The Lonely Sea and the Sky

by Sir Francis Chichester

  I planned a route farther north than my 1960 track. Every route across has its pros and cons; the amount of fog, strength of current, wind, weather and ice are everywhere different; in fact, no two square miles of Atlantic are the same. My route took me north of the Scillies and that clump of rocks known as the Seven Stones. So far I had fine weather; the sun shone out of a cloudless sky, and there was a lovely dark-blue sea. For a while I lay sunbathing on the cabin top, stretched out on a sail. I had never had a day's weather like this in the 1960 race. I was running before a gentle breeze and here was another contrast to 1960, when the biggest sail area I could set for running was 600 square feet, and that was soon out of control in the big storm which hit me. Now, with my new rig and self-steering gear, I set 1,100 square feet, and felt in control of it, so that I could sleep peacefully. And Miranda really was in control of the steering. I had no more fear of her being smashed in a jib.

  The second day out a great event occurred; I found a handsome homing pigeon with bold black bars slashed across its folded wings sheltering in the lee of a sail on the foredeck. Pidgy, as he was soon to be called, was shy and not to be caught. He was intensely curious, and as soon as we had met he followed me about the ship, watching closely everything I did, his head cocked slightly to one side, one bright round eye attentive. Each time I went below he perched on the companionway. As I was tuning up the radio for my daily talk to The Guardian, Billy Cotton suddenly came through with his wisecracking. This was too much for Pidgy, who promptly hopped on to the edge of the chart table, listening intently. Next morning I gave him some of my breakfast, muesli, a Swiss peasant dish made of oatmeal, raisins and nuts, but without a grated raw apple and honey which I added for myself. Pidgy enjoyed it, and sipped some water from a saucer. While I was sunbathing on the cabin top, Pidgy slipped inside the cabin, and by the time I found this out he had made the most frightful mess on the cabin floor (fortunately not on Sheila's new nylon carpet). I had to shush him out into the cockpit.

  I had nightmare visions of what he could do to my bunk and the settees; I had plenty of work without having to cope with that. I soon discovered that his personal habits were shocking; he was nearer to discovering the secret of a perpetual motion than any scientist ever will be – I had to follow him round the deck with a mop and bucket. Later, his loose behaviour was to be actually the cause of slowing up the ship. I prepared a box for him in the cockpit, and presented him with a wooden mallet and a small coil of rope to stand on. (I thought that maybe I should be able to sell the guano deposit on that mallet at great profit in America!) It was not long before I decided that Pidgy had a most stupid streak in his character; he kept on pecking frantically at a saucer, long after he had finished everything in it, and refused to look at another one with a new supply of food which I put in the box, although I showed it to him several times.

  Just before midnight on 3 June, a fine night with winking stars, I could see the Fastnet Light flashing to the north of me at the south-west tip of Ireland. In the morning the weather forecast was for a south-east wind, increasing perhaps to Gale Force 8. Gipsy Moth was running well, but it was a rolling twisting ride in the Atlantic. It made me feel queasy, and I was not the only one; Pidgy looked terrible, all fluffed up with his head tucked under his wing, and bleary-eyed when he looked up at me. I feared that he was going to die. I had heard that birds are unable to be seasick, and are therefore worse off than humans. Next morning, however, he was still alive. He looked miserable and twice his size, a huge puffed out ball, with his head nearly sunk in his shoulders.

  From below in the cabin I heard a loud bang and rushed on deck to find that the rope holding the big genoa to the spinnaker pole had parted in a gale puff. It took me seventy-five minutes to clear up the mess. After that I found that the breakband locking Miranda to the tiller was slipping. I fixed that, and had started taking a sextant shot at the sun when a steamer, the Bristol Gift, circled Gipsy Moth. By the time I had finished my observation and turned on the radio-telephone, I was just in time to hear GCN 2, the GPO station, signing off, having given up hope of contacting me. However, I got through to them all right at 10.30 that night.

