Three fingers too many

It has been so long since i have written anything i sincerely doubt that anyone is still reading this. Which i really quite like. It has a nice public but yet safe feel about it.

Its 5.21 in the morning and i'm still awake. Which means it is lunch time back home. Which is odd, though i have stoppd thinking about it. I am drunk, i was going to go to bed at eleven but i have ended up drinking a whole bunch of whisky by myself and thinking. If i was in edinburgh i would be up Arthurs Seat watching sunrise. But i'm not. I'm here. In a land where i have lots of friends but no-one that actually cares. I need people to talk to, people i know and trust. But i threw all that away because i needed an adventure. I have thrown alot away in the last two and a half years for exactly that reason. I am out here alone because i so desperately didnt want to be ordinary. And here i am, wishing i had a smoke and pondering opening the next bottle of whisky. Are you proud of me mum and dad?

I love boat school (if you dont know what boat school is stop reading) it is wonderful and joyous and a chance to have a life i enjoy. From here i am continuing onwards, 9 months here, 3 in the caribbean, 3-12 across the pacific, 12 in new zealand. I wont see home for two and half years at best. I am terrified. I was about to write that i am worried that i have made the wrong choice. But i havn't. I have done the right thing with my life. But i miss you all.

Everyone i knew back home, i miss you. I may not say this tomorrow as i will be sober, but tonight, this morning. I miss you.

Sorry just three fingers of whisky too many

/ramble/

Lost

She looks out of the car window as it drives past me. Turning I see it’s a taxi, private hire, not a black cab. I don’t know why she caught my eye, it wasn’t an attraction thing. It was something in the expression on her face, not wistful but pensive and almost regretful. It was something in the unreal quality of a city late at night, the streets empty the orange lights finding the edges of the buildings, trees and ground. I wondered what or who she was thinking of. If a person it must surely have been herself, her own life, not others.

Further down the road a couple are framed by the shapes of the street around them. A blonde woman, drunk, with long hair flowing down her black clad back. The man tall an unexceptional, they are arguing she staggers into him and away, he refuses to hold her hand. Shaking her off he pushes her into the road where she walks before swerving in again trying to hold him, make it all ok. I remember how much I have wanted to do just the same this last week, many more miles separate us. As I pass them I surreptitiously take my headphones out, hoping to sneak a little bit of their lives. All I can catch her saying is but you said and the rest is hushed by the man and I feel more strongly than I like the complete tragedy of being human. The crushing fear that we all seem to live with, that weakness we all have somewhere, hiding though it maybe it always come out eventually. Often under that sodium orange glow.

Zuganruhe is the restlessness exhibited by caged birds during their migratory period. Unable to move as they should they jump up and down and cluster as far as possible toward where they want to go. I know how they feel, I wish I could be free to roam, to have the world under my feet. Month and months ago I wrote in my journal:

Travel does make things wonderful. Not the new places, not the new people, not the languages or the food. Not the views or the history. It is the act of motion that frees. Lengthy travel appeals not for the destination but for the journey itself.

And I do think that’s true, I was thinking of adventures and what I really want to do is sit on a very long bus journey, or better walk for days on end across a strange land. To live wild and free, it’s the ultimate stupid hippy nonexistent dream but if anyone knows of how to get there, answers on a postcard please.

James

Last night in the Royal Oak I realised how much I will miss James. He left today, heading off around Britain before taking the ferry to France to begin his over land trip to Iran and Tibet. He is taking on such a big adventure I can’t help but be impressed, I would be so very apprehensive, but he seemed confident.

James is slight, bearded and keen. His laugh booms across any room he is in, upon first meeting him he seemed false, too friendly, too nice. As I got to know him I realised that there is nothing false about him, he genuinely is just nice to everyone.

Working with him in Metropole was always tremendous fun, over the course of an evening we would talk about music, travel, academia and people. He would flirt ridiculously with just about every girl who ever came in there, and he would always enjoy it. It wasn’t so much the goal but the chat that he liked, his confidence encouraged me to talk to the customers more and I enjoy it more as a result.

Last night in the Oak as he sat surrounded by his friends a guy played a song for him. He was a great bear of a man holding a full sized guitar that looked like a toy in his hands, his fleshy face carried a small beard and bold strong eyes. He strummed his guitar and belted out the songs at a noise loud enough to be heard over the fifty people chatting the pub. As he said goodbye to James in his own way I felt so happy for my friend. James smiled and laughed and chatted and sang along. I couldn’t imagine a better last night, and I wish him so much happiness.

Old Things

While rooting around on my computer for some old WebExp stuff so I could do some work i found a few old bits of writing and thought i'd stick them on here. The first is really old, the second less so:

I sit for an hour or more wasting time, destroying it, consigning it to the oblivion of the past. Eventually I get bored of doing nothing and leave, pulling on my jumper and coat as I walk. Heading over towards the jewellers to ask about my watch I decide it’s silly he’d have called if it was fixed. She’ll ask about it though, I will lie in the casual way of one much practiced “yeah I asked, he said a while yet” easier than the truth. So head to the nearby supermarket instead. I drift in, hoping to be enlightened, to be inspired to buy something that will cheer me. It only dawns on me when I leave empty handed fifteen minutes later that a supermarket is not the place to expect enlightenment. Under the headache inducing glow of fluorescent bulbs; beside the glaring signs proclaiming marvellous special offers; amongst the almost infinite variety of prepacked, preflavoured, preshaped foodstuffs I failed to find inspiration. I should not be surprised.

I can’t understand why I feel so dispirited, but I do. Out of place and disjointed I think of the future and a wave of irrational melancholy takes hold. Graffiti stops me. It wakes me up from my self pitying slumber. Written on a wall, black spray paint on a blue wall, are three slightly worn words: “Savour This Moment”. The M is almost unreadable but I can read it, “Savour This Moment”. I stop, I look at it, and I laugh out loud. I do just that. Looking up a seagull is wheeling in the wind, it looks sharp almost unreal against the harsh blue sky. A poster for a club has been put on upside down. Glued there incorrectly until it gets covered over or taken down. A man passes, big headphones block his ears making him look like a fighter pilot, or a futuristic soldier. The beggar is given some money. Godblessyou says he, all one word, without meaning. An old couple tread past, talking without enthusiasm. A girl laughs at a dog. A cloud looks like a sheep. The pavement slab is broken. The wall is blue. The words right there in black. I stand there and savour that moment. It is beautiful. Similar to all others and yet exceptional. Exceptional in that it existed, in that I was in it, in that it will never happen again.

