Image - Great Barrier Reef, Australia

Good friend Bob Rouner of Houston, Texas, just sent me this well written account of what it is like to sail alone under demanding conditions.

At 0730, after listening to the wind gust at 25 kts or more thru the rigging all night and feeling the constant jerk of the anchor chain, the lone yachtsman struggles against the wind on deck, wondering how to escape this blustery, whitecapped anchorage and get the anchor up. Freeing the snubber takes 30 minutes as the yacht violently yawls around its anchor, and the chain tries to take the skippers fingers. Repeated trips to the helm to engage the engine to slack the chain, and finally the hook is aboard, the vessel turns beam to the wind and is flattened with a gust over the saddle between the large hills. She is doing 2.5 kts under bare poles as the lone sailor crawls back to the cockpit to take the helm. Now cold and wet, the yachtsman puts up a scrap of jib and sails out of Cape Bedford, mindful of what Captain Cook must have experienced in these same waters more than 200 years ago.

Around 0930, with about half the jib out, the yacht is corkscrewing along at 8 kts, rolling heavily in the short but steep curling seas generated in the shallow 60 ft waters inside the Great Barrier Reef. The turquoise water is covered in boiling whitecaps and flying spume from enhanced tradewinds of a steady 30 knots and gusting higher, coming from just aft the beam, and is expected to continue for days as a big high moves up from south Australia, pushing its bulging strength up against a lazy low hanging over Papua New Guinea, creating a squeeze zone and a virtual wind tunnel in this barren landscape. Just off the port bow, Cape Flattery is partially obscured by a passing rain squall. In the distance lies Lizard Island, about 30 miles off, offering the possibility of a calm anchorage for an already tired solo sailor. Patches of blue begin to appear among the white clouds with dark grey bottoms but they, like a pretending woman, are only a tease, for they are soon gone, and the sky darkens as the brooding weather increases. The world that is within the yachtsman's vision is full of noise, motion, water, anxiety, and thrill, reefs galore lurking about waiting to destroy the unwary and careless.

Despite the lure of a tropical calm and secure anchorage ahead, the experienced Skipper's confidence is mixed with trepidation as he already is rehearsing in his mind how he will successfully anchor his ship, worried whether he will be able to get the hook down before the relentless trades blow him backwards too fast for the anchor to set hard, resulting in a collision with other yachts in the mooring field, or worse, coming to grief on the nearby reef. Such worries arise from a deep and lingering fear, like the ringing in the lone sailor's ears, that never goes away and is always lurking in the background, waiting for the slightest circumstance to spring it to life. In a second, these anxieties are vanished as a rogue beam sea slaps the side of the hull and sends a waterfall of seawater crashing into the cockpit, bringing the Sailor back to the present moment. He decides to roll out the jib to the 2nd reef point to help steady the yacht, a slight smile appears on his raw and whiskered face as a glance at the knotmeter shows over 8 knots. Feeling good, the yachtsman eases out some more jib, but no matter how much he tries, he is unable to see 10 kts, 9.4 being the best he can achieve, even on a surf.

As they close on Lizard Island, the rudder on the Aries self-steering gear comes loose and flips up out of the water, a gust of wind hits and the yacht rounds to the wind, laying her over, and yet another beam sea washes aboard. After securing the servo-rudder, the Skipper takes the helm and decides to take the pleasure of driving his vessel on to the anchorage. As they round the island and head east to the anchorage, the solo sailor grinds the genoa winch as the yacht is now hard on the wind, spray is soaking the bow and flying over the dodger as she pounds to windward for the last mile. Several yachts are sighted in the small anchorage, and the butterflies return to the Sailor's stomach. His yacht is heeling badly as she drives to weather, the feeling is exhilarating to the Sailor, especially so since he knows the yachts in the anchorage are watching his ship heeled and driving hard. Then, with less effort than parking a car, the lone yachtsman rolls up his sail, fires up the engine, goes forward to prepare the anchor, and calmly motors in between the moored yachts, finds a proper spot in 12 ft of water, having already calculated the low and high water marks for the coming tides, drops the anchor in free fall, snubs it up for a good set, then slowly eases out 120 ft of chain, attaches the main snubber and a backup snubber, eases the halyard, returns to the cockpit, hops below and cracks open a cold beer. The VHF radio soon crackles with familiar voices from nearby yachts "Boomerang, Boomerang, welcome to Lizard Island."

Another successful day without tragedy for the solo Sailor. Later, after a proper shower and a stiff rum, the solo yachtsman sits in the cockpit, gazing at the stars, listening to the wind singing in the rig, and contemplates where the wind will take him next, charts spread out in front of him, he thinks of Flinders,Cape Melville, Thursday Island, Gove, and Darwin. Time for another spot of rum. And so it goes...........
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At 7/30/2009 10:07 AM (utc) my position was 14�39.60'S 145�27.09'E