In the morning there was no improvement in the weather. Boiling water for tea was out of the question again so I had a Coke Zero instead but what I really wanted was a nice cup of tea. Somehow Coke Zero just didn't hit the spot like good cuppa would have.
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| Flying fish were regularly found dead on the deck |
Everyone seemed to be very lethargic but then there wasn't much else to do except sit around and be rocked to sleep. Standing was nigh on impossible, if not dangerous. At best you were in danger of falling into something hard, at worst there was a real danger of going over the very low side rail and into the drink. John kept falling asleep with his rod in his hand but then as he wasn't catching much else since his moment of success yesterday, he wasn't about to be disturbed.
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| This photo shows how much the boat was rolling |
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| . . . as does this one |
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| . . . and this one |
I did another calculation this morning and reckon it's still going to take us at least another 3 days to get to Subic Bay, not accounting for all the spinning around and mis-direction, which was depressing enough, never mind not being able to have a cup of tea.
The chilled/frozen food in the so called refrigerators was already soggy, limp and turning rotten so the joke was that with our current progress we were all going to go down with scurvy.
To make matters worse I notice we've changed course and were heading due south and not south-east towards the Philippines. When I queried this I was told that Berk had decided the best course of action was to head south because that's where the better weather would be. Quite how he could determine this remains a mystery to me but it didn't seem a particularly bright idea.
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| Berk at the wheel |
To my mind, considering the vulnerability of the boat we were travelling in, we would be better making for the Philippines in the shortest route possible as once we were in sight of land we would be in range of safe anchorage, harbours, mobile phones, fuel, possibly more sheltered waters and plenty of other craft to rescue us in the event of an emergency (bearing in mind we'd not seen another vessel since heading out).
I made breakfast for the crew which consisted of ham and tomato sandwiches. Jim was raving about what fabulous sandwiches they were but when you're hungry it's amazing how good tinned ham and tomatoes in plastic bread tastes.
Lunch was pot noodles. We took the risk of boiling a kettle of water (and it nearly ended in an accident) as we were in need of some hot food.
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| Pot Noodle lunch |
It was time to top up the fuel tanks and so Berk went below deck to top up the main tanks from the drums we had filled in Hong Kong. Below deck there wasn't much room and in the rough conditions standing was difficult. Berk had the hand pump and placed it in one of the barrels with the hose running across deck to the fuel tank fulling point. Once he started turning the handle diesel started spraying out from every conceivable connection and I couldn't help thinking that even without the right tool I would have made a better job of putting the pump together so it didn't leak. Diesel was spraying the deck below making it very, very slippery. It went onto the hot engine making it smoke and was soaking Berk in smelly fuel. As he tried to crank the handle on the pump, which was taking twice as long as it was sucking in air, Berk kept slipping on the deck and the only thing that was to hand, and which he grabbed by reflex, was the exhaust pipe scalding his hand. If he did it once, he did it a dozen times. Most of it was insulated except the bit that was used as a step to access the engine room, and this was the bit Berk kept grabbing. But he very soon let go, cussing and swearing. I don't consider myself a vindictive person but I was kind of enjoying watching this go on and thinking to myself as I watched 'I've sacked people for doing less that that'!
One drum down and only 3 to go: it was going to be a close thing to get to our destination on the fuel we had available.
By late afternoon the battering that the boat was taking on the port side (a symptom of going due south) took its toll and a large piece of the front trim broke off. Jim managed to induce a fair amount of anxiety by declaring that the boat was starting to break up but retracted his statement saying it was superficial damage only. Regardless, it looked like a pretty significant chunk of the boat. A salvage team (me and Jim) was organised as the timber was held in place by the handrail netting and was bashing against the side of the boat. The easiest solution would have been to cut it free but Jim, obviously as it was part his investment, wanted to salvage what was a significant lump of wood for the repairs to be carried out later so after several attempts it was hauled up and lashed to the side of the deck.
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| Parts of the boat were being knocked off |
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| Steering the boat didn't get any easier. The loop-de-loop usually occurred at a change over. |
That evening Jim and I were on the 9pm to midnight shift. We were unable to agree over the heading we are taking. I thought the arguments that I was putting forward to get as close a possible to the coastline made sense but Jim could only counter argue that he thought that what Berk had decided in heading south was the best idea. And so we continued to head deeper into the South China Sea half way between the Philippines and Vietnam. It would be a long swim to shore.
Our progress over the next 24 hours was as follows (note the change of direction heading due south):
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| Progress shown in green |
