# The North Marquise Islands.



## Cpt Dick Brooks (May 13, 2013)

Début lay at anchor off the main pier of the small town in the Bain de Taiohae, in Naka Hiva. She had just crossed the Pacific Ocean from Acapulco in Mexico to the Marquise Archipelago in just over twelve days. We had just been given out six month cruising permit after paying out U.S. $14,000 as a bond for all the crew on board... all bar less than U.S. $2,000 in cash that we had on the ship.
At the mall hotel overlooking the harbour, I met up with a lone yachtsman from Sweden. Egon had already sailed single-handed half was around the world once before on another yacht, to be wrecked in the Philippines, and had returned home to build the small Ferro-cement Skippy. He had taken almost five months to reach the Galapagos Islands from Panama, nearly running out of fresh-water and suc***bing to starvation. He only managed to catch one fish on his nine hundred mile voyage across the eastern Pacific Ocean.
After a bad storm off the Marquise Archipelago, his un-stayed junk-rigged mast had cracked at the base, and he'd limped into port. Now the French Administration wanted to kick him out of French Polynesia because he was broke. I towed him alongside Début with my launch, and the crew soon had his mast lifted out on to our deck and repaired. He stayed alongside us until we were ready to leave the main harbour ourselves.
Egon told us of the second highest waterfall in the world, a little way along the south coast of the island. it was second to the highest waterfall in the world at Angel Falls, in South America, of two thousand, seven hundred seven hundred feet. We mounted an expedition to the base of the two thousand foot cascade, and swam in the crystal-clear pool at the bottom of the falls.
Just before our arrival in Nuka Hiva, a French adventurer had set out to sail his outrigger-stabilized windsurfer to Hawaii to beat the world windsurfing record. After two days at sea with very light airs, he'd put back and returned to the island. As he hadn't bothered taking an outward customs clearance for his small craft, the French Administration came down on him like a ton of bricks. After taking all the abuse he could stand from the insufferable, pompous bureaucrats, he jumped on his windsurfer and set off for Tahiti. He was wrecked in the Tuamotu Archipelago, over six hundred miles towards the south-west, and still claimed the world record.
The official photographer for his attempt on the world windsurfing record was The Whitt, an American who worked for one of the sporting magazines. He wanted to catch up with the Baron in Tahiti to cover the story, but was stuck in Nuka Hiva with all his camera equipment. I offered him a lift on Debut, and he was signed on as crew at the immigration office.
Big-Anna was rather struck by him, and fancied her chances for a spot of romance. She arranged to sneak off with him during our trip to the cascade, and gleefully ran naked into the rainforest to have her way with him. Half an hour later, they re-immerged with The Whitt displaying a bloody nose and feeling rather sorry for himself.
Big-Anna was in a right temper. "This bastard is a ******!" she shouted, pointing at The Whitt. "He tried to Greek me!"
After that, The Whitt showed more interest in Siggy, as he tended to swing both ways. A few days later, I got up in the night for a stretch in the early hours of the morning and hear a noise out on deck, just in front of the wheel-house. On the raised platform behind the main winch, The Whitt and Siggy were taking turns in going down on each other. I silently watched for a while, then went back to my bunk for a cuddle with Lorraine.
Just after a week from our arrival in the island, we raised the anchor and got underway for Taipi Bay... the next bay towards the east. Within 35 minutes, we'd anchored in Anse Hanga Hoa in 45 feet of water, with three shackles of chain.
The local fishermen told me that the reef-fish around the island were poisonous with ciguatera, so I instructed all my crew to only fish for pelagic fish outside the reef. Without my knowledge, The Whitt brought on board a speared angel fish, intending on using it for bait. As soon as it hit the deck, the ship's bear grabbed it and ran off for a feed. The ship's cat must have also eaten some, as the next day they both came down with ciguatera fish poison. They were both physically sick, and were paralysed below the waist. Both animals were in a right state, suffering from double incontinence.
Some of the crew were badly upset because of the animal's suffering, and thought it would be more humane to put them down. I explained to them that both doctors on board wanted to study the various treatment they used, and how long it took for their recovery. Their next Ciguatera patient might be them, and the doctors needed a better idea how to treat the illness. And I was sure that they wouldn't like to be put down to ease their suffering!
Because many of the smaller communities on the islands only had a district nurse, the two ship's doctors were asked on many occasions to run a clinic for the local population. They both took a quantity of medication with them, and practiced in their own particular field. Yachtsmen in the anchorage with us often came on board for treatment, especially the girls to have an IUD inserted. Those who were up for it, could have it christened on the mess-room table.
We mounted many expeditions into the interior from the anchorage, apart from lots of diving trips among the rocks outside the bay. The main foray we made ended with me cutting open my hand in the rain-forest on a length of bamboo, and having to walk five miles out of the jungle with Siggy. Lying naked on the mess-room table with both our doctors around me, and with Big-Anna, Lillann and Carrie as their attendant nurses, they cleaned up my wound and stitched me up after anaesthetizing my hand with a wrist-lock. In all the time Nick and Alex were on the ship, I was their only medical emergency operation.
It was while we were anchored in Taipi Bay that Gabby and Roland joined the ship. He was a short Swiss guy, while she was a tall German fraulein. They had travelled as crew on board a yacht from Peru, but wanted to get off because of bad feeling on board. I signed them on Debut before we left for Hiva Oa.
At 0735 hours on 25th September, we got underway, and I set a course of 125° into the auto-pilot after clearing Cape Tikapo. There was a light breeze from the eat, and the sea was calm. A slight easterly swell set in, with visibility of 35 miles.
Hiva Oa was sighted on the port bow at noon, and at 0700 hours we entered the Canal du Bordelais. Debut entered the Baie Taara half an hour later, and anchored in Baie Tahucka in 24 feet of water, with two shackles of Chain. It was a very exposed anchorage... on the windward side of the inland... with a heavy ground-swell rolling in from the east. A skeleton crew had to be kept on board at all times in case the anchor dragged, and the ship having to put to sea.
Because Gabby and Roland had joined Debut from a yacht that ad siled from South America, the Gendarmerie sent a four man search team on board to rummage the ship. They were under the impression that everyone who comes from Latin America must be carrying suitcases filled with narcotics. Other than the large stock of legal drugs our doctors kept in the ship's sick bay, they found nothing of interest and left very disappointed.
We only stayed four days at Hiva Oa... long enough to get our cruising permit for the Southern Marquise Islands. We all wanted to visit Fatu Hiva... of Thor Heyerdahl fame... but the island is administered from Hiva Oa. At 1245 hours on 29th September, we got underway, leaving the uncomfortable anchorage of Baie Takuaka behind us. 
The brooding island of Fatu Hiva was sighted on the port bow two hours later, its peaks reaching up into the sky like outstretched fingers from a mire. They steamed and smouldered as if they'd just been thrust up from the indigo depths of the ocean floor, over two miles below. Brown and black outcrops of bare rock broke through the dense canopy of vegetation covering them, and ancient orchards dotted their slopes.
As the ship drew nearer, groups of white goats could be seen moving about the sheer cliffs, which rose straight from the sea. They clung on to the clefts in the rock, some no larger than finger-holds. Seabirds screeched around them, trying to protect their nests from attack, their cries echoing back out to sea from the vertical walls of rock.
The swell became more gentle once we were under the lee of the island, and broke in a lazy whoosh against the jaggered crevices. Small caves and inlets were cut into the cliffs by the continuous action of the sea, their voids acting as a sounding board. Debut turned to port, and the Bay of Virgins opened out in front of us. A cluster of small white yachts huddled within its shelter, like baby chicks trying to squeeze under the protective wings of a brooding hen.
The crew stood about the decks, looking at the island and pointed at its wonders. A tunnel led beneath an arch in the cliffs on our starboard beam, to the calm water's of a bay on the other side. Hanavave Valley led up to a ridge of mountains in front of us, which ran north-east to south-west down the island like a central spine. On the other side of the range was the Voodoo Valley, leading down to the sea on the windward side of the island.
After ringing the telegraph, the water boiled under Debut's stern, bringing her up short. The anchor splashed down into the cobalt depth a 160 feet below, the chain following in a cloud of rust. The ship eased astern clear of the bay, and we let go a stern anchor in 210 feet of water, then shortened up on the bow anchor until we were once more under shelter. When her machinery was shut down, an eerie silence descended over the bay, with only the whoosh of the swell breaking on the rocks nearby.
I scanned the shore through my binoculars, and watched the frenzied activities of the islanders. They were launching their dug-out canoes through the surf to come out to the ship. I studied the small black dots as they gunned their outboard motors towards us. All the best, Cpt Dick Brooks.