  I was woken during the night by the sails roaring, with Gipsy Moth rough-riding across the seas in a gale of wind. In the morning I had more trouble with the steering because Miranda was slipping badly. I fixed her as well as I could in a wind, gusting to a full gale.

  Pidgy was squatting on the corner of the cockpit seat and took no notice when I stepped right alongside him. He must have been feeling awful. I too felt sick, and had some hot water and sugar, my latest seasickness cure.

  5 June. A squall gusting to 60mph had me out on the foredeck setting a storm staysail and a spitfire jib. Several waves broke over me, and to my disgust water ran up inside my oilskin trouser legs and over the top of the long boots inside them. I then had to double-reef Miranda, which was a difficult and tricky job, with seas picking up the ship and throwing her down on her side, or slewing the stern round while I was standing on the counter using both hands above my shoulders to reef. Just as I got below and hung my wet scarf and boots above the Aladdin heater, an RAF Shackleton started buzzing me. Although it had done well to find me in that disturbed sea, I did not feel hospitable. However, when it buzzed me a third time, I pushed back the hatch enough to poke half my head out. I promptly got a sea down my neck. Swearing, I put on an oilskin coat and flashed my Aldis light at the aircraft. It started flashing a message at me, but it was coming at me from behind the trysail and I should have needed to chase out on deck to read the signals. I could not face a drenching below the waist, so merely flashed an acknowledgement.

  Looking round, I could not find Pidgy, which made me sad; I thought that the swooping aeroplane must have frightened him, and made him take off, and I also feared that we were too far from land for him to make it. Two hours later I had good news; Pidge was back. He must have hidden away somewhere from the Shackleton. He looked all in, poor devil. But at least he could do something that I couldn't; he was standing on one leg on the cockpit seat, and swaying to the roll of the ship without looking. It was real Atlantic weather; grey mist, turbulent sea, moaning wind. It was not comfortable, but I had great satisfaction that Gipsy Moth was charging ahead at a steady 6 knots under her storm rig, and I felt in complete control. 6 June. I was rousted out twice during the night when parts of Miranda's rigging gave way. The first time I found all the sails aback, and the yacht headed for England, which does not put up the average speed when racing towards New York. I began to jib at calling up London on the R/T at a fixed time every morning. It was then my best chance of a sleep after the schemozzles of the night. I would be drowsy and snug in my blankets when the alarm went off, unwilling to get up, have no copy ready and be dozy-brained when I tried to think of some. On top of that, as soon as I did get up I would be sure to find that a sail change or a retrim was needed, and I would either regret losing racing speed if I telephoned, or regret missing the transmitting rendezvous if I changed a sail. I asked for the transmitting time to be switched to the evening, and promised better copy then.

  Under the cockpit seat I found Pidgy, bedraggled and sick-looking. I feared for his life. I made him a hut under the seat with a transparent plastic covering, and gave him a dish of Macvita and bread, with a bowl of fresh water, both of which he went for. Later he seemed better.

  The battery-charging motor began to give trouble. It would stop every few minutes when the yacht rolled. I had to think of some way to get over this, for the batteries must be charged if I was to get my story through. I fashioned a piece of wood to plug the petrol tank opening and to raise the petrol level, but it did not work. The motor still petered out at each big roll. When 600 miles out I had to reset the storm sails for a gale squall. It was rugged work; several waves broke over me on the foredeck, and once I was bucked clean into the air.

  At the end of the day I had just got below and was sitting, fagged out, when I was faced with getting on de
ck again for another schemozzle – the tell-tale compass showed that Gipsy Moth was away off course. I started pulling on my wet sea boots, mentally groaning and cursing, when I had an inspiration. I had been eating some shortbread, and the tin was on the end of the swinging table just above the tell-tale compass. I pushed the tin along the table, and the compass needle swung back to the right heading. Gratefully I hung up my boots again. Who would have thought that a tin could have been so highly magnetised?