I walk home exhilarated, feeling joyous and special. As if I have received a message that others have missed. I know I will forget it; I will forget this message and become ordinary again. For the duration of my walk home I am so happy, I smile at everyone, I catch everyone’s eye, I laugh at every thing. For a short time I think I am truly alive.

Later on I am sat in my room, unable to energize myself I read listlessly. About Russia and Euclid and Rome and Geometry, trying to expand my knowledge, forcing facts in, hoping it will make me a better person. I know it won’t.

I give up and start writing again, the words seem to flow onto the page it reassures me, comforts me. Each hit of the keyboard leaves its mark on the computer screen, each newly formed word wraps around me, sheltering me. In honesty I find strength. Writing slowly I watch the sun set, except I can’t see the sun, and it isn’t setting yet. I can see the sun proceed across the garden, over the wall, losing its grip on the sheets hanging out to dry. Sliding up the wall of the building opposite, leaving my visible world to shadows once more. The world outside of this room is filled with light, but none reaches here.

Time passes, my flatmate arrives and leaves quickly. As she is leaving her boyfriend asks

“When will we play risk again?”

“tonight” is say. They look surprised, “sounds good we’ll be back soon” and they leave me for a time.

The next bit is party from my journal, partly from memory, but i quite like it, if only because it is nice to remember the crossing:

Dawn

Benster…. Benster….

I roll over and wave to Barney that I’m awake. As it is pitch black he quite reasonably tries to wake me again.

Benster….
Yup Barn, yup

I manage to murmur, it’s just before six in the morning and still dark. I sit up rubbing the sleep from my eyes, and grumbling to myself silently. Arthur is lying next to me, our double berth separated by a cloth wall down the middle, after two weeks at sea I can get up and on deck silently and quickly. In the dark I instinctively find my clothes and pull them on, my mp3 player goes into one pocket, my torch into the other, finally I pull my lifejacket over my head and ghost out of the small and claustrophobically stuffy cabin.

I pause at the chart table to see how far we’ve come in the last ten hours, sixty miles have been left astern as I slept, whilst others ran the boat. Except I didn’t sleep well for some reason, I’m used to the motion and the noise these days but I was busy thinking. I head up on deck, into the dark of the night, into the cool air and the starlight. As my eyes adjust to the darkness I see Barney sat behind the starboard side wheel, checking the autohelm controls. I watch him for a second before looking up at the sails. We are running off the wind, main and a small amount of gennoa up, the great white mass of the former glows falsely in the starlight. The light of the masthead tricolour streaks across the stars as it the top of the mast swings with the motion of the boat.

Morning Ben.
Hey Barn, how you doing? Good watch?
Yeah ok, we had a bit of a squall but not too much wind, I been playing with the course, trying to keep the sails quiet, but they bang anyway.
They will do, not a lot we can do about it.

Barney is eighteen and to my amasement seems to actually respect what I say as far as sailing goes. His boldness and openness to learning make him a pleasure to sail with, competent, yet unassuming.

Damn, Barn, the stars are awesome tonight.
Yeah they have been since the moon set about an hour ago. Oh I got a new constellation, the dog one.
Canis Major? Where is it?

He points it out, and sure enough behind Orion shines Sirius and the rest of Canis Major. Barney and I have been filling long night watches by finding and identifying the constellations. Many an hour we have whiled away squinting at a star chart trying to align it with the real sky above us.

I got it if you want to go sleep mate.
Alright, cheers have a good watch.
Night.

He disappears below, he has been up since three in the morning and deserves his sleep. A few lights glow in the saloon as he records the position, gets himself a drink and uses the heads. His cabin hatches glow briefly as he goes to bed. Then darkness. And I’m alone.

These moments are perhaps the most wonderful of all, when the whole world is mine. For the next hour or two I am the only person in the whole world, the yacht sails ever onwards, heading west away from the sun. That great sun is just beginning to make it self noticed to the east. The sky along the horizon is very slightly paler, a supremely dark, rich blue rather than the black that holds above and in front. The stars are feeble in it, gone is their potency, glimmers of light rather than brilliant flames of white.

The sudden crack of the sail as it empties and refills brings me back from my thoughts, I have to actually look after the yacht. I move to the steering position and check the instruments, the wind has veered slightly, so a small course change is necessary to keep everything happy. On Blue Sky at night its all buttons, I add the few degrees to the electronic heading readout and sit down to watch the day begin.

Sunrise is a time for Explosions In The Sky, a Texan three piece post-rock band who manage to make even the most ugly world seem beautiful. And they make this beautiful perfect world seem divine. Digging out my mp3 player I find the album I want and put it on. Headphones in, hands buried into my pockets against the predawn chill I face astern, east to the rising sun.

The sky has begun to lighten properly now, I can make out the shapes of low clouds hugging the horizon close and tight. At first the sky lightens slowly, but at this latitude the sun is thrown into the sky with a odd haste. So the light grows and the clouds gleam, bronze and gold clouds block the rising sun, where it shines through great beams of yellow light shoot into the sky like in a comic book. My attention is distracted by the recognisable sound of a flying fish bursting from the water. Looking round I see it skirt a breaking crest with ease and drop with a tiny splash back into the water fifteen feet from where it left it. The first fish of the day always heralds more so I watch the water for a little, sure enough in a flurry four blue-green darts jump from the rough sea with a swish and skim over the surface just like the first. I smile. Flying fish always make me smile.

A corner of the sun has become visible while I was watching the fish and the day is begun. Its only going to get hotter from here on in, soon Michael will wake and we’ll hoist the spinnaker for the day. But I have thirty more minutes, so after a sweep of the horizon and check of the sails and the electronics I go below to make breakfast. A pot of coarse, strong coffee and three long-life brioche with honey is my breakfast of choice at the moment. While the kettle is boiling I stand in the companion way, braced against the motion I watch the sun climb, temporarily blinding myself by looking at it to directly.

