Memoirs of a Worldly Guy
One spring day in 1958 I was walking along Eighth Avenue in Calgary when I met Bob Svar who was trying without success at the time to convince people that there was oil offshore Norway. Silly boy! (Prolific fields were discovered after he'd given up his leases!)
'Here's a guy you should get to know, Bob,' he said, turning to his friend. He introduced him as Bob McCullough. 'Bob owns a yacht in Jamaica and is looking for someone to help him sail it up to Florida.' I had never been to Jamaica!
Needless to say it was only a matter of time before I turned up in Jamaica. As luck would have it I had agreed to be 'best man' at Lew Teeter's wedding south of Detroit on May 17th so I was heading in that direction anyway. After failing to talk Lew out of getting married I headed off down to Jamaica and joined up with Bob McCullough.
Bob had reserved a room for me at a reasonably couth hotel in Kingston and the following day we went over to the natural harbour where 'Echo" was anchored. Bob was on familiar terms with the family living in the large house facing the waterfront and I was immediately smitten by their fifteen year old daughter. I'll tell you about the yacht later.
I would guess that Vida had approximately one-sixteenth of African blood and as a result, although she had blond hair it was slightly kinky. Her skin was a magnificent creamy fawn-like brown and the fact that she wore short short cut-offs showed off a distracting percentage of her body. The rest of her body was bursting plumply from her tight shirt and partially visible brassiere. She showed a keen interest in everything we were doing and her interest was reciprocated.
Now let me tell you about the yacht, a forty-five foot gaff-rigged yawl. I suspect that it was somewhat older than I and the standing rigging was in such bad shape it would have been suicidal to take it to sea. It was lacking completely in running lights which was not only illegal but we were to find later that it was exceedingly dangerous during light fog conditions and the dark of night. We had to replace most of the standing rigging. It's amazing how quickly one can lose the old 'sea legs'! I estimate the bowsprit on 'Echo' was at least twelve feet long and it didn't have a safety net belowit! It tapered from about four inches wide at the stem of the yacht to about three inches at the forward tip. One of the little girl gymnasts who look so much at home on the balance beam would have handled it easily. I sat down and inched my way slowly out to the end. By the time we set sail I had overcome my vertigo and could walk out to the end of the bowsprit; bear in mind that we were still at anchor in the harbour.
Bob had invested in an RDF (radio direction finder) and whatever other navigational equipment he could lay his hands on but I think we may as well have been dead reckoning for all the good it did. Our local expert, Ian Bell-Smythe had been born in Kingston and could speak the local unintelligible patois as well as the natives. As it turned out his most useful function occurred while we were still in Kingston; he was familiar with the locations of all of the private and public social entertainment establishments. I remember him taking me one night to a large public dance hall crowded with mostly black Jamaicans. We were subjected to hostile glances when we entered but after he uttered a few unintelligible local patois phrases we seemed to have been accepted. We sat at a table and had a beer as we watched the myriad of young people circulating about and casting curious glances our way. We left the dance hall after about twenty minutes and had a troupe of roughly fifteen attractive young women follow us out to the car, all hoping to be chosen for membership in our foursome. Oh, my! What to do? What to do?
I was accustomed to sailing on small vessels that were virtually shipshape when I joined them. Having to spend more than three weeks bringing the ship up to snuff was longer than I had expected. There were advantages, however; Bob felt constrained to pick up most of the tabs and I was willing to let him do so, all things considered. We visited Lord Nelson's old repair yard, Port Royal, which had, years previously, disappeared beneath the sea following a subsea earthquake. Lunch at the seafront hotels was always pleasant but occasional necessary visits to the downtown shops were brutal because of the intense heat and humidity.
When we finally set off we found it more convenient to do our main purchase of supplies at Black River for what we reckoned would be a ten day cruise at most. In spite of the plethora of navigational aids Bob had acquired we seemed not to have a clue about where we were. Bob had aspired to sail us to Georgetown at Grand Cayman but our first landfall was Little Cayman (or was it Cayman Brac)? A quick glance at any map will show you the efficacy of Bob's navigational prowess. Our disappointment was somewhat mitigated when the island Governor's son arrived in a small boat to invite us to dine with them that evening. Two hours later the wind picked up and we were listening to the ominous sound of a dragging anchor. Unable to stabilize it we finally hauled it in and said 'Adios!' to the little island.
As the seas picked up Ian indicated that his tummy was becoming unsettled and he finally retired to his bunk. That was great! Our professional seaman retiring to his bunk with seasickness! Meanwhile, up in the cockpit Bob and I were more confused than ever. We had obviously begun to hallucinate and were seeing the lights of Georgetown in every direction. I finally decided we'd be better off in the wide open Caribbean well away from lee shores so sailed 'off and on' all night and during daylight the next day we headed for a safe anchorage in The Isle of Pines.
The night before we reached the Isle of Pines was undoubtedly the worst night I have ever spent at sea. Vicious squalls passed through every hour or so and the jib was raised and dropped at least five times. Each time I had to run out along the full length of the bowsprit and grab one of the metal wire forestays to prevent myself from going overboard. I could then sit down on the bowsprit, remove the pliers from my pants pocket, unscrew the shackle pin and either attach or remove the shackle from the jib. Why me? You might well ask! Bob categorically refused to go before the mast under these sea conditions at night and you know already how much help we were getting from Ian.
The squalls were so vicious that unless the jib was dropped we ran the danger of losing it completely. As soon as a squall had passed it was necessary to raise it again to gain reasonable sailing control. Besides, Bob was the captain; I was merely a lowly deckhand!