  7 June. The charging motor spluttered and went dead with a squealing squeaking noise. I tried to turn the flywheel by hand but it was seized up solid. Finis the charging! And no charging, no transmitting.

  The first thing I did was to dig out the cabin paraffin lamp, some candles, and the paraffin riding light. I must save every little watt of electricity for transmitting. When I next transmitted I described the disaster and asked for advice. I cannot describe the hours I spent during the next few days grovelling and fumbling in the bowels of the ship connecting and disconnecting wires and terminals, removing and refixing floorboards, engine covers, battery box lids, while kneeling on the cabin floor of a jumping, lurching, pitching, rolling and (I could well believe) laughing ship. In the end I had the 24-volt batteries of the radio-telephone wired up to the 12-volt dynamo of the auxiliary motor, but as soon as I started up the motor, the propeller shaft began to turn. That was no good – I was out for a sailing record. I switched off hurriedly, and after failing in various different ways, I finally stopped the propeller shaft from turning by winding a length of cord round it and making the end fast. But after running the motor for sixteen minutes it was so hot that I had to stop.

  9 June. Big news! In the middle of the night Pidge gave tongue – roucou! roucou! Perhaps he was feeling better, or was it only a dream in the dark? No, in the daylight he suddenly began imitating an eagle! Standing head up, chest out, he spread his wings like the eagle of the old German flag and flapped them bravely, hopping on his toes. In the morning I made a tent for him with two thicknesses of old canvas which I stretched from the cockpit coaming to the edge of the seat. I provided him with a plastic bag for a ground sheet.

  I worked hard on the engine, head down under the cockpit and arms at full stretch beside the engine. I had to work by feel, because my arms left no room to see. I only just escaped being seasick. The result was a failure.

  On deck I found that I had lost my sense of balance, and could not walk along without holding on all the time. I had to sit down to change headsails when the job required both hands.

  With Pidgy's tent at the forward end of the cockpit seat, I could not see him from below. I missed his beady eyes, so, after cleaning up after him in the cockpit, I made a new tent at the other end of the seat where he would stand in the entrance and, no doubt, laugh secretly at me as I cleaned up his mess.

  Through London I got a message from Martin about the engine. He keeps the Buckler's Hard garage, and has a flair with engines. As a result I succeeded in pumping current into the batteries for half an hour, but the result was scarcely noticeable. I had a desperate feeling of futility when I thought how every hour's charging used a gallon of my precious petrol, and of the seemingly endless and tedious chores I had to perform every time I started or finished charging.

  That afternoon my back went click. It was very painful to move about. I feared that it was the start of a disc breaking out as a result of struggling with the gear-lever bolts with my back arched under the cockpit. I decided that if I could avoid another sudden jerk or twist, it might get no worse.

  That night was a rough one, and next morning I was tired. I looked up at the rigging and around the deck, and thought that this kind of sailing was becoming absurd. There were no fewer than thirty ropes of different kinds coiled up or in use for my sailing. It seemed mad not to have a simple rig like Blondie's one junk sail, and a few ropes to operate it. I went forward to change my working jib down to a spitfire jib and then in the middle of the operation changed my mind, and reset the working jib; that was a sure indication of fatigue. I only ate one meal all day, another sign. However, I had made good by that day over 1,000 miles from Plymouth on a Great Circle course from the Lizard, a third of the distance to New York. One thousand miles westward in ten days was one ambition I had achieved. If only I could keep that rate up! Of course sailing conditions so far had been good for the Atlantic, but how ridiculous to be depressed or feel tired; especially with my back better, for which I was very grateful.

