16 Oct. 13
A big 30 knot easterly wind nearly blew the saw out of my hands as I was
cutting some wood to repair the seats in one of John’s boats. It was one of
those typical nothing is going to work out according to plan days. John told me
to repair the seats on his river charter boat and if I need any screws or
spares I could find them on his yacht on the hard in the harbour grounds. I
carried the broken seats onto the jetty and collected my wood working power
tools only to discover the jetty had no power so I had to cut the wood the old
fashioned way. By hand. Next I tried to fetch screws from his yacht but as I
approached the gate to the harbour the guard stopped me and told me no entry
without a permit. At that point I gave up and called it a day.
I finished making the seats and installed them on John’s harbour tour
boat not quite happy with the job I had done since he didn’t give me the
products I normally use to do repairs. My mood was glum and Lola noticed it as
I moped around on Yrumoar so she asked me what was wrong. I wasn’t sure myself
but believed it was because we were still in East London and it was time to go.
Lola listened to my sop story then went inside and checked the weather. A
window was open to head to PE so we started preparing Yrumoar for the trip and
went to the water police to launch our second flight plan. We thought the best
time to leave would be about 11 at night but by 2 in the afternoon we became
impatient and untied the lines. Even though the sky was covered in clouds and
it was a miserable day John told us the sea was flat and he thought the
conditions would be good to go. We motored out the harbour and turned to head
out about 6 miles offshore to find the current. The sea was “flat” is a
relative term in my opinion. Yes it was quite flat compared to our horror trip
from Richards Bay to Durban, but it is never “flat” like a dam. A two meter
swell was running directly at us and made our outbound journey quite bouncy
with our bridge deck slamming the water every third or fourth wave. Then we
turned southwest and the swell came from the side. This must be the most
uncomfortable position for a cat to sail. The wave arrives and hits you side-on
slapping against the side before it lifts the hull up tilting the boat up on
one side before slipping under. Once it passes under the hull the bridge deck
vibrates as the boat slams back down on top of the wave and then the other hull
shoots up into the air tilting the boat the opposite way. It feels like the
boat is going to capsize on almost every wave. Anyway this continued for 2
hours before we again gave up and turned around.
The mood on Yrumoar is still sombre and each of us seems to have
withdrawn into our own world. Rauen spends more and more time on his phone and
Kyle disappears into his room to play with his teddies. Lola has buried herself
deep in a book and I sit alone in the cockpit staring at the water. Two other
cruising boats have arrived and one of them has two little kids on board. This
makes me feel even more ashamed at our failure so I wasn’t surprised this
morning when I woke up with feathers sprouting all over my body. I thought about
Darwin and his theory, nature had finally evolved me into a chicken but then I woke
up and realised my pillow had torn.
21 Oct. 13
Our mood has started to lift and this afternoon we all sat around the
saloon table to discuss our options. Each of us has a different feeling about
this trip. Lola wants to get to New Zealand but is worried that we may not have
enough money to get there on Yrumoar since it would take another year at least.
Rauen feels his teenage life is being stolen from him and he is missing out on
the social life most other teenagers have. Kyle doesn’t really have an opinion
but doesn’t want to go back to real life since he feels he never fitted in
socially anyway. And me? Well I feel I have the opportunity in my hands to
cross oceans and live my dreams but I’m not sure it will happen. I am not even
sure if it’s what I want anyway. So I don’t know, will we continue? Send me
your comments, if you have any and perhaps we can be convinced to continue and
feel more positive.
We managed to sell the car we bought in Durban today so have no reason
to come back here again. Hopefully getting rid of our “anchor” helps.
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