Regrettably, on one trip I lost my balance and swung completely down and under the jib. Had I not been holding desperately onto the forestay there's no doubt that I would have gone overboard. Any chance of Bob having been able to pick me up on his own was not possible; even had our 'master seaman' not been lying below on his bunk, the chance would have been slim to impossible. I knew all this as I swung down below the jib and it would have taken steel pliers to release my grip on the forestay. However, in doing so I rubbed my forearm mercilessly against the other of the two forestays. I knew I had to maintain my hold on the forestay as I crawled back up on to the jib or it was 'Lights out!' I finished changing the shackle and made my dash back to the boat and on to the cockpit.
'Jesus! Your arm's covered in blood!' Bob exclaimed.
'Why am I not surprised?' I said sarcastically as I looked down at my arm. From halfway between my wrist and my elbow the skin had been shaved off down to my wrist as though by a microtome and was oozing blood. A scab eventually formed but it required several weeks of picking at the edges before it disappeared completely. We eventually reached the Isle of Pines and found a reasonably calm harbour in the lee of the island but were kept from a decent sleep by the intermittent scraping sound of the anchor on the harbour bottom.
An astonishing thing happened the following day! We sailed north until we reached the Gulf Stream and when we reached it all previous allusions I had about its nature disappeared. I had always thought it was a general but indistinguishable movement of warm Gulf of Mexico water toward the northern latitudes. But no! It was a clear, distinctive stream, almost a river within a lake, moving steadily northeast carrying clumps of Sargasso weed on which were small crabs and other tiny marine creatures presumably completely unwitting but content to be carried to wherever the Stream would carry them.
Toward noon the wind fell out completely and we were becalmed for nearly three hours as the sails flapped uselessly and the main boom swung from side to side as though unable to make up its mind. Then, about mid-afternoon the wind picked up again and we were sailing once more.
'I just remembered something while we were sitting becalmed,' I said to Bob.
'What's that? he said indifferently.
'This is the day I was supposed to be in court getting a divorce! Son of a bitch!'
'Oh, is that all?' he said with a faint smile. 'I don't think you're gonna make it!'
As darkness began to fall we entered the area of sea lanes used by the ocean freighters and were passed by several large vessels emitting the long, lugubrious sounds of their foghorns as a light fog began to form. We thought it was not really fog weather but assumed they were testing their equipment to make sure it would be functioning if needed. Our main concern was our lack of running lights and the fact that in the absence of a radar reflector we would be effectively invisible especially it there were no moon. Our concerns became more real when we were passed within one hundred yards by two large vessels heading through the Florida Straits as they passed the southern tip of the East Coast of America.
'I think we're going to be in deep 'doo-doo' if we don't rig up some kind of running lights soon,' I told Bob. 'Not to mention if the Coast Guard should catch us out here without running lights.' I had no sooner said it than I saw the lights of a huge vessel apparently heading directly for us from about two miles distant. Bob was suddenly galvanized into doing something.
'Get that kerosene lantern under my bunk lighted up as quick as you can, Ian!' he shouted down to our bedridden 'superstar'.
'Will do!' came the reply. Minutes passed. The lights came perceptibly closer.
'How ya doin'?' I shouted a moment later. Finally I went over and peered through the hatch into the cabin below. Ian had just lighted the wick and it was smoldering and smoking ineffectively.
"I'm doubtful if that tired old thing is going to do us any good,' I said, turning to Bob. 'The mantle looks like it hasn't ever been cleaned. They'll probably mistake it for a firefly if they see it at all!' I was thoroughly pissed off.
'Here it is,' I heard Ian call out. I went over to the hatch and looked down. He was standing in the saloon holding up the lantern. He thinks he's the Statue of Liberty, I thought. I reached for the handle and he released it when my hand was still a good six inches away. The lantern fell to the saloon deck and the reservoir smashed. Kerosene was beginning to spread over the saloon deck.
'Son of a bitch!' I cried as I scrambled down the companionway and grabbed a fire extinguisher from its hook on the bulkhead. I had visions of us burning to the waterline as I directed the CO2 stream at the flaming wick.
'Get back in the bunk, you useless bastard,' I snarled. Ian tottered away and flopped down in the master bunk. I scrambled back up to the cockpit; we could clean up the mess below later.
'Do we have any other lights aboard?' I asked Bob.
'There are flashing lights on the life preservers,' he replied.
'Thank Christ! Let's hope they work!' I said, dashing below again, taking care to avoid the broken glass. I came back up hugging two life jackets and we quickly removed the lights. It didn't take us long to find out that if we held them upside down they gave off a strong flashing light that could probably be seen for a mile or more. We'll probably never know if the freighter saw them or not. We only know that she passed us by and we were visible to others that came near to us and veered away.
We headed toward the lights of Key West and were eventually north of the sea lanes and in the purview of the key. There was a light following breeze and we had the delight of gliding silently along on virtually calm water. The sound of voices from other vessels came clearly to us and we came finally to an unused mooring buoy and tied up for the night. At daybreak the next morning I was nagging Bob to move on up to the jetty and soon after that I was on the telephone to my lawyer. He was unable to restrain his amusement when I told him I was becalmed off Key West when I was supposed to be in court.
'Not to worry,' he said. 'I'll just say you can't make it for reasons beyond your control. The judge will set it over.'
'Let's hope so!' I said. Nevertheless I made incredible connections on the airlines and flew from Key West to Miami, then from Miami to Toronto and from Toronto to Calgary virtually non-stop. I notified 'Smitty' that I was back and then awaited the big day. In the event I met my former spouse at the courthouse on the appointed date and she informed me that she 'hadn't been able to sleep a wink!' Migawd! I thought-- she's not going to go through with it! By the time our case was heard I had manged to get her to swallow a couple of tranquillizers and she was as mellow and calm as a Hindu yogi. I was then able to return to the peace and quiet of my bachelor pad at Rideau Towers.
— The End —