  Pidgy looked disgusted; what a life for a bird! Streams of water were sluicing into the cockpit, the air was wet and windy. During the night he had moved from his new camp and stood on the seat beside the companionway, but I had to move him back for fear I should tread on him. He tried other spots, but he was in the way wherever he went, poor devil. I debated taking him into the cabin and putting up with his indescribable mess, but then I thought, 'Surely a bird is used to the open air', and contented myself with making his tent as snug as possible. I gave him a box full of muesli which was his favourite food (except for the raisins which he threw out, just as my son Giles does). A big wave gave his den a fair washout, and swamped the rest of the muesli. I gave him another plateful in the tent, but he just sat outside waiting till that too had got soaked. That night I was woken frequently by crashes and once wondered if something had broken or come adrift, but all was well. Gipsy Moth was sailing at 6 knots through rough water. During the night Pidge seemed quite happy, squatting inside his wigwam facing the entrance. He chattered his beak silently at me when I spoke to him. I ate a handful of dates and an orange in my berth. My nails were worn too far down to peel the orange, but I managed by starting it with my teeth, and finishing with the ball of my thumb. On the whole I had an easy night, which did me good.

  In the morning, for some reason, I laughed at Pidge. To my surprise he was sensitive about it, and much disliked it. He stamped to and fro, chattered his beak and gave me dirty looks.

  12 June. I woke at 5.30 in the morning to find the ship headed north, and cursed at having to get up. But I fell asleep again, and woke two hours later to find the heading east-north-east. Horror! I was headed for Iceland – not the way to increase the daily average run.

  John Fairhall of The Guardian in London gave me the positions of the known icebergs which I had asked for. I wanted to know how far south they came, so that I could plan my route.

  While charging the batteries I noticed that the motor's speed varied, suddenly running much faster, then slowing right down. After forty-eight minutes of charging there was a loud 'plonk', and the propeller slipped into gear. I switched off immediately. The cord holding the shaft had snapped. I found steam blowing through escape holes in the gearbox and the clutch. They were so hot that rain dropping on them sizzled. The clutch must have been partially engaged. The truth was that this engine was not built to freewheel for more than a minute or two after starting up.

  The biggest penance I suffered through the failure of the charging motor was due to the paraffin riding light I used at night instead of electric light. Unfortunately my Old Faithful of the 1960 race had been broken, and I bought what I was told was the best riding light to replace it. What I suffered through that lamp! Night after night I spent from half to one hour trying to get it into the rigging alight. In the cabin the slightest jerk put it out instantly. In the cockpit any sudden puff of wind extinguished it. If only I could get it fastened to the backstay in a steady wind before it went out it might survive for several hours. I tried warming it up in the cabin before venturing out, using a higher or lower flame and filling it only half full. How I cursed the makers of that lamp! How I damned the designer, and wished he could be brought into the Atlantic to try making it work.

  13 June. Great sailing! A rough breaking sea, with Gipsy Moth crashing through fast and strongly as if she loved it. Great sailing, but not for Pidge; I saw the look of disgust on his face when he caught a wave (I think he must have been a crabby old bachelor). Sometimes he seemed to give
me a malicious look. Later when I went on deck I found that the log had stopped, and at first was puzzled why. Indirectly Pidge was responsible. I had given up stowing the coiled ends of the ropes in the lockers under the cockpit seats because Pidge fouled them up so horribly. I had left them coiled on the deck beside the cockpit coaming. The seas breaking on deck had washed them overboard, where they had tangled with the log line. Ropes trailing in the water are used to slow up a yacht, so that this must have cost us speed. On top of that I spent hours untangling the log line with its thousands of tight twists. A lot of clear white sparkling sea was coming aboard as I did so; it was blowing a gale though the sun was shining. I could not be sure how long the log had been out of action.

  15 June. Pidge! Pidge! Pidge! He ruled my life then. Every morning I had to feed and water him as soon as I emerged, before I trimmed the sails and got the ship back on to her proper heading. I couldn't bear his forlorn beady look. Then I would notice the various messes on the cockpit seat, which I'd tread in while handling the ropes, so I had to go round and clear all of them up before getting to work on the ship. During the night, even if I darted out in an emergency, I had to shine my torch round and locate Pidge before stepping into the cockpit for fear of treading on him. That morning when I fed him, and gave his tabernacle another covering, he let me stroke him, so I reckoned that he must be pretty fed up. He looked like a sick jackdaw.