# Windblown Through the South Seas to Australia.



## Cpt Dick Brooks (May 13, 2013)

A third of the population of Funafuti are Samoan, resettled there after the islands were decimated many years before by a vicious cyclone. We were received with a generous welcome by them when they heard that Mariana was from Apia. They took us to their traditional fales and cooked an umu in our honour. In this sleepy little island in the South Seas, it was quite an event for them, us arriving with such a large ship and only two people on board.
Because Debut's hull was painted black, with her accommodation-block in storm grey... done so in preparation to fight in the Falkland War... the do-gooder missionaries on the island persuaded the government that she was evil. They had nothing personal against me or Mariana, but said she had to leave. I tried explaining to them that a ship is only made of wood and steel, so how could she be evil... but they wouldn't have any of it and closed their ears. We had no light-coloured paint left on board to repaint the ship to appease their dislike.
It came back to me how the priest in Bequia, in the Caribbean, had told the local residence to kill a harmless manta ray on the beach when it swam into the shallows. Because of its black colour and horned mouth, he'd urged them on in a frenzy to slash it to pieces while it was still alive, saying it was the devil-fish. These people have no idea of the harm they cause to others with their good intentions.
We took stock of the situation on board, and found that we only had enough fuel in the header-tank to last for two hours... the four deep-tanks being empty. That would badly get us outside the lagoon again, and clear of the island! There was enough foodstuffs in the storeroom to last a fortnight, plus enough rice and beans to keep us alive another month or so more. When I checked in my purse, I found we were down to our last American dollar and some change.
As luck would have it, a small inheritance from my recently departed mother arrived the day we had to leave. With it, we provisioned our ship's stores, but they wouldn't extend our stay so we could bunker. There was only time to load three forty four gallon barrels of fuel-oil, and that would only last the main engine another six hours at dead slow.
To thank the Samoan population, who'd been so good to us during our stay on their island, we threw a farewell party in the messroom on board the ship. They brought with them their guitars and ukuleles to serenade us with their songs, plus sacks of coconuts, taro and breadfruit for Mariana's island-style cooking.
At 1130 hours on 26th February, we got underway and steamed across the lagoon. Just over an hour later, Debut went through the Te Ava I Do Lap Pass at slack low water, and out into the open sea. At 1310 hours, we stopped the main engine and pulled up the sails, heading north-west on the starboard tack. The weather was sunny and bright with a calm sea, and the ship was steady. We settled down to get on with our lives for another long ocean passage.
It wasn't until dawn on our forth day out at sea that we lost sight of Funafuti Atoll. The wind had been light from the north-east the first few days, but it became fresh just before dusk on the third afternoon, taking us from the island.
The weather deteriorated as the days went by until we were in the midst of a full storm. With only the two heavy storm-sails set, we were making good time towards the south-west. By the second week out at sea, we got caught up in Cyclone Gavin, with screaming winds and rain from the north-east. Once the eye of the storm passed over us, the wind backed round to the north-west, driving Debut before it to the south.
During the 8th March the strong south-westerly winds eased down and backed to the north-west again. Debut rolled heavily in the large ground swell, causing the sails to slat from side to side. I kept them up, sheeted home hard to stabilize the ship. Just after dawn, we caught our first masi-masi since leaving Funafuti... a wonderful start to the day. This was the first of many, and after that we could eat as much as we wanted. On 12th March, the weather quickly deteriorated during the morning. After catching two masi-masi at ten thirty, the wind picked up to gale force from the north-west.
By dawn the next day, the wind had gone round to the north-east, allowing us to head west again on our course, but was back to the north-west before ten o'clock. We had our second cyclone warning from Nandi at 1230 hours, putting cyclone Hena just ahead of us, south-west of our present position. Four hours later, a heavy squall-line ripped out the foresail, and we had to get on deck to lower it before it tore itself to shreds in the wind.
For the next week, we were mixed up with this storm, as it slowly tracked south-east to smash into Fiji. The days blended into one, with continuous screaming wind and driving rain. Although our position wasn't enviable, at least we had a large ship under our feet, and not some tiny yacht. Debut was riding gently in the large, confused sea, with very little water coming on deck.
The 20th March broke into a clear, sunny day, with a fresh easterly wind driving us towards the west. The sea eased down, allowing us to celebrate our daughter's second birthday in comfort. We toasted Zyanya, who was far away in Western Samoa with her grandmother, with a glass of home-made rice wine. As we reminisced about the past, I asked Mariana where she'd like to go next. I said we could tack north to visit the Caroline Islands, and then on to Japan, tack south to New Zealand, or we could run with the wind to Australia. She wanted to go to Australia, so we toasted that as well.
So far, we'd only caught pelagic fish out in the open ocean, but on 13th April we came upon a large shoal of trigger fish, swimming with a school of dolphins towards the west. They were easily caught by hook, and from then on we really had a feast. They left the dolphins to their travels and lived in the shadow beneath the ship. Each day after that, we could catch a dozen or so in no time at all. Whenever we came upon a log floating in the sea, we'd steer towards it, knowing there'd be even more trigger fish in its shadow. They would leave the log to join our own fish in the shadow of Debut.
At 1015 hours on 2nd May, the perfect cone of Mera Lava Island appeared out of the haze on the port bow. We were approaching the Banks Islands, and this was our first sighting of land since leaving Funafuti Atoll, over two months before. There was a great feeling of elation between us on the ship, even though it disappeared again fifteen minutes later. We caught another glimpse of Mera Lava Island just after midnight, when the sky cleared into a bright starry night, with a fresh northerly wind. By dawn the island was bearing 300 degrees true, and Maewo Island was in sight at 230 degrees.
