Raparee's exciting-ish Days 18 & 19 at sea
Onnyway (as they say in Nornairlond) we carried on ghosting until the dogwatches when suddenly our trailing line thingy sort of went all twangy, like big time. Nick goes to Don Gloves (one of our stowaways)to help with line hauling while Mike gets out the gaff from the loo. After a bit of hauling, in comes a meaty blue tuna neatly landed in the deck bucket. Some smart-ass suggested an alcoholic aerosol would send the fish to sleep (and I've known a few alcoholic aerosols in my life, so I can vouch for that). Anyway we tried gin in a killa-spray bottle but it no workee and made the poor crathur dance around like Michael Flatley on speed. Skipper resorts to the old mackerel method of breaking the neck and this works a treat, although it does mess up the deck shoes a bit. Fishy-wishy was about 7kgs, so quite meaty. Dr David then gave a public demonstration of his surgeomechanical skills by producing some huge uneven fillets and other unspecified lumps of gore. Nick our Chef de jour marinaded some raw lumps for a teatime sushi jobby which were indescribabababbbly delicious. Dropped chute before dark, and we try to sail on for a bit, but wind drops again to zilch, so sadly, time again for Betty Beta, our iron topsail. Great supper of tuna steaks with the remaining Canaries potatoes, and some old 90 cent portuguese plonk (shouldn't be drinkin' at sea but this was a special treat). Leftovers pickled for later sushi-ing.
All night we steadily motored on, skipper very morose and hacked off. Motoring is anathema to his Zennist ideals. We should be living off strained seaweed and propelled only by butterflies wings. And then there is the handicap system which is excessively penal for engining, pushing us even further back in the ranks. Mutter mutter. However, foremost in our minds is the Jazz evening Saturday....we MUST get in for it, even if we have to recruit some passing Minkies to tow us.
Here we are now, Day 19, Dawn has been and gone (she comes and goes stealthily by Rib and does a great cleaning job), its morning of the 8th Dec, motoring along between sullen clouds on a flat oily sea. Hot and humid. You know the sort of thing. Bored sailors making whalebone models of Salisbury Cathedral while being flogged into holystoning something or other. Anthony Hopkins and Russel Crowe staring steely eyed at each other across the creaking cabin. Noise of mosquitos. That sort of thing.
Suddenly Nick's line goes twang again and away we go with gaff and gloves. This time its a big bright yellowish thing with a swallow tail. Same colour as a fluorescent donkey jacket and about as attractive. Do we eat it or use it as an aircraft beacon. Fish (if that's what it is) has better ideas and does a quick On Y Va and is gone from the hook. Oh well. Back to the days motoring and jobs. On the bright side our daily HF chat shows most bateaux in our group are also avec moteur so I guess we all will have the same handicap anyway. Nick reading. Dr D dozing. Skipper making lists, but must go as he needs to tidy the back cabin (not a euphemism) and do some canvas work (fashioning an attractive holder for miscellaneous useless nameless objects, a statement of his life really).
Au revoir mes amis
Miguel le squipeur irlandais
Nicque le Chef de Poissons jaunes et etranges de Jour
M.Le Medecin avec un grosse barbe
Et la grande barque RAPAREE
15-23N 57-14W