Michael emerges as I’m finishing my first cup of coffee, cup of tea in hand and pensive, distrustful look on his face. Ruud appears moments later with his cup of milky coffee and honey, he looks refreshed and happy. As soon as we finish our drinks we’ll change sails, but for now we enjoy the last peace of the morning.

Good Things

I have been trying to think of a way to start writing my blog again. I toyed with explaining my absence and filling in the gaps. But it ended up being rubbish, so I’m going to steal from the wonderful Alice and simply make a list of good things in my life at the moment:

Jelena: I’m sorry its just true, she makes me smile. I woke up this morning and she was the first thing I thought of, that put me in a good mood all day. We walked and talked and she surprised me by being insightful when I was least expecting it. She span poi and looked pretty. Its nice.

Thomas Dybdahl: Norweigan singer songwriter, who writes pretty songs about love lost and found. Each day I have a new favourite song, today its this one.

Walking: Idly and pointlessly, letting my feet take me somewhere without thinking about where I’m going. I get time to think, and listen to music and take pleasure in the way my coat billows behind me when I stride quickly.

This

Playing Diabolo: Particularly after I have set it alight, until I drop it, or hit myself, or it goes out. But then I can light it again and throw a ball of fire high into the night sky, twist it a turn it and make it roar with heat.

Words: Never cease to please me. Rhyme, rhythm, purpose, meaning; so musical and yet so unique and powerful.

Memories: Recent and ancient. I like not regretting my life, even things that could have been better are now happy memories. Everything is good in a way.

Rum: At this instant I am drinking rum I brought back form the Caribbean, it has sugar and vanilla in it. It is just stupidly tasty.

The Future.

I guess this exercise was slightly pointless as I’m in a very good mood at the moment, so rather than trying to cheer myself up I’m just feeling boastful. But I liked doing it, spread the meme, write your own. Perhaps if everyone remember their Good Things it’d all be just that little bit happier.

Jack and Drew

Parental Advisory - In order to tell the following story it is necessary to use large amounts of strong language and frequently mention drinking smoking and generally doing all the things that make people bad and evil. Consequently if you are:
a) younger than say sixteen
b) a relative who thinks i'm a wholesome person
c) easily upset by wickedness and bad spelling
d) all of the above
It would probably be best of you didnt read this post and wait till the next one, which will be good and nice... Probably. Thanks for your attention.

Drew coughes and passes me the joint, i take it gratefully and lean back. The American laughes and continues his story in his loud and brash style.
"So it's like my first week here and i've got to get to St Johns for something, i'm walking down the road and i see the drive off ahead of me. I want that bus man i dont wanna fucking wait around so i start running"
Jack laughes at this, he is stoned and seems to have been laughing constantly for at least half an hour, so it would be more acurate to say he laughes more at this.
"You ran for a bus? You? Run? No way!"
"Hey fuck you bitch i'm in prime shape" Drew shouts back, he is though a firefighter in the US he is working a season in Antigua as a deckhand/day worker/self confessed whore of the industry. At 6'2", broud shouldered and bronzed for working outside he looks strong. His air of american fratboy type confidence that makes him look invincible.
"Anyway i'm running and it's like fucking midday so it's deadly hot... Shit pass the rum already whats wrong with you?"
"finish the story then you can have rum" Jack shouts back. He is a drifter he got a degree in Literature four years ago and has done little since then. Mid height but stocky he looks as strong as Drew but being English lacks the chamed energy of his flatmate. He relents and pours a rum whilst Drew continues.
"Thank you man, anyway yeah so i'm running and this guy is sat outside his hut. You know how they do here, they just sit. As i run past him he yells out
'Woah, woah, woah there is no running in Antigua'"

We all collapse into giggles and knock back more rum. We are drunk and stoned, four of us sat inside being raucous. Infront of us sits a table covered with the paraphernalia of revelry, empty beer bottles, discarded bits of citrus fruit an ask tray overflowing with cigarette butts and assorted litter. Looses tabacco and ask lightly dust everything.

Antigua is all about three things: Sailing, Intoxication and Inactivity. Everyone wants a job on a boat so they can buy more rum so they can do nothing but get drunk.

I'm off to Saba in a few days to learn to dive. Then i'm coming home. I'll be back in scotland by the 21st, which I cant decide if i'm happy about or not. Its a fact, i'm pretty ambivilent towards coming home. Yeah i'm tired of travel and bored, but i know Scotland is hardly the promised land in January. So we'll just have to wait and see. Patience.

Antigua

Is fun.

No really, you got to believe me it is. Which is part of why i have been so totally rubbish at writing any blog updates. I assume i have no readers left, but if anyone is still reading mail me (i_wish_iwasjeff@hotmail.com) and tell me otherwise i might give up blogging. It was easy on the boat when i could use a laptop but i dont want to find internet cafes to write stuff no-one will read. So yes let me know if you want me to continue writing.

We got here four days ago, flew in from guadeloupe. A taxi took us to our booked hotel, no change that, overbooked hotel. So after a few debates a different taxi took us to another place. Which was really expensive but I smiled sweetly at the woman behind thedesk who sneaked us into a room for half price as long as we left before 7.30 the next morning.

We got a bus to English harbour and proceeded to find a place to stay by the time honoured method of walking around looking lost and asking anyone we could see. After speaking to a series of ancient old women we got directed to The Marsh Village a collection of Huttages (cottages built like huts) and apartments populated by foreigners trying to get work on yachts. It really is all anyone talks about boats, boats and well boats. Which is fine i guess.

For new year we went down into Nelsons Dockyard and danced drunkenly to reggae till the fireworks burst into the sky to the sound of cheering and Auld Lang Syne - reggae style.

And yesterday we were hungover, so we sat on the beach and nursed our sore heads by swimming in the perfect clear blue sea.

Now i'm going to go hide from the heat with a book and a beer.

Happy New Year everyone. Ben

Guadeloup - Old post that went missing

I did try to post this shortly after we arrived in guadeloup, but it went wrong somewhere so now i'm putting it up from Antigua. Alrighty?

