by T I WADE
By the time he went back up it was starting to get dark outside; the lights were turned off inside the boat and there were seven females and a young male sitting there waiting for him in the dark.
“Let’s check out the boatshed,” suggested Mo.
“The house is totally empty of all food and liquids, Captain Mo,” joked Beatrice. “We left the house as you wanted it, double-locked the gates from inside and left lights and music on. We even brought all the toilet paper we could find.”
Mo, Marie and Beatrice checked out the boatshed at the end of the pier and found and filled what they could from a simple re-fueling system. There were fuel pipes long enough to reach the boat’s fuel inlets, two on each side.
He pulled out the long pipe, opened the steel caps one at a time and topped off the tanks. Somebody had already done a good job filling the tanks, but he managed to get another twenty gallons of diesel into them. There was very little gasoline, only one full five-gallon red canister. Everything in the ship worked on diesel. They found a dozen empty red gasoline canisters and he filled them with diesel. There were also five larger thirty-gallon gas canisters on wheels and he filled those as well. They were moveable gas tanks and had a manual pump and gas nozzle on each. The five mobile tanks, steel, also had a Colombian military insignia on each one.
“Do you have any idea how much fuel she takes, Marie?” Mo asked. The bridge fuel indicators did not indicate fuel quantities, and the gauges only marked quarter-tank quantities.
“I would guess that, being a Coast Guard ship, she should have a range of at least a thousand miles, maybe even two thousand miles, but it could be as little as six or seven hundred miles. The tanks must hold 350 to 500 gallons each, and there are four of them. Those engines will drink fuel at about a gallon per mile per engine. Estimate 2,000 gallons for about 1,000 miles of cruising at around 15 knots for a steel military ship. Now with the small engine, I’d say that the smaller Cummins would consume about a gallon every five miles, a gallon or two an hour. It should be supplied out of the same fuel tanks and that puts our range at about five knots per hour to as much as 5,000 miles. If you get five knots from the smaller engine and a strong breeze fills the sails for another 2 knots, then we are talking a good situation. With a stiff twenty-knot breeze and the smaller engine on low revs, she could even get up to ten knots on a gallon. Mo, it would take a year, but this ship could circumnavigate the earth, a pretty good setup. I’m starting to like her.”
They carried the extra two hundred gallons on board and tied the canisters to the aft railings. It was now dark as Mo asked the two sailors to show him how to drive the ship. They laughed and told him “sail” the ship even though it was engines doing the work.
The little engine was running and a very faint gurgle could be heard from its exhaust below the water line; Mo had the lights and instruments dimmed in the bridge. The old radar scanner atop the first mast was working and showed him the bay and the hills behind. Marie told him to shut it off until they were out of the bay. She had found a few pairs of military night-sight binoculars in a cubbyhole and now they could creep out of the small bay without lights or radar.
The depth gauge showed fifteen feet as Beatrice eased the aft line and handed it to the three French girls for onboard storage. The water was totally calm around them as she threw in the middle line and then ran for the last one on the bow. Marie took over control from Mo. She gently pushed the engines’ control lever forward and a gear clicked and Mo could feel faint forward movement. Beatrice threw the last line in as the ship inched forward and away from the pier, coming abreast of her, and she nimbly jumped on deck.
Marie eased the side slowly away from the pier, keeping in the dug-out stone furrow under the ship and not letting her touch bottom.
Very slowly, she allowed the small engine to move the large, heavy ship forward. As the pier disappeared behind them Marie gently swung the wheel to starboard. She increased engine revs and Mo could feel a slither of power vibrate through the ship.
The depth gauge read thirty feet as Marie turned the bow southwards and the ship peeked out of the bay around them. Mo scanned the sea close to them through his binoculars and saw nothing. Apart from a few lights in the direction of a small town they were about to sail past, everything was pitch black; blackouts were probably in effect in the main town and harbor.
