Marie Christine writesé
generator turbine was gone, the self-steering wrecked. The Navstar aerial, lifebuoy, strobe light, spinnaker jockey pole and a winch handle had all been washed away. Sitting up in the doghouse with me, Richard disappeared into his greying beard, squirming with embarrassment. He was spending very long hours there, offering good cheer and chocolate to whoever was on watch.
Down below, our home for the next 18 months had swiftly deteriorated into little more than a rolling jumble of soggy cardboard boxes. My bunk was awash, the leaking windows quite unable to repel the rollers raking the deck. It was the hard routine again: two hours asleep on the boards in the saloon and then a couple at the wheel.
I kept reassuring the others that the seas were ‘only average for this boat’, which I’d twice raced round the world. But I was no longer quite so sure myself. I’d read in the Guinness Book of Records that the biggest wave in the world had been recorded one autumn off the west coast of Ireland – 150ft was the measurement that came to mind.
“Big one, John!” Will called, looking back into the night. Out of the corner of each eye, on either side, in the glow from the stern light, I glimpsed a white curtain rearing up to overtake us. The bow dropped to seven o’clock and the stern rose to one. I misjudged it. The bow swung to the right as we broached and the boat charged across the side of the breaking wave as it rolled over us. We were on our side. The wheel was wrenched from my hands. I was swimming. The ammonia taste of salt water squirting up my nose reminded me of failed childhood surfing in Cornwall. Only my harness held me in the cockpit. I thought of little Isso in her bunk below.
The 25-ton boat shuddered gallantly upright, water streaming from her decks. It was John to whom we owed so much. He had been the architect of this adventure; he had seen us right. I thought about the lines from Tennyson’s Ulysses, which could have been written for John. ‘How dull it is to make an end. To rust unburnished, not to shine in use’ and wondered how long it would be before he became restless again.
Every hour brought us nearer our goal. We rolled into the Sea of the Hebrides. John spotted the misty island of Barra. We sped on, excitedly spotting familiar landmarks – Neish, Vaternish, Trodda – and in gathering darkness we picked up the lights of Lochinver, Stornaway and Stoer Point. The bulk of Handa Island loomed out of the night. John had sailed more than 750 times around this island, so there shouldn’t be any more surprises.
I had not dared allow myself to think of this moment until it was actually happening. Shafts of watery sun pierced the chill grey April dawn as we sailed into the loch. It was 554 days and nights since we had set off, and our odyssey, with its many snares to test our watchfulness, skill and, above all, patience, was complete. I could finally surrender to the soft, safe embrace of home.
I hopped down the narrow hatch, grabbing at a few of my personal items – toothbrush, camera, shampoo. But nothing was vital now. The moment of arriving had changed the status of all my possessions. The meagre hoarded treats – a half-bottle of whisky stuffed under the spare jumpers that doubled as a pillow; the hidden squares of chocolate; the few faded clean clothes – lost their value at a stroke. Once I stepped ashore, faithless as a fickle lover, I would turn my back on the boat. It might be all of another 17 years before I committed myself again; before I was prepared to take the vows required for this special order of yachtperson, forsaking privacy, comfort, space and accepting a constant undercurrent of dread.
And so the story ends, the circle is complete, farewell to ocean waves, I have ground beneath my feet.
It was only eight years until Marie Christine went to sea with John once more, this time on a circumnavigation to draw attention to the plight of the wandering albatross.