The Caribbean has a very large amount of mythology surrounding it. Simply mentioning the place brings to mind the long over used image of white sands beaches, crystal clear water and over hanging palm trees. Arrival here, especially when the journey is so very long and stressful, is so very likely to fail to meet the expectations of any traveller. I thought of this as we sighted land for the first time in nearly three weeks, this huge fund of accumulated cultural history is hard to see through. Indeed our first Caribbean landfall was La Desirade a large, mostly barren rock which as late as 1970 was a leper colony, no white sand beaches or turquoise waters in sight.

Guadeloupe proper, indeed Bas de Fort where we are moored, similarly falls short of the Caribbean dream. But it lives up to so much more, it is so much more alive and so much more wonderful. Since our arrival we have worked on the boat lots, and done quite a bit of sight seeing. A day trip to the markets in the main town of Pointe A Pitre convinced me of the vibrancy of this place. The markets are big and different, bananas and plantains were enthusiastically sold by large black women in ludicrously colourful almost garish tartan dresses and turbaned head wear of similar brightness. They chatted and smiled constantly, as I took a photo of one woman she turned and smiled for me, such a bright wide and confident smile I was dazzled.

Since arrival we have been occupied, but mostly we have relaxed and recovered from getting here. Crossing the Atlantic in a small yacht is perhaps one of the more difficult modes of transportation, wonderful but definitely deserving in a few days of recuperation upon arrival. At the end of these days we invariably eat dinner in the cockpit, under the glow of our home made and wonderfully tacky chandelier. I think the spirit of our time here so far can be summed up by one moment.

Dinner was finished and tidied up, the bottle of local rum had been found and we had been working through it steadily. The traditional local way to drink this, know as Ti-Punch is really very good: sixty percent white rum mixed with sugar syrup, five parts rum to one part syrup, the sweetness takes the kick out the alcohol more than the dilution. Lime is of course an essential ingredient too. It is delicious, sweet dangerous and yet somehow gentle and well suited to the heat. I fetched my guitar and sat down in the companionway. We chatted quietly and I played old favourite tunes from the crossing and new ones made up on the spot. The sound of crickets vied with the noise of our happy laughter and the water against the hull. Michael said I had to play a song about rum, so I did, pulling mournful A minor chords and G sevenths from Lucy I played slowly and sang made up words quietly:
Don’t give me no more of that Ti-Punch
Cos I just cant go on
Don’t give me no more of that Ti-Punch
My head it aches and my body is numb
Slowly I played, then slowly went to bed, content and happy and slightly drunk. Slowly and gently, that is how we have lived here, and it might well be how I’ll live for a little while yet.

Later addition: We are not Terre de Haut one of Le Saintes just south of Guadeloupe. Barnie and I rowed ashore and walked into the main town. It has one street. It's lovely and feels like the proper caribbean. The bay is small, and idyllic, palm trees and white sands are here. We are just getting ready to have a barbeque on the beach, superb.

Leaving

I could´'t really sleep last night. I had that sort of daft childish excitement you get used to get on christmas eve because we are leaving tomorrow (hopefully). Finally this is the culmination of plan that has existed in my head for about three years. It doesn't really feel real that tomorrow when we cast off the warps and watch Tenerife disappear behind us we wont see land again for three weeks. For most of the tiem the nearest land with be five miles away. Downwards.

We managed to completely fill a taxi with supplies today, and we'll probably go get more tomorrow morning. We have to fill the water tanks, tidy, clean, and go.

Superb

Santa Cruz and Santa Cruz

Today it is a lovely day in Santa Cruz, we arrived here yesterday from Santa Cruz. Santa Cruz is not a nice place, but Santa Cruz is lovely.

The Canaries are covered in Santa Cruz's. We were at Santa Cruz de La Palma, now we are at Santa Cruz de Tenerife. I was wholly non-plussed by La Palma, it was dirty and dry and dead. Tenerife is alive with exciting things, art, architecture, cafe's, people and the Queen of Spain.

We had a great sail here, i sat up on the dog watch as we beat up wind into the teeth of a strong force five. At half past four in the morning i was sat in the wind, slightly damp from spray, not jacket on reciting Shakespear and cackling maniacally. I do that alot.

We are here for new crew to arrive, Ruud and Barney/Baz/Arthur (depending on what we call him to avoid confusion with the current Barnie). Then when the weather looks good, and the ship is ready we'll head out for the big blue. Hopefully reaching Antiga sometime between the 10th and the 20th. But that really depends on the wind obviously.

I intend to write another post before we leave Europe. But if i fail our passage across the Atlantic can be followed on Blue Sky's ships blog: http://blog.mailasail.com/bluesky/blog/. Then i'll write something new in the sunshine of the Carribean, while drinking rum. And cackling maniacally. B

Madeira

From my seat in the back of the car I had watched the walls of rock and plants for twenty minutes as we climbed up into the hills. Upon rounding the corner a great vista swung into view and I actually, involuntarily said “wow”. We could see down three thousand feet into the great valley below. Right beside us the hill side was more like a cliff, it fell so steeply that you could look almost straight down to the valley floor. And it was so verdant, so rich, so fertile every inch was covered in plants, some on hundreds of narrow terraces for cultivation, others just growing wild on any available bit of space. Grape vines grew on ground so steeply sloping harvesting them must have involved abseiling.
The north coast of Madeira is so very dramatic. It actually takes your breath away, I don’t mean figuratively I mean you literally draw catch yourself when you round a corner and the ground falls away around you. It is almost all on a slope, there are flat bits in the form of terracing and a very small part of the valley floor. I don’t think any part of Madeira is naturally flat. Houses are dug into the hillside, and supported on stilts on their downhill side. Roads wind in tight hairpins or are built laboriously through and over the valleys on an interminable series of tunnels and bridges. Cultivation is on the slope too, there are no tractors here, lots of short round faced locals work laboriously to maintain the terraces and harvest their crops growing a thousand feet above them.
But what crops they are, this north coast is the most fertile land I have ever seen, every single inch of land is covered in greenery. Sugar cane vies for space with bananas, potatoes and marrows fight for the soil, vines cover large sections, copses of fruit trees stand stout over lower growing crops. Roadside verges and tiny gardens yield crops, nothing grows here for beauty it is all edible, or drinkable. Driving through it is a welcome antidote to the last two months of dry, dusty mainland. Michael was working hard though, while we watched this rich promised land coast by he was encouraging the car up the hills, forcing it round the hairpin bends and easing it down the slopes again on the other side of the valleys.
Over the course of our first full day on Madeira we travelled halfway along the north coast. Stopping at small towns and cafés to gaze at the views and replenish Michael with ice creams and cups of tea. In a rock pool a hammer head shark sat, dead and decomposing it’s strange shape reminding me of the alien-ness of the sea. At one point towards the end of that drive the road narrowed to one lane and lead through the rock in a rough, dark old tunnel.
Later we found the Madeira Volcano centre with lava tubes left from the island’s formation. Accompanying the natural exhibit was a small centre with information about volcanoes. I don’t think I took any hallucinogenic drugs before entering which suggests that the ten minute 3D film of the inside of the earth core, mantle and crust was actually real. But it was too surreal to really be believed.