“Mo, turn on the radar and size the screen down to a ten-mile range,” directed Marie, as she swung the wheel to port slightly and increased power to three quarters. Mo complied with her instructions and thought about going out on deck to look around. He glanced at the instrument; the depth gauge indicated seventy feet and he could see the black shape of the island beginning to line up with the left side of the ship half a mile away.
“I think a five-mile range from the island would be better, Marie. I’m sure somebody could see us if the moon rises.”
“I agree,” she replied and turned the ship to angle away from the black shapes of the island and increased the speed to cruise power, a line in between three-quarters and full power. “She’s just gone over five knots, Mo, Exactly what I said she would do.”
“You are Captain now, Marie,” smiled Mo. “I’m going to act like a sailor in the movies and do the binocular search.” He grabbed two pairs of binoculars and left the bridge.
He went down the stairs to the lounge and found that thick curtains had been pulled over all the windows and a small kitchen light was on so they could see each other.
“We are getting ship-shape, Mo,” stated Beatrice. “The fridge and three freezers are full. We found a third chest freezer in the engine room and put the rest of the frozen fish in it. I also found several high quality fishing rods and a fishing chair which hooks onto a pole or something on the aft area. It can be checked out for fishing tomorrow. We have put the water away and the girls, and Lu and I have been getting to know each other. They are a nice family.”
Mo handed her a pair of night binoculars. Reading what was written on the side, he noticed they were high quality military issue, made in China. He led Beatrice outside, quickly closing the door behind her.
The first slight swell reached the ship causing Mo to lose his balance and knock into Beatrice. She steadied him and he held onto her for a brief moment.
“Mr. Wang, I might think you were making a pass at me, or trying to push me overboard,” suggested Beatrice, putting the glasses to her eyes and staring out.
“Making passes at you would be far nicer than pushing you overboard, Beatrice. Now show me how to see clearly through these glasses.”
They looked together for several minutes. There was nothing visible on the becalmed sea. Mo noticed that the land was now further away and through the night vision, he could identify green unlit shapes of houses along the beaches. There were faint lights in the small town or village now abreast of them, and a few further up on the hills behind. He searched carefully for any shapes on the water without lights but couldn’t see anything.
The swells were getting larger and Mo could hear the faint throbbing of the small engine below deck. He could hear the gurgle of an exhaust, but even though it was quiet all around them, the noise of the ship gliding through the water and the noises from the aft area were certainly not going very far. He had heard that sound travels better over water but did not think anyone would hear them a mile away. They were still on the southern side of the island with at least thirty miles to go to the eastern tip.
He went in to tell Marie to take the power down to three-quarters and nearly panicked when he stepped into the lounge to find her there, talking to Lu.
“Who is driving the ship?” he asked, shocked.
“Monsieur Captain Autopilot, Captain Mo,” she replied. “Do you want me to show you how it works?” He nodded yes.
She returned with him after asking Lu to think about dinner and that she, Beatrice and the girls would help her. Marie showed him how simple it was to engage the autopilot. She placed a dot on the rada
r, now at a fifteen-mile range, with a plotter instrument on the radar control unit, a line automatically was drawn by the radar’s antiquated computer system to the dot from the ship and the heading was fixed with a readout of twelve miles and ETA, or Estimated Time of Arrival, in 153 minutes at five knots. Mo decreased the power to three-quarters, the speed dropped to four knots and the time went up to 179 minutes.
Mo was impressed. Since there wasn’t much else to do he sat down and started studying the other instruments. The depth gauge was showing over a hundred feet and the radar showed them to be two miles off shore.
Marie said that she was going to help with dinner and left him to his learning program. He moved the little dot to the right a few degrees and he saw the wheel turn as the autopilot automatically changed the ship’s direction. He looked at the large echo sounder computer and screen and switched it on. The screen slowly glowed and, after a minute blinked on to reveal a fuzzy green panoramic view of the sea floor.
