I don't know about you, but when I saw this coming at me just before darkness turned all to murk and mystery, I figured I had better put on my big boy pants and do something, anything, quick.

It was to be my welcome to the Indian Ocean. Flitting about the cockpit hauling on line and pulling on rope, the thing, looking for all the world like it escaped from some Japanese sci-fi horror film, passed harmlessly astern visibly churning the waters beneath it white while dark sheets of rain slanted wildly away. Saved by the Coriolis Force I was, as it veered off to the left of the prevailing wind.

The Indian Ocean. I can hardly believe it. It sounds a long ways away. And different. And exotic. Arabian Dhows and pirates and cyclones different (None if which I am anxious to see by the way). It is no place to take lightly with extremes of temperature, current, water depth and bottom topography the norm any one of which can normal on its ear. Taken together, they can spell disaster. With my sights now set on Cape Leeuwin, I must not forget to look back every now and then as the worst of the weather ending up east of Good Hope is stirred up over Brazil and Argentina.

As it is, there is a 2.5 - 3 knot current sweeping us north while Seaburban, becalmed, rolls and bangs in a steep, sometimes breaking 6 - 10 foot mixed swell. I entertain myself by seeing how far different objects fly when left loose on the dinette table and trying to persuade Sir Salty to wager his ration of grog on an arm wrestling contest between a Port and Starboard.