The next day we drove into Funchal, the main town of the island. It was not a particularly exciting place, neither beautiful nor ugly. We rode a cable car to the top of the hill and wandered around a botanic garden filled with an eclectic mix of Japanese, African and Portuguese art. It also housed the tallest vase in the world – certified by the 1992 guiness book of records, I do not know if this has now been superseded by an even taller vase.

After moving the boat to a quieter marina we hired a car again and drove the plateaux in the middle of the island. It is high and still, it reminded me of Scottish hills, with mist and bracken. We walked along a levada – a small canal built to move water along the contours of the hills from the wet north side to the relatively dry south side of the island. I stopped briefly in a little sheltered gully by the old man made stream and ate brambles while the others walked on ahead. After our walk, and a rejuvenating pizza we had tea and scones at the Savoy with some friends of George Michael. Just to show we don’t always slum it.

Earlier today I climbed the hill to a large grey building on the hill top. It stands over the small village of Colheta like a modernist spaceship. It is not signposted anywhere. It houses the best collection of surrealistic art I have ever seen in one place. It is filled with Dali and Magritte and Miro, it was designed by Mies Van Der Rohe. It was the single most rewarding hour I have spent here, fantastic and, well, surreal. It sits over a little village, beside a school in a remote Atlantic Island. I love Madeira.

It is half past four now, once the rain clears and the wind looks good we are going to head out towards La Palma in the Canary Islands. Two more days sailing on big clear oceans then we’ll wake up in a whole new place, with new things to see, new words to speak and new people to meet. It’s a good life really.

B

To Madeira

If I stand up on the cockpit seat I still can’t see land, I’ve never done an ocean passage before so this is a new experience. And the sky is huge, and the sea goes on forever, such a vast expanse of water. So much sky, and such complexity of shade and shape. Towering cumulus are hit by the sun, smaller darker ones crouch near by, streams of wispy cirrus and great banks of nimbus hang moving slowly too. The sky isn’t filled though, blue shows through, pale and fragile in places; in others bold and regal.
I know I’ve written about the sky before, but it fascinates me. I like that I can now read the clouds and understand how they formed. Mid-ocean there is little else to see, but the sea and the sky. On my first night watch after leaving Portugal at about four in the morning I was startled by the halo round the full moon. I have never seen it so clear, a great circle of light caused by refraction of light in ice crystals in the troposphere.
Much or this post is copied from my journal that I wrote while at sea and written a few days after arriving in Madeira when it became suitable. On our first morning at sea I wrote bits of the first two paragraphs and continued (I quote directly): In three days time we should reach Madeira. Until then we can only read and write, talk and sing, watch the clouds and the sea. And Sail.

It is comforting to feel the floor moving as it should (I wrote the next morning). The boat is heeling well over to port and leaps and crashes into each wave. It’s interesting accommodation for it all, in order to make a cup of tea you need at least four hands – one to hold the mug, one for the kettle and two to hold on. As I don’t have two spare limbs we make do, non-slip surfaces, clever wedging of things and (most importantly) anticipating the movement of the boat. But I love it, the world feels great here. All the stresses of land disappear and I’m free again. Ok so any small action, like getting a biscuit becomes a major undertaking. Ok so we had to reef in the dark mid squall last night, with flying spray and horizontal rain. But these are such minor problems compared to crossing the road, or buying a lottery ticket (something I’ve never actually managed to figure out).


Once again I woke refreshed and content. I managed to have a shower and put on clean clothes (which as mentioned can be a serious undertaking at sea). Then I had a pot of coffee, bread and honey and watched the world. We were steaming along still, wind force four ish, off the starboard quarter. We hoisted the spinnaker and played with the tower generator.
Now it is early evening and I’m really rather happy. The sailing is beautiful and gentle, and the skies big and clear. Ocean sailing is wonderful when it is like this, you wake up and just watch the sky and the sea rush by, free from worries. My night watch was easy last night, I chatted to Barnie for a while and relieved him early, he was on again at three in the morning so it seemed only fair. Then I sat and listened to John Coltrane and watched the world. The moon rose high and bright, only to soon be met by Orion. The moon and the constellation fought for dominance for an hour, one glowing brighter then the other. I don’t remember who won.
It is so easy to smile here, to be content. The boat yaws from side to side as the waves overtake her. The spinnaker flaps and bangs as it fills with wind. Our wake hisses and foams as we cut our swathe through the great ocean. A squall approaches, a narrow band of rain links the clouds to the sea, it’ll bring wind. This great sea, so wide and beautiful, has been a battleground and a trade route; a home and a prison; a race track and a wilderness. It’s had not to love, and the fear.
And Blue Sky yaws again, crockery clinks in lockers and something tumbles across the cabin sole. After we have eaten dinner, perched around the cockpit in the falling light the others go below. I stand and watch the last of the day tumble out of the sky and Blue Sky settles in for the night. At sea darkness means the end of the day, lighting is only used in need not for recreation. After the sun has set, and we have eaten only the watch keeper remains on deck and alert. We sail on, but she feels different, quiet and gentle.
It is a beautiful night again, the moon hasn’t risen yet so the stars are scattered like dust and impossibly numerous. Michael joins me on deck, we play with the sails and chat. After a while the sea mimics the sky and phosphorescence glows in the wake. Tiny plankton react upon being disturbed and give of bursts of pale turquoise light. The sea and the sky twinkle together. The moon soon hide the stars though, and blankets the phosphorescence, my watch is over so I retreat to my bunk.
The next morning the light trickled back into the sky at first, increasing to a torrent as the sun rose higher. For a while a band of pink ringed the entire sky all the way round. Inside it the moon hung on, looking out of place surrounded by deep purple. I stood at the wheel, alone, guiding this great mass of fibreglass, wood, metal, canvas and rope through the sea to her first ocean landfall. To the shape of Madeira Grande just emerging on the horizon.