By the way the program started and loaded, he guessed that most of this equipment was from the seventies; it must have been state-of-the-art for that time. He studied the contours of the bottom stretching out around the ship for about three miles, a brighter green band of light circled around the screen every minute. The bottom showed 112 feet and the water was getting deeper.
Still at four knots, he increased the radar to thirty miles, its furthest point and made a dot five miles offshore, west as well as south from the eastern tip of the island. His travel time increased to six hours and forty nine minutes. He reduced power to two thirds, the speed reduced to three and a half knots and the time automatically increased to eight hours, fifteen minutes. Mo Wang was enjoying his lesson.
He left the bridge thirty minutes later, feeling weird that nobody was up there doing anything. They had been traveling now for two hours. It was just after nine and they would reach the end of the island hours before he had told Pedro to meet him. The table was set and a tasty dinner of steamed fish and rice, made by Lu, reminded him of home. It was the first time he felt a little nostalgic for China.
“Is everybody happy with the sleeping arrangements?” Mo asked over dinner. There wasn’t enough room at the dining table and the five younger people were sitting on the floor and eating around the large coffee table. Only the four adults were at the six-seat table.
“I’m sleeping with Cheri in the one room, and Annabel and Virginie have commandeered the other,” said Marie.
“I offered the master stateroom to Lu and her two children, but they are refusing to take it,” added Beatrice. “If they take the main cabin then there is perfect room for the two of us in the lounge, Mo. The couches are better for us. It will save using the uncomfortable camp beds. Somebody needs to be on watch at all times.”
“I will stay out of the discussion. I can use the separate toilet off the bridge and I can easily nap sitting up in the captain’s chair,” replied Mo. “I might not be a good sailor yet, but I’m a light sleeper and can sleep with one eye open. I’m sure that the electrical systems all have alarms built into them, but I did not yet get that far with my lesson.”
“I’ll help you with those after dinner,” added Marie. “Mo, you still haven’t told us where we are going. It has been such a rush since you decided to leave just this afternoon and with so little warning.”
“I’m planning for Florida,” Mo replied. “How far do you think it is?”
“Without looking at the maps, I would say less than a thousand miles. I expect you will find maps in a drawer under the table-top in the bridge. The square table is the exact size of a maritime map, so it should hold all the maps we are going to need. We need to plot our course, which I’ll teach you how to do after dinner. The idea is to mark our course on the bridge table, which is really the ship’s navigation table, and then plot the directions into the autopilot. The worst problem I ever faced sailing was other shipping. The large container ships and tankers always sail on autopilot and don’t often look out for smaller vessels. That’s why, as Beatrice said, we always need a person on watch.”
“I expect that problem doesn’t exist anymore, and apart from fishing boats and other yachts, there isn’t much traffic out there,” stated Mo. “I know that my nephew, Lee Wang, is somewhere around North Carolina and I think there is an airfield where he is staying, a friend’s airfield. I told Lu about her brother and we are hoping to meet him. I can phone him, but he is not very friendly with me. He knows I betrayed him.
“I think this ship could be a good safe home for the future, and if we make it, I don’t think the German lady will be around to take it back or complain about us stealing it in Florida or North Carolina.”
After dinner while the kids and Lu and her family were washing dishes in the galley, Mo, Marie and Beatrice went up to the bridge, got out the maps and looked them over.
