LITMIR.BIZ

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was starting to set as we rounded the harbour wall. The swell was getting bigger. We were excited about this; it meant good surf the next day. There was a northeasterly blowing, which would be helping us down the coast. None of us had sailed before, but we were keen to learn. The captain was showing us the ropes as the wind filled the mainsail and we were off on our adventure.

      It had been a beautiful, sunny day in East London – until the sun went down. We were not even 10 kilometres out when we noticed the wind picking up. Every gust blowing harder and stronger than the previous one, until the ocean was whipped up into a frenzy.

      Angry waves bashed into our yacht and, before we knew it, we were caught in a severe storm.

      The captain stayed calm. He commanded Miles and me to strike the mainsail. As we started turning the crank to bring it down, we heard a massive ripping sound. We both looked up and realised the sail must’ve got caught against something sharp. Then the wind just ripped it further.

      ‘Be careful!’ the captain shouted.

      We had no idea what we were doing, so we kept cranking until the sail was fully down. In a moment, we had lost our mainsail. The boat was tossed around violently as we battled to secure ourselves on the deck.

      We didn’t think to tie the sail down onto the boom.

      Another wave hit us. Eyeball screamed. We looked up and we saw him holding his wrist. The wind had caught the unsecured sail and sent the boom jibing across the deck, missing his face by a hair’s breadth. It knocked his diving watch right off his wrist and into the ocean. Eyeball was in shock.

      The captain kept shouting above the noise of the storm, telling us he would be using the motor to get us back to the harbour. It spluttered and coughed as it sprang to life. The boat slowly turned into the face of the storm. The Vagabond fought bravely through the oncoming swell. The motor strained to keep her moving forward. We’d hardly turned around when we heard a loud clunk. The captain stuck his head in the engine room. A few minutes later, he came back up. The motor had seized.

      ‘Not to worry,’ he said. ‘We’ll send out a mayday distress call to the harbour.’

      The wind and waves kept driving us deeper into the ocean, until we could barely see the city lights. We were only a few miles from the harbour. Why was no one picking up our distress call?

      The two-way radio wasn’t working.

      Eyeball’s sea legs didn’t last long. He was doubled over the side of the boat, emptying his stomach. Miles stuck by his side, making sure he didn’t go overboard. The captain, looking more distressed, told us he was going to try to fix the motor.

      And that is where he stayed all night.

      The captain gave me the job of ‘steering’ the yacht. I tried my best to point the bow in the direction that the wind was blowing. I had no idea what I was doing, or if I was even doing anything to affect the direction that we were moving in. The wind gusts kept getting more violent. Miles and I still hadn’t secured the mainsail properly to the boom, and the wind kept unfurling it and chasing it up the mast.

      This, in turn, would cause the boom to jibe unexpectedly and dangerously across the deck. We also hadn’t secured ‘the preventer’. We didn’t know what ‘the preventer’ was, let alone how to fasten it. (The preventer is a line that stops the boom from jibing across the deck if the wind shifts or boat rolls.)

      The captain came up on the deck to check our position and noticed the unsecured sail.

      He shouted at Miles and a very sick Eyeball to tie down the sail and secure that preventer thing. At least Miles had the sense to ask for harnesses, but the captain didn’t have any.

      Cautiously, they stumbled across the deck to secure the sail. As they got there, another violent gust of wind caught it. The boom jibed straight in their direction. They instinctively tried to stop it, but they were lifted right off their feet instead. They grabbed onto the sail, the various tangled ropes attached to the boom, and hung on for dear life. The boat rolled. The boom jibed … and cleared the gunwale. It rolled so far that their legs dipped into the ocean. Rolling back, the boom swung across the deck. They let go and fell onto the deck, shaking with fear. Knowing that, had they slipped off the boom, it would’ve been the last we’d see either of them.

      They still had a job to do, securing down the mythical preventer and tying down the sail.

      Miles and Eyeball found me hanging onto the helm where I cluelessly tried to figure out how to steer the yacht. Eyeball’s face was the picture of fear. He started crying. My head was spinning from the never-ending rolling and pitching. I never felt sick, but I was beyond exhausted.

      What should we do, they asked. I said, ‘Nothing. There’s nothing we can do.’

      I was an old hand at coping with traumatic events by learning to shut down my fear.

      Miles was furious. ‘You don’t care about anyone! You selfish Dutchman!’

      I didn’t say anything. I didn’t know what to say.

      I couldn’t provide them with any assurance that things would be okay. I didn’t know how else to deal with the stress of our predicament and the trauma they were experiencing.

      I had what could be called ‘stupid peace’. The kind of peace that comes from naiveté. I was too young to die. Surely we just needed to wait out the storm and everything would work out. I had no idea of the grave danger we were in.

      The east coast of South Africa is a notorious coastline. For hundreds of years, it has been a graveyard for ships of all sizes. Violent storms, massive waves, deep water, treacherous currents and rocky reefs can suddenly create conditions that have seen the end of many a sailor.

      Miles started to calm down when he figured out that there was some logic to my thinking. He said he was hungry and made his way to the galley. He found some pork sausages and decided to fry them up. They smelled really bad, getting worse as he cooked them. The pungent smell of the oily pork sausages and the constant smell of diesel and fish didn’t help his cause. The exercise was near-impossible in the constant rolling and pitching. He took one bite of those semi-cooked porkies and that was the end of it.

      He came flying up onto the deck and doubled over the rail, feeding the fish, as he heaved away.

      It was way past midnight. The wind was relentless, driving the yacht further into the open ocean and down the coast. Waves kept battering us from all sides, sending shuddering shocks through our bodies every time a big one hit. I couldn’t take it any more. My head kept spinning and my body ached from the beating. I had not eaten anything since lunchtime the day before.

      I was exhausted, so I stumbled my way to the cabin in the bow of the boat, looking for a place to sleep. I lay down on a green tarpaulin that lay on the cabin deck. I was desperate for my head to stop spinning. It didn’t help matters that, every time the boat rolled, I could see clouds through the porthole. When it rolled back, I would see the water. I feared that the boat would turn turtle. I eventually passed out.

      When I woke in the morning, hours later, there was no movement, like the yacht was stranded on dry land. Feeling disorientated, I made way to the deck to see where the others were.

      It was overcast. There was not a breath of wind. I couldn’t see land anywhere. There was just water all around us. The ocean was a weird, green colour, glassy like a mirror and completely flat. I couldn’t make out the horizon; it had blended into the clouds.

      I felt claustrophobic, right in the middle of an open ocean. The eeriness of it all made it feel like we were in some kind of alternate universe. There was no sound. No bashing waves or rushing wind. No traffic sounds or dogs barking; all familiar sounds were absent.

      I found Eyeball and Miles sitting on the deck towards the bow of the boat. It seemed like they had forgiven me for ‘not caring’. I asked them if they knew where we were. They told me the captain said we were near Madagascar Reef.

      ‘What?’ I said it was impossible that we had blown all the way to Madagascar!

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