BLUE DAWN By Gerard O'Neil
The small yacht
motored over the long oily swells leaving a trail of salty bubbles and the
coast behind her. For hours there hadn’t
been a breath of wind, so John, the yachts young skipper, had not been able to
hoist a sail.
Just before
sunset, a zephyr of wind danced its light hearted way across the smooth surface
of the sea. As it passed, John felt a slight movement of air on his cheek.
‘There is wind
out there somewhere,’ he shouted to no one in particular as he was the only
living soul within miles!
Soon another
zephyr approached. It was traveling much faster than the last. As it went by, a
corner of the mainsail gave a lazy flap. A few minutes later a light breeze set
in. John hoisted the Mainsail and Genoa and once they were drawing nicely
turned off the engine. After connecting the self steering system, he went below
to prepare something to eat.
John returned on
deck just as the first stars were beginning to appear. He searched the horizon for ships and then began
to steer my hand. He loved beautiful nights like this. Soon a full moon arose
turning the ocean a silvery white.
As the night
wore on, the odd shower cloud appeared. One of them passed to one side of the
moon. Moonlight reflecting through its rain produced a beautiful ghostly white
rainbow. John stared in amazement. He knew he was observing an extraordinary
rare natural phenomenon. For the first time since he had left port he felt sad
and lonely. He had no one to share this special moment with! The rainbow lasted
for perhaps three minutes before the cloud was gently blown on.
By 02:00
hrs John was feeling fatigued. He reconnected the self steering system and
retired below to his bunk. He awoke just before 05:00 hrs and turned on the
radio to listen to the marine forecast. The news wasn’t good. A cold front was
advancing quickly up the coast bringing with it strong winds and heavy rain.
During the
morning the seas began to build. Clouds appeared over the horizon and began
marching in his direction eating up the blue sky as they approached. By late
afternoon they had nothing more to devour. The sky had turned completely black
and it began to rain heavily. The wind grew so strong it became unwise to carry
any sail so John brought Blue Dawn’s bow into the wind and “hove to’. By night
fall the sea had become a mass of broken foam and flying spray. John retreated
below to wait things out.
Below decks the
noise of the storm was a little less intense, but not the motion. Blue Dawn
would slowly climb a wave, momentary balance on its crest and then whoosh down
the other side. Sometimes she didn’t
whoosh down, she simply fall with an almighty crash. All Johns’ energy was
devoted to clinging to his bunk trying to avoid physical injury. His nerves
were so stretched that sleep was impossible.
Daybreak took a
long time to arrive, and when it did, it revealed a world painted gray and
without hope. Not long after John heard a noise that made his heart freeze.
Even though he had never heard such a sound before, he knew exactly what was
coming. Death was approaching and rapidly! He shot out on deck, quickly closing
the hatch behind him. The noise came
closer and closer and then a massive wave came into view. It was traveling at
right angles to the other waves and where the two met, the sea turned into a
mass of confession and destruction. The huge wave broke about 20 meters away then
began to gather itself up ready for another destructive leap forward. Blue Dawn
was sucked into its base and then began to climb upward. Up, up, up they rose.
On the crest they balanced momentarily. For a few seconds John had a 360ยบ
panorama of miles and miles of storm tossed ocean. Blue Dawn began to gather
speed and went surfing totally out of control down the waves face. At any
second John expected Blue Dawn to turn turtle. Then with a deafening roar the
wave broke and John found himself swimming in a mass of spray and foam.
By some miracle
they both survived. John slid the hatch
open and went below. By now he was at past the limit of his physical endurance.
With difficulty he went to the navigation table and noted the following
information in the ships log:
‘Date:
23/09/2002 Time: 10:37 Wind Speed:
SW 50 knots: Estimated Boat
Speed: 4 knots. Comments: “Hove to”. ‘Almost sunk by a
massive wave. Totally exhausted. Desperately need to sleep!’
He returned the
log to its position on the navigation table and went to his bunk. He was too
tired to worry any more about the storm or if he lived or died. Within seconds
he had fallen into an exhausted sleep.
Sometime later
John awoke to the sound of singing. It was coming from out on deck. Looking
through the hatch window he saw a strange figure at the helm. His face was extremely
weather worn and he was dressed in a black sou´wester, just like the ancient
mariners of old. For some reason John didn’t think his presence was at all
strange. Rather than going on deck to investigate further, he simply turned
over and let the visiting helmsman’s singing lull him back to sleep.
John woke with a
start. Someone was shouting urgently for him. In an instant he was on deck.
Little less than a mile astern he saw an enormous cargo ship on a collision
course with them. Each lunge of the ship took caused a huge quantity of spray
to fly into the air. The wind would then whip it back over her superstructure causing
the craft to momentarily disappear. In the storm conditions, John knew that
Blue Dawn would be just one more piece of static on the vessels radar. No one
on the ship would be aware of their presence. John swung the helm hard over and
started the engine. For what seemed like an eternity nothing happened, and then
ever so slowly Blue Dawn began to draw away from the rapidly approaching wall
of steel. They cleared the ship’s bow with less than 30 meters to spare. John collapsed on deck and nervously watched
as the vessel continued on her blind journey. Once he had calmed down a little,
he returned below. As he was sliding the hatch closed he noticed that to the
south the weather was showing a slight sign of improvement.
Hours later John
awake. There wasn’t a sound. Out on deck the sun was shining and the sea was
calm. He soon had all of the sails set and Blue Dawn sailing on her own. He
went below to listen to the marine forecast. The announcer was promising fine
weather and light winds for at least the next three days. To round off the
forecast the announcer dedicated an old sea shanty to all the brave
mariners out at sea presently listening. To John’s amazement he recognized the
song immediately. It was the same song the ancient mariner who had helped him
during the storm, (or rather, the ancient mariner he had dreamt about during
the storm), had been singing. As the
song finished the hairs on Johns’ neck stood on end. He could have sworn someone
had gently pushed past him on their way topsides.
Turning off the
radio John went to the navigation desk to update the ships log. To his surprise
the log wasn’t in its allocated place. While he was looking for it he heard
someone shout from up on deck:
‘Bye, bye
Skipper. Have a pleasant voyage!’
John rushed up
the companionway stairs. There was no one there! To his amazement however, in
the cockpit he found an empty whisky bottle rolling from side to side in rhythm
to the boats motion. (It hadn’t been
there a few minutes earlier). John picked it up. It still contained a mouth
full of strong smelling alcohol. He was
dumbfounded. He had no idea where the bottle had come from.
While still
trying to make “head or tail” of the mysterious bottle, John spotted the ship’s
log in a corner of the cockpit. He was taken aback. He never took the logbook
on deck! He opened it at its last page. To his astonishment there were a series
of entries written in a hand other than his own. The entries recorded wind
speed, sea conditions and various events that had happened during the previous
24 hours while he had been asleep. One entry stated that the author had called
the “Skipper” topsides, because a ship was about to run them down. The last
entry had been written less than five minutes previously. It simply read:
‘Skipper now
recovered. Am handing command back to him.’
All entries were dated the year 1876!
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