“You plan to meet Pedro at the extreme end of the island,” confirmed Marie, looking at a large map of the island. “We are here.” She showed Mo by pointing out the island parts and coastline on the radar and plotting their position onto the map. “We have covered fourteen miles and used three to four gallons of fuel.” Mo looked at the gauges which were all still at maximum. “It is going to take us six hours to get to our first point.” She then placed a second map on the table, a map showing far more territory. Mo could see the tip of Mexico in the top corner and saw the island of Cozumel, where Pedro wanted to go. “That will be our second point,” he stated to Marie. She got a pencil out and drew a faint line on the map, and with a compass and protractor worked out the degree west of north it would require them to sail. “Remember this saying: ‘From grid to mag you add, from mag to grid get rid.’ Never forget that, Mo. You know the difference between True North and Magnetic North?” Mo nodded, but looked a little perplexed so Marie added a little more information. “I know that our difference here is currently about two degrees. So we take away two degrees from our compass bearing or add two degrees from our map bearing. The difference changes all over the world but we are due south of Long Island where I have sailed before and two degrees will put us within a one degree accuracy. I’m sure we will find a book which will tell us; every ship has one as a backup if their GPS system goes down. Remember, we have the radar to warn us when we are thirty miles from land. Since nobody has GPS out there, that is about as accurate as I or anybody else can navigate on the high seas.”
“So, one degree in a hundred miles is one mile off course?” Mo asked, his memory a little rusty. Marie nodded and they did a few math problems so that he could understand. Mo then plotted a course to Cozumel, from the point in front of them and he came up with the angle to steer. Then Marie showed him how to work out the distance.
“One hundred and fifty-three miles to a safe point five miles off the center of the island,” Marie explained. “Five knots is nearly six miles an hour, so without sea currents and head winds, it should take us about twenty-six hours to our second waypoint.”
“Next point is the tip of Florida,” stated Mo. He was finding all this so exciting.
“Let’s map a voyage nonstop from our second waypoint to Key West.” And Marie let him plot the course this time.
“Four hundred and sixty-eight miles, but we pass right next to Cuba,” stated Mo looking rather pleased with himself.
“I don’t think we should get too close to Cuba, there could be pirates,” suggested Beatrice. “I would like to plot a course taking us at least fifty miles north of Cuba.”
Marie showed Mo how to do this by adding an extra waypoint, fifty miles northwest off the Cuban tip and then turning towards Key West.
“A distance of 539 miles,” stated Mo adding the travel distance. “Slightly less than one hundred hours which is just over four days.”
From Key West he plotted a route all the way up to Wilmington, North Carolina; another 710 miles on a direct route.
“So we are going to map a total voyage of 1,400 miles at, say, a gallon per four miles, and on
high cruise at 6 knots, or seven miles an hour. Work it out, Mo,” suggested Beatrice.
“Minimum 350 gallons of fuel and 200 hours nonstop,” Mo stated.
“Work it out at 2 gallons per mile with the big engines at 12 knots or 15 miles an hour,” encouraged Marie.
“Easy, 2,800 gallons. I’m sure we don’t have enough fuel and only four days travel time. So we should use our sails when there is wind, use only the small engine, and keep our diesel reserves for emergency. Does that sound correct?” asked Mo. The ladies agreed with him and he felt a little more like a sailor.
For three more hours they travelled until, at a distance of five miles from the southern coastline of the island, Mo suggested that he see what he could about the defensive situation. He told the girls that he had brought the shotgun and an old army pistol aboard and he showed them where he had hidden them. He then went below, turned on the fourth generator, and went into the battery room where all the ammunition was stored.
There certainly was a lot. He opened the door to the separate and forward gun room and pressed the button to elevate it onto the deck above. It worked quickly and this time he could see stars above before the gun reached the deck and closed off the room below. Behind where the gun had stood Mo noticed that a shoulder rocket launcher was heavily taped to the V-seam of the bow with several cases of what had to be rockets.
He returned to the lounge, grabbed his night binoculars, and went outside to see the machine gun. It stood there just like in the movies, except that the barrel was pointed down at the deck. He unscrewed a large knob, lifted the heavy barrel skywards, and it clicked into place.
Through the binoculars he could see quite well. Mo suddenly realized that it wasn’t so dark outside anymore and saw a faint glow over the horizon to the east. He didn’t know if it was the moon, but it was going to light up the sea pretty soon. He could just see the black island mass five miles off the port bow. He signaled to Marie to turn to sail slightly farther away and over the horizon. If he could see land, then anybody on land might see them.