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## sidsal (Nov 13, 2007)

Blimey, Cpt Dick - you've had an adventurous life.
I cir***navigated under sail - 250 ton ketch in the 80's and called at NUku Hiva in the Marquesas.
I am in my 90the year and was at sea in ww2 having trained n HMS Conway. Left the sea after 1 years as I caught TB but sailed with nephew who skippered large yachts.


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## Cpt Dick Brooks (May 13, 2013)

*For Sidsal.*

Good to hear from you, Sidsal. You're doing well being in your ninetieth year... I hope I make it that far. I've just turned seventy myself, after spending twenty six years at sea as captain of my own ships all over the world. After spending eleven years in the Home Trade area, I'd had enough of the cold, the fog, the strong tides, but most of all the rows and rows of sandbanks. Those first eleven years were spent under sail, on my Blue Bell, that was a 42 foot gaff-rigged ouster smack originally out of Whitstable, and my second ship was the 72 foot gaff yawl, Biche, that was originally a French Thoniers from the Breton Bay of Biscay coast, fishing out of Isle de Groix for tuna with lines from long poles.
After buying the 110 foot Lowestoft trawler, Dauntless Star, I took her out to Dubai on a year voyage with two friends, then after working a couple of months as a commercial diver and relief captain of an 800 ton ex-German freighter, Lux, I sold her with a two year contract to work as her master.
When I returned to the UK at the end of 1977, I stayed in Bristol for a while with Hooky, an old friend from my Dubai days, to acclimatise to the English winter after the 64° Celsius temperatures of the Persian Gulf. In the spring of 1978, I bought the 189 foot Ross Resolution, changed her name to Début and converted her to a dive-support vessel and a full salvage ship. I then took her for a twelve year voyage around the tropical world, including sailing her for 4,600 miles under sail with just my young Polynesian Wife on board after we ran short of fuel. After spending over a year at Cairns, in Australia, I was shipwrecked in the Coral Sea and spent three years castaway on Emily Reef, off the Far North Queensland Coast of Australia.
I have written seven books of my adventures, each with 30 or more coloured photographs, and have almost finished the first draft of my eighth and last book, From Beat to Open Deck. For further details of my work, go to the Books forum under Whisky and Water, The Black Ship's Odyssey and The Black Ship Trilogy. All the best, Cpt Dick Brooks.


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