For the next six days, we slowly sailed towards Mera Lava Island, intending to pass it to the north through the channel between Merig Island. Just before dusk on 8th May, Debut had the island five or six miles off the port beam. Once we'd sailed by, we could see through the cleft on the summit, right into the crater itself. Debut passed Merig Island on the starboard side at 2115 hours and headed for the passage north of Espiritu Santo.
At dawn the next day, Santa Maria Island was on the starboard beam at five or six miles. The current was taking Debut towards the shore, and we were unable to weather the south-eastern point of the island. At 0840 hours, we started the main engine and steamed south-west for an hour to pass the island, with the dark green hills of the northern peninsula of Espiritu Santo to the south of us.
Cape ***berland... the north-western point of Espiritu Santo... stretched out in front of us like a giant breakwater. All during the next day we sailed towards it, studying the island through our binoculars. Debut only made about two knots with the small amount of sail we carried, which was more of a sail-assisted drift than anything else.
Just on dusk on 11th May, Debut weathered Cape ***berland with only two miles to spare. We were so close to the shore as we cleared the fringing reef that we could even see individual stones on the beach. At 2130 hours, we sheeted out the sails and headed out into the Coral Sea. My ten years spent under sail in England were proving very useful to us now. 
We saw a pod of whales and individual whale-sharks, shoals of ocean grey sharks and schools of dolphins... the Coral Sea was alive with fish of every type. To add to our own shoal of trigger fish, which grew larger every day, we now gained a shoal of masi-masi and Spanish mackerel around the ship. We spent many hours fishing each day, not keeping more than we wanted to eat, but just for sport, then tossing them back.
Ships of every size and shape were sighted almost daily, going one way or another across the horizon, and planes flew low over us taking photographs. The first one was French, out of New Caledonia, and the other two were Australian. On the 20th June, an Australian naval vessel stationed itself off our port bow overnight with dimmed lights, thinking we were unlawfully fishing in their economic zone.
We had an albatross swim alongside the ship for a while, and a booby that lived on deck for two weeks. It had caught itself in some polypropylene sacking and hadn't been unable to feed. After freeing it using our hoop-net on a long pole, it returned to us each evening to sleep on the fore-deck. The ungainly way it landed, many times overshooting into the sea, reminded me of the albatross in the Walt Disney 'Rescuers'.
Even though I'd spent a lifetime at sea, I always looked towards the west at sunset to see if I could catch the green flash through the water once the sun had dropped below the horizon. I'd done it thousands of times before... whenever there was a clear horizon to the west... and many times through a haze of plonk and good cheer. The only time I ever saw the green flash was one evening in the Coral Sea. I galloped around the deck in my excitement, for the first time knowing it was true.
Weaving our way through the extensive reefs in the Coral Sea, we'd hoped to tack south-west to pass through Trinity Opening, in The Great Barrier Reef, and sail into Cairns, on Trinity Inlet... but luck wasn't with us. The strong prevailing south-easterly winds on the east coast of Australia, and the strong-setting north-flowing currents, pushed Debut further and further towards the north-west.
We sailed through the passage between Osprey Reef and The Great Barrier Reef, trying to get as near to a pass in the reef as possible before starting up the main engine. After leaving Funafuti Atoll and using the main engine to clear the Banks Islands, plus a few other occasions we'd used it to put the ship about, we were down to only five hours of fuel at six knots.
I had even rigged a forty gallon header-tank above the main filters to be able to use the last drop of diesel-oil, since the main header-tank was far too big for what little fuel remained. We had to get within twenty miles of a pass into the reef to stand a chance of getting through without running out of fuel.
At 0725 hours on 25th June, 1985, land was sighted on the starboard bow. By using the identification silhouettes at the back of the pilot book, I was able to positively identify it as the Altanmoui Range, near Cape Melville, on the Cape York Peninsular. It was a calm, sunny day, with a moderate south-easterly wind. After four months at sea, our elation knew no bounds at this landfall.
Once I'd established our exact position with my morning and noon sights, we excitedly went down into the engine room to start up the main engine. Over the time we'd been at sea, I'd taught Mariana how to use celestial navigation. She was the one who'd worked out our position from the sight.
At 1250 hours, we got underway on a course of 225 degrees for Waterwitch Pass through The Great Barrier Reef. I took another sight and gave the measurement of the sun to Mariana. Just as she gave me her calculated position, I saw the No I Sandbank on the port bow at the entrance of the passage.
At 1550 hours, we passed through Waterwitch Pass into the sheltered waters inside The Great Barrier Reef. Two hours later, because of a leaking fuel-line on my temporary header-tank, we anchored Debut in sixty feet of water, with two and a half shackles of chain, approximately four miles south of Stapleton Islet. We had made it, as far as we were concerned... at least we were under shelter again.
It blew at twenty knots continually, and a smaller ship would have found it quite uncomfortable. After no one had come to see us for almost two weeks, we started the main engine and headed south for a more sheltered anchorage. Two hours later, with not enough fuel to run the generator to lift the anchor again, we re-anchored in thirty feet of water under the lee of Howick Island. Now we had to wait... like it or lump it... until someone came over to see us. 
Since leaving Vila Harbour, in Vanuatu, we had sailed Debut to Guadalcanal, then to Funafuti, in Tuvalu, and finally to Australia... covering more tan 4,600 miles of ocean under sail. That was with a 189 foot ship of a thousand tons displacement, with only me and my 21 year old Samoan wife, Mariana, on board. All the best, Cpt Dick Brooks.
To view the photographs of this voyage under sail, go to the Books forum and see The Black Ship's Odyssey, Book Two, regarding downloading the manuscript.


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