the weather got bad. However, it wasn't going to plan. First I noticed the food bags in the V-berth were once again wet, with water droplets over the plastic. Then the floor around the toilet area was constantly reflecting light from the wet surface. I was hoping it was only one of the sea cocks (taps) to the toilet leaking, and that it was merely a matter of fiddling about, turning them off and on.

  One of the more annoying leaks was above the navigation table, where the companionway slide allowed water to squirt in and drip onto the table. I jammed a thin piece of foam in the gap to try to reduce the amount of water collecting on the table. That slowed down the drips, but never stopped them. The most annoying aspect of this leak was its position. The navigation table held all the electronic instruments, which were theoretically ‘drip proof, but after months and months of dripping you would start to wonder. With the instruments there was the 240-volt inverter plug which powered my laptop computer and kept me in contact with the outside world through email. The navigation table was also the only place I could sit the computer when I was working on it. I was forced to keep wiping the drips from the hatch slide before they gained enough weight to fall.

  The wind died down to 20 knots as the first front passed and the sun made an appearance. The silhouettes of four huge albatross circling the boat made for quite a sight.

  Friday, December 11

  Listened to Simon & Garfunkel twice this morning. Wind has died off to 15 knots and I am doing 4—4/4 knots. Mum is trying to organise film and rubbish drop at the bottom of Tassie. Barometer has dropped from 1010 to 1005. Could be the low expected to hit tomorrow morning. Still two reefs and small amount of genoa. Can't be bothered doing much. Will make a daily timetable of routine.

  TIMETABLE

  08.00 Breakfast and position plot

  09.00 Exercise

  10.00 Radio interviews for one hour

  11.00 Email for one hour

  12.00 Lunch—free time

  15.00 Radio interviews

  16.00 Answer email

  17.00 Free time

  19.00 Cook dinner and clean the day's dishes

  It was a nice attempt at setting some kind of routine. But it was more a writing exercise than anything practical. Plus, I don't quite know why I was setting such a tight schedule for myself. Needless to say, that, and any other routine, went out the window for the rest of the trip.

  Friday, December 11, 6.10 p.m.

  Gybed half an hour ago and the wind is slowly increasing to 10—15 knots. Put preventer on main cos it was slamming too much. Found some nice moisturiser that smells like Laura! [a friend] Ate two-thirds of freeze-dried stroganoff. It was yuk and I was still full from lunch. Since gybe I'm on a good heading (130°) at 5 knots boat speed increasing.

  The low was meant to arrive on the Saturday mornin
g and I thought the increase in wind was the beginning of it. But, to my frustration, it never materialised.

  Saturday, December 12

  Running under single-reefed main with no headsail. Doing 3—4 knots at 115°. Spoke to Mum and Andrew again this morning. I thought it was Friday until they told me otherwise. They said it was so hot there (42 degrees) that no-one was doing anything. I wish I was there skating to Ringwood pool with Trav and Ryan then going out tonight. I might give my mates a call later tonight. Have read a quarter of the Hobbit.

  Still have preventer on main to stop the slapping. Couldn't be bothered keeping routine but I don't find myself consciously bored even though I'm not doing much. Enya is blasting away as I write, combined with the creaking of ropes and the sound of water passing along the hull. Even though I am remote and alone I feel unstoppable.

  I was still waiting for the wind to increase, but even in the light winds I was not pushing the boat too hard. In 15 knots of wind I could have been travelling at 6 knots easily but the boat was still new to me. I planned to be over-cautious with the rig to avoid any breakages. The last thing I wanted was to have a bad breakage forcing me to jury-rig the boat (rig up a temporary mast) and limp back to land unable to finish the trip. I didn't care how long it was going to take as long as I wasn't compromising my safety or any equipment vital to the success of the trip. What made me more cautious was the fact the big blocks on one of the running backstays had come undone from a missing pin bolt. I was able to fix it with a spare part but I knew the bugs were still being ironed out and how vital it was that I didn't push things.

  I was sailing along the west coast of Tasmania and beating into the waves a little. I tried to stay below as much as possible because the waves were constantly hitting the hull of Lionheart and sending spray across the deck. The only safe spot was behind the protection of the bimini. I ventured up to the foredeck after I finished tying up a few lines when I spotted an extra large wave ahead that looked like it was definitely going to break against the boat and drench everything. I made a quick hop, step and jump back towards the cockpit area and behind the bimini, but as I stepped on the cockpit seat my boots didn't grip and I landed with all my weight on my shin against the corner of the seat. OUCH!

 

‹ Prev