Yesterday

All my troubles seemed so far away, now it looks as though they’re here….. no not really. Things are swell.

Yesterday we fought hard to overcome the effects of being in port for a week. Namely the fact that the time we get up has been slowly creeping later and later. As a result of this when my alarm woke me at 8.30 AM (A time I have always been suspicious of) I was not a hundred percent chirpy. This lack of chirp was made significantly worse buy the fact that I broke the coffee pot the night before so couldn’t even rejuvenate myself with a significant quantity of caffeine. My life is so very trying.

Anyway, the reason we had woken at this ungodly and vaguely bizarre hour was sitting in a nearby car park. A rented car, a day trip, a chance to get off the boat and travel a bit! As we drove out of the Marina the sun started to show behind the last of the cloud and we suddenly noticed the blue sky, a bizarre sight after a week of rain and thunder. It is very good fun to travel, to move along, watching the world go by. I sat, my hand out the window smiling a looking. The more I see of Portugal the more I like it, the poorest of the European countries and possessing a unique character unseen in the rest of Europe. The people are friendly, the language unusual sounding, and the wine is really very good.

We drove to Sagres just east of the Southern corner of Portugal. Driving down towards the town we passed through a row of shops and bars, aside from the usual assortment of old men dressed in clothes from five different decades there was no life anywhere. Five minutes later upon driving into the country side abruptly we realised that we had been through the town. Sagres is one long(ish) street with a small assortment of dilapidated shops and empty bars. There is however a large fort built out on the cliff, so we went to look at that. It also was dead, open but empty. Empty is not quite the right word, there were about six other confused looking tourists. And about thirty people fishing off the cliffs, the fifty foot high cliffs that made up the fort were lined with men of all ages, expensive looking sea fishing rods in their hands and small piles of fish. Some of them had climbed someway down the cliff and were perched on narrow ledges over a forty foot drop onto rock and pounding swell with all the outward signs of happiness. We left slightly baffled and drove north.

We found a long surf beach, with some surfers a few holidaying families and huge messy surf. The wind whipped the tops off the breaking waves blowing them back and covering the whole sea in whiteness. George Michael watched Barnie (Note: I have been told off for incorrectly spelling Barnie’s name, this problem has been rectified, sorry Barnz) swimming while I walked along the beach barefoot. At the far end of I came across a small stream flowing through a gap between two rocks. So I promptly dammed it. Then sat watching with satisfaction as the water built up finally breaching the sand and flowing away to the sea again.

Perched on the cliffs, it’s windows shining brightly in the sunshine stood a restaurant. We drove up there and had a satisfying lunch of Cataplana (Portuguese fish stew) and A bottle of Vinho Verde. Rejuvenated we drove further north to the town of Aldjezur. Climbed to the top of the hill there, had a drink in a café and left. It was yet another hot, sleepy town, differentiated from the others only because it wasn’t on the coast, and because it was teeming in very large ants.

Driving home was fun, we took what was euphemistically termed on the map a “secondary road”. To call it a dirt track winding up and down through the hills occasionally blocked by fallen trees and small lakes/large puddles would be a more accurate description. But I guess that wouldn’t fit in the box on the map. That evening I cooked dinner, a rare event on Blue Sky as George does nearly all the cooking, but it wasn’t a disaster, so that’s nice.

Later we walked into Lagos to check out the Lagos Festival that was going on. For some reason we couldn’t figure out it was all medieval. Lutes, Wenches and Mead succinctly sums up the theme. At midnight a big firework display ended the fun, it was variously set to toverture from Carmen, The Ride of the Valkeries and Carmina Burana. After a final two pints (50cl) in our local bar we headed bunk wards. Tired but happy.

Must dash now, going shopping.

Rainy Day Thoughts

Two posts today, both a little more cohesive than the last post. Just out of interest i am posting these on Michael's laptop in the South Bar in Lagos. It is small,. friendly and full of English people.

I retreat into a corner. Blue Sky is well thought out boat as far as nooks to retreat into goes. The cockpit has a nicely curved space where you can wedge yourself against the table. Sitting on the deck with my back resting on the mast and the spinnaker pole is pleasant too. My cabin is just the right width to sit across the bunk comfortably, with my back against the central partition I can look out of the window or the photo I have stuck against the side.

This particular corner however is the navigation station, the bucket seat is comfy and gentle, on one side is a wall and on the other the gloom of the nav station is pierced only by the bright glowing of twenty LEDs indicating that certain electronics are switched on. I settle into the space and relax. I remove my glasses and stare at the form less shapes of the rest of the saloon without any particular interest. Nick Drake plays his guitar and sings so softly soothing me. It is strange to look at the world without my glasses, these shapes normally so full of meaning become indistinct and unimportant. The form of Michael is as stationary and unimportant as the table. George is further away and so is even less real. Only Barney maintains some semblance of humanity by moving in a repetitive measured way as he builds a complex knot known as a Monkey’s Fist.

Its quarter to nine and wet outside, dinner over for once I don’t feel like drinking so sit dry and quiet. It has rained all day, we have hidden below all day running to the chandlery to buy bits of rope and shiny metal in one brief lull. Sheltered below life this, confined by the rain we read and play backgammon, after the chandlery run we play with rope, splicing and knotting. We drink tea and idly play guitar. We are stuck here in Lagos until the radar is fixed, until we the lee cloths we ordered have been delivered and until the wind starts blowing from the North as it should be instead of the unusual southerly it has been for the last week.

