39
39for many hours as we crossed over. There was also the boat to
consider. She was old, and the previous experience of losing the
centerboard had cast some doubt on how much abuse she could
take. Adding speed and going into the wind under those sea con-
ditions would only add stress to an already hardworking vessel.
So we decided to wait out the storm. The hope was to main-
tain our position as best we could; however, wind and current
were slowly carrying us south. And who knew at the time that
the conditions more than 48 hours later would be unchanged? If
anything, the waves had time to build more.
With a crew of three, watches were solo — not that there
was that much to do. Nottoway was behaving well and rode
comfortably. On occasion larger rollers would slam into the
port side, sending a shudder through the boat. We had our
fi ngers crossed that Nottoway would take the abuse. We were all
in various degrees of dampness, and it was hard to stay warm,
especially during night watches. In addition, I am prone to
seasickness, and even with Dramamine I felt best in my bunk or
on deck.
During the day, our paths would cross, especially at watch
changeover, but at night, except for the handing over, you were
on your own. We kept a deck watch at all times and always
had our harnesses buckled in. I would huddle up next to the
companionway to keep in the lee of the dodger because at
night there was no way to
see what sweep of water was
coming your way. Watches
were shortened to three hours
after dark, but with the boat
buttoned up and no light, the
sense of aloneness was intense.
It wasn’t a terrible feeling, but
decidedly unnerving and not
something I had ever experienced before. Add to this the noise
and the fact that we were still 100 miles west of Portugal, and it
was like being on another planet.
Noise and sailing have never mixed well with me — the louder
it is, the more anxious I become. And it was noisy, especially at
night. When you can’t see a thing and your only sense is hearing,
sound intensifi es. The wind was howling as we climbed a wave,
then quieted down as we reached a trough. The rigging was
singing, and the crash of breaking waves was all around. We were
sitting on deck in almost complete darkness, hunkered down as
much as possible to avoid the weather, feeling damp and cold
and wondering if it would ever end. I remember shouting at the
top of my lungs on one night watch, “Would you please stop?!” I
didn’t have to worry about waking Spencer, David or, apparently,
whoever was in charge of the storm.
On our third evening, with no change in the weather, we’d
had it. Our drifting had slowly pushed us south, and there was
little chance of fetching Cascais. It was around suppertime —
cold baked beans and peanut butter sandwiches — and I was
coming on watch for David. Spencer was poring over the chart,
and suddenly proposed the idea of running down to Lagos, at
the southern tip of Portugal. Finally, here was a chance to be
proactive, and we jumped at it. Under more sober refl ection, we
might have opted to wait for daylight, but as Samuel Johnson
said when asked about sailing nearly 300 years ago, “Being in a
ship is being in a jail, with the chance of being drowned.” We
were going to make a jailbreak.
We estimated we would arrive at the Gibraltar shipping
channel just before dawn. As it was my watch to start, I unlashed
the wheel and headed off. Our tuft of jib was just enough to
nearly match the wave speed. After three days of doing nothing,
absolute concentration and maximum eff ort were now required.
Running before 15- to 20-foot waves is quite an experience,
especially in the nearly pitch dark. The waves were invisible
except when a top would break and run whitewashed down the
face, the phosphorescence in the white water and the reddish
hue of the binnacle light contrasting with the near-blackness
of the night. These were the waves we had to watch out for.
First would come the noise, like a small avalanche of water. The
broken wave tops gathered speed as they spilled down the face,
sometimes lunging into the cockpit. The feeling of closeness
to the sea was magnifi ed by the low profi le of the boat itself, so
unlike today’s high-freeboard designs. Even with weather cloths
secured to the lifeline stanchions, the proximity to the waves felt
very real, as if I could reach out and touch them. It made for a
lively ride that drew me in completely with our surroundings.
Later that night, as we approached the shipping lanes, we
doubled up on the watches in case contact was needed with
any ships bearing down on us. Ships don’t always respond when
called, but the eff ort would need to be made anyway because
a 40-foot sailboat would not fare well in a collision with a
1,000-foot tanker. Just as David was stepping to the wheel, a
particularly large wave of green water ran over the transom and
fl ooded the cockpit. It knocked the EPIRB off its bracket and
into the rather full footwell. Our immediate concern was that
the action had activated it, transmitting a distress signal to all
passing craft. Luckily, upon retrieval we found that the switch
had not been tripped. It was
just another moment of stress
that wasn’t needed. Here we
were, fl ying by the seat of our
foul-weather pants — cold,
wet, slightly seasick, tired and
beaten down, dealing with
conditions that were mostly
new to us. There was no panic
or fear, but anxiety was in the air, and it’s safe to say we weren’t
having much fun.
David and I exchanged shifts on the wheel about every half-
hour. While one of us drove, the other huddled under the lee of
the dodger, dozing as best as one could. Our skipper, Spencer,
had been awake throughout most of the previous 36 hours and
was fi nally getting some much-needed naptime in the quarter
berth. When I last took over, the eastern sky was just beginning
to brighten.
With dawn came hope for our tired spirits, and the wind fi nally
began to drop. We had successfully crossed most of the shipping
lane and were now about 25 miles off the southwest coast of
Portugal. David could go below and get some real sleep, and I
had the boat to myself. What followed was probably one of the
most exhilarating sails of my life. I smiled at our good fortune
and how well the boat and crew had fared. Spencer relieved me
around 0600, and when I came back on deck at 1000, there in
the distance were the headlands of Cabo de São Vicente, with our
destination of Lagos only about 25 miles farther on.
Our high spirits carried us for this last leg. Five hours later,
as we rounded the corner near the entrance to Lagos, we were
met with a surreal sight. At the mouth of the harbor are a
series of caves carved out by the waves. The place is a vacation
destination, and a number of wooden fi shing boats converted
for sightseeing bobbed around the entrance. They were brightly
painted in blues, reds, oranges and yellows, and fi lled with
swimmers and sunbathers shouting and laughing in the sun. It
was like landing back on Earth after a trip to Mars.Anthony Irving is a forest ecologist by trade, but sailing has always been
a constant, including on long-ago stints on the schooner America and the
hermaphrodite brig Black Pearl. He has sailed extensively throughout
New England and parts of Europe, most recently in the Mediterranean.The waves were invisible except when a
top would break and run whitewashed
down the face, lit by phosphorescence and
the reddish hue of the binnacle.june/july 2016cruisingworld.com