Cleone - CLEONE Leg 17 Day 4 - Ships that Pass in the Night

If you don't see it, does a passing ship exist?

 

It was Alex who started it.  When asked by the Skipper whether this voyage was "as you expected to be", Alex looked thoughtful for a moment and then replied: "There aren't nearly as many ships around as I thought there would be".  Which is a pretty fair point.  Huge tankers and Gas Carriers bring oil and LPG from the Far East, around the Cape of Good Hope to Europe and the USA. 

Vast bulk carriers (and I mean vast - some of these ships bulk out at 500,000 tonnes) carry minerals and cereals all around the world, and giant container ships carry all kinds of foods everywhere and bring manufactured goods from Japan, China, Korea and elsewhere to feed Europe and America's hungry markets.  Even if there is nothing to carry the other way (financial, digital and other such services don't need ships), these ships must retrace their steps in order to refill with other stuff to replace that which is stolen, thrown away, worn out or has simply become unfashionable.  We are crossing the Indian Ocean, where all these ships must be at some point, but where on earth are they?

 

The Panama Canal works at maximum capacity throughout the year, spitting out about nine or ten thousand ships a year in either direction.  Approaching and leaving, through the Caribbean Sea or down the coast  you need to be wary and keep a sharp look out both by day and night.  The English Channel (apparently the busiest sea lane in the world) is like a motorway.  Two staggered lines of ships pass each other in each direction in a constant stream, travelling at about 18 knots and only a couple of miles apart.  The yachtsman has to dodge between them as he weaves his way across them, aiming to cross close to the stern of one ship in order to avoid the leviathan travelling behind it - there is no question of steam giving way to sail here.  It takes one of these beasts two miles going full astern before they can bring themselves to a halt. 

The Australians think the passage through the Great Barrier Reef is busy.  It is not; we saw less than four ships a day when we made our wonderful passage through this magnificent and beautifully charted area.  And of course we've seen plenty of ships in the various harbours we've been to, and in the approaches.  But apart from these places, we have seen almost none whilst at sea.  Where on earth (or rather, at sea) are they?

 

There are maybe two answers to this conundrum.  The first is that ships pretty much follow designated sea lanes, and unless you are in or near these (and they are good places to avoid if you are in a small yacht), you wont find other than the odd survey vessel or, if close to land, small coasters (but these are just as much as a hazard to yachtsmen as bigger, often better crewed ships).  And the second answer is that the oceans of the world are quite simply vast.  At sea level, in a flat sea, the horizon is about 4 miles, which means we can survey about fifty square miles of sea.  This sounds quite a lot, but it is tiny when you think of the number of square miles there are in an ocean.  In good weather, can see the lights of big ships at about 8 miles distance, and our AIS is normally set to alert us to any big ship within that distance, though it will pick up their signals a bit further away than that.  But if a ship is beyond visual range, why bother - in our little world, it may as well not exist at all.

 

That thought apart, we have continued to enjoy fine, down-wind sailing.  It has been a bit bumpy, but we are by and large used to that now and can generally get around the boat without bumping into things, and some of us can even cook without losing the whole lot onto the cabin sole (a sole = a floor in Nautispeak, for some reason - Ed) more than once.  There was a Norfy Special (signature dish - Carmelised Onions) last night, and the Skipper is baking bread for lunch today.  It normally works, but he's also on supper duty, which is a different matter.  Alex, like his Anderson namesake (curious; Armitage is George Alexander whilst Anderson is Alexander George.  And they are both tall), has mastered the art of Maggotting (also known as Zedding), and easily rivals Norfy for the amount of time spent horizontal with eyes closed and breathing regularly.  Only the skipper is occasionally seen walking about the boat and conscious during his off-watch hours.

 

Now as to fishing boats, they are a different matter, which I will bore you with at some stage!

 

It's been classic trade-wind sailing (again) and we are another 167 miles to the good.