Days like this remind me of family, of old summer holidays. We used to sail up the west coast of Scotland on family holidays. These indistinct trips are, like most childhood memories, sensory rather than specific. They smell of damp and mould, sound like rain on cabin roofs and wind in rigging, they taste of salt and look grey, and most of all they are angry. It is no injustice to my mother to say she became angry on these weeks. We were three boys bickering and complaining, and my dad trying to keep people together and apologising for the weather. Everyone was exasperated, and tired. Sailing in Scottish waters is a soggy experience, once anything gets wet it doesn’t dry, and everything gets wet eventually. My dad’s boat Rosie B is nice, and suits my dad’s needs but when it is raining constantly for three days straight everything ends up damp. She is also not particularly big, especially not for three teenage boys who do not wish to be there. I still remember when my mum finally cracked, the shock of her swearing was so sharp that it is still distinct.

Looking back I am so glad we went on those trips, it was a hundred times better than sitting on a beach getting sunburn. They taught me to love the outdoors, to love Scotland and to love sailing, even if I didn’t see that then. Here and now things are different, Blue Sky is spacious and dry, I am here by choice and a wholly different person. Sitting reading book after book listening to the rain, watching the next band of grey water laden cloud approaching my thoughts go back to that time and place. Make me think of my family. My little brother just starting to become an adult and not knowing how. My older brother just coming to the end of his adventure having to come home and deal with the real world. My dad working each day, travelling on commuter laden trains, thinking of his boat. And my mum, walking along a beach in the blustery autumn day, hands buried in her pockets smile on her face.

The Mysterious Life Of Lief N. Nielsen

Walking down a street in Lagos my eye is caught by a box of books outside a shop. They are in English, oh holy grail of holy grails. In five minutes I have found Conrad, Arthur C Clark, and Somerset Maugham grasping these happily I go inside. A large trestle table takes up the centre of a cluttered shop floor. It is piled with books, my smile widens at them all. Books of all shapes and sizes piled in heaps of twenty or more cover the whole table, most are in English, some Spanish some Dutch and lots of Danish. This is what remains of Lief N Nielsen’s life, this Danish man died and all his effects somehow or other ended up given to this charity shop down a small back street in a sleepy Portuguese town.

His library has obvious themes, he loved the sea has many books about diving and sea life, a big set of encyclopaedias stands right in the centre. The autobiography of the Dalai Lama is the most interesting of a huge collection of Buddhist and Mystic books. Zen and Enlightenment feature heavily. Lots of these books contain old bookmarks. A cutting from a magazine article about the Chinese invasion of Tibet is yellowed with thirty years of age. A Business card for Dr. Thomas Garman, Consumer Studies Family Finance from the college of Human Resources in Virginia is crisp and unbroken. A bookmark advertising The Tigers Fang by Paul Twitchell proclaims that “Wisdom is never for the multitudes, but for the few who seek it”.

This mysterious character has brought me much delight and caught my imagination. See Lief N. Nielsen as he sits in an armchair, elderly and worn. Books and bits of paper clutter a table nearby, he sits still, meditating. By his side a cup of Chai tea steams and his cane is leant against his chair. The room is small and fits around him like rooms do from many years of occupation. The curtains are heavy and patterned, half drawn they only let a little light in from the cold grey day outside. It slants in illuminating the swirling dust and steam rising from the tea. A large and wild spider plant grows down from a tall and narrow cane table, a small pile of earth sits on the floor near it where Lief knocked it earlier that day. The Portuguese lady who cleans for him will deal with it tomorrow when she comes but it will have to wait until then. The walls are covered with photos of his life, smiling boldly he looks out from the top of a mountain in Nepal, he proudly beams at his graduation. There are several of friends and lovers, Panama and Ceylon, diving in the South Pacific and Walking in Denmark.

He had a son, but hasn’t heard from him in many years. The next time his son thinks of his father will be when Lief’s cleaner calls to tell him his father is dead. However Lief often thinks of his son, trying to remember how they drifted so far apart. He doesn’t know where his son is, or what he is doing. He doesn’t know that he has a granddaughter, or that his son has cancer. He never will. He thinks also of his lovers, they were many and varied but none lasted, he drove them all away one way or another. Later he reads in the dim light of a standard lamp, he goes out to a small café on his corner for dinner. The people recognise him and serve him a bottle of wine and seafood cataplana without saying anything more than greetings. Lief eats alone, he goes home and listens to Beethoven on an old record player.

Lief lives like this for months; meditating, walking slowly to the café for his dinner, reading listening to old records, thinking of his son. One day the cleaning lady comes in to find him sitting in his chair. When he doesn’t return her greeting she walks over to him and sees his eyes closed. His tea is cold, so is his hand.

Lief’s son buried his father in the local cemetery, desperate not to think of death as that cloud hangs over him too he takes a few things from his fathers house and leaves the rest for a charity shop to pick up. He leaves Portugal and goes back to Germany to his wife and child. He tells them he has cancer, but he does not mention his Father.

Two weeks after that day I go into a charity shop and buy this man’s books. They sit beside me now old, yellowed and smelling as old books should. One day someone else will buy them.

Ups and Downs, Thoughts and Places

Something has thrown me, my earlier elation at the freedom I felt has worn. It has drifted I guess, life continues in it’s own way, there is a routine of sorts. We move from place to place, from day to day, from hour to hour even. Cadiz unsettled me, it caught me unawares and confused me. I couldn’t make sense of it, or find solution to my thoughts.

Cadiz is a lovely city, built on a narrow isthmus that shelters the bay it is old and much fought over. The Moorish influence is strong here, as is the European. Perhaps that is part of why it was hard to understand, it had a feel of its own that was not wholly cohesive. The marina is a long way out of the centre, so we walked in along a wide mole. It is dry and dusty, but everywhere is dry and dusty around here so that does not help in the description. The path over great concrete paving slabs was the home of stray cats, ten or more of them sat in the sun eating or sleeping. Small groups of teenagers were here too, slouching on benches, acting as they feel they must act. Approaching the old town we found a strange collection of concrete columns and arches, as if a building was begun and left unfinished, they were covered in graffiti, hundreds of colours of words in Arabic and Spanish. People asserting their existence, or declaring love they have been drawn to this small space to fight with everyone else’s proclamations.

After a time an old wall appeared, we walked beside it, I took some photos, a window, a patch of light, my friends walking. Further in we crossed a large square, a huge marble column attributes Cadiz’ principles to Ferdinand the VII. Soon we found ourselves in the old town proper, winding streets and bustling people. People on street corners sold lottery tickets, these having pre selected numbers on them the sellers display those with ‘good’ numbers prominently. They are proud of symmetrical ones like 12321, or those with sequence 12355. Expensive fashion shops do well, though they seem to mock the poor people selling tickets on each corner. We had a slow Spanish lunch, choosing tapas randomly off the menu and drinking beer. I could not quite relax, not as before, it didn’t feel right. After lunch I wandered off with Barney. I hoped to find what I’m missing, what I have lost. We walked down the alleyways turning left and right, going anywhere that looks interesting, we stumbled upon a small square. Cadiz is full of little squares, each with a fountain and a café in it, and a stray cat of course. I hope through this random walking to feel free again, to exercise my free will and in doing so return to a mind set where I can laugh at a patch of sunlight.

But free will is an illusion, we are not free. I won’t let myself believe in free will. In rejecting the metaphysical, in rejecting God and spirits and ghosts I can solely accept the physical. That is to say I accept that matter is all that exists in the Universe. Traditional physics tells us that matter is governed by rules, or at least behaves in a predictable manner. The complete and utter inconceivability of understanding these rules, of predicting the behaviour does not change that fact that there this regularity exists. The world, the air, the seas, this laptop, my brain are all made of matter that must behave in a non random way. The end result of this is that our actions are not free. We do not reach a decision in our heads and act on it freely, we reach the decision we had to reach as a consequence of the arrangement of atoms and smaller particles at that moment. Thought is the end result of a process electrical discharges and chemical reaction in the brain, nothing more. Quantum physics can dissolve this problem like Aqua Regis. But everything dissolves in Aqua Regis, determinism and free will and order and reason, quantum physics leaves everything scary and uncontrollable. I prefer a deterministic world to that one.

I do not believe in free will, I do not think man (or woman) is free to make a choice in his life. However, and here is my succour, I believe in consciousness. Some weeks ago I said to a philosophically minded friend that we are free to make a decision, but the one we reach is the one we were always going to make, he scoffed. He was right to do so, that is a bit of a daft statement, but it is also slightly right. Free will does not exist, but we are conscious and this consciousness creates the belief in freedom. Free will is an illusion, but it’s a bloody good one.

A few days have passed since I wrote all that and looking back on it I am reluctant to post it, or to continue with what I had begun. The ideas, the arguments are half formed and poorly worded, I don’t know enough about quantum to dispel it that easily. However, I have posted it, I think it shows what my mind does here. I spend hours thinking about philosophy and life and how I fit into it all. I had hoped to weave my philosophy into the thread of my narrative, and I may yet, but it is too soon. I don’t know what I’m thinking properly, and I certainly don’t know enough to argue these things properly. I don’t believe in free will, but I do believe in freedom, “freedom as the strongest expression of life”. I think that creation makes people great, creation of new thought, or of art or of deed. Freedom to do this is what really matters. I think all that, and I believe it, but I don’t yet know how to explain it. Its like a new colour that no-one else has ever seen, I know what it is like I can imagine it and picture it but I cant possibly explain it to anyone else beyond saying “its kind of like apricot jam mixed with a muddy sea and the green of a cactus; shaken up in a triangle poured over Bach’s second Cantata on a bright Tuesday afternoon” It just doesn’t make sense.

So anyway. We are anchored in Portuguese waters, in the lagoon around Faro, but away from the city in the shelter of little island called Culatra. We have been here for four days now, as Michael would say, “just being pretty chilled”. We have swam and played and read, we have taken Alex ashore and waved goodbye as he headed home. It’s strange to imagine leaving this life now, I have become so settled into it that I couldn’t handle leaving.

Culatra is beautiful though, possibly the most beautiful place I have been to on this trip so far, a small island with a surprisingly big community. Barney described it as a toy town, and it is a good description. There are no roads, only a meter wide concrete pavement that runs down between the houses. On either side of the pavement is a wide patch of sand, dirty with dog shit and foot prints. The houses are almost all one story, flat roofed and fronted, though varied in colour and design many have a door with a single window on either side. They are houses that children would draw, right down to single tree on one side and the round yellow sun on the other.

Beyond the village/town/settlement a board walk leads out over the sand dunes, scraps of dry and weary looking plants grow on the sand. Small amounts of rubbish do not spoil the subtle beauty of this fragile ecosystem. Eventually we reached the end of the boardwalk, here is a simply fantastic beach. It is long and golden, and empty. Huge rolling waves pound in against the sand, there is nothing but sky and sea and long golden beach. I run, excited again, laughing madly at this unexpected shore. I ran into the surf ignoring the soaking my clothes got, I stood and shouted excited, bold shouts of pointless noise, I think young Barney was a little puzzled but I didn’t care. I ran along the water front singing loudly, uncaring. My freedom is back, that daft, reckless wild freedom that makes me feel like nothing is impossible.

The next day we took the tender over to the town of Olhao for the market. Though we see little of the town the market is excellent. Lots of local farmers selling misshapen tomatoes and dirty vegetables, old ladies standing in the shade of an umbrella behind a few buckets of nuts and young guys in vans with cheeses and olives. A covered market is noisy and boisterous, we bought sardines and sausages, got more gas from a hardware store and enjoyed our selves purchasing vegetables. We bought a few bunches of non-descript herbs from an ancient woman, she was tiny and covered in wrinkles, dressed in a printed dress grubby and worn with an equally old straw hat.

We have returned twice to Culatra, to walk and watch and chat. We played Frisbee on the beach in the sunshine, and drank beer on plastic patio furniture in the shade. Two old guys sat in a corner playing cards, neither of them had a drink, now made any sign of buying anything. I don’t think anyone cared. Dogs roamed and children played, the whole island is basically one big sandpit free from cars and crime, I can think of few better places for small children. The whole island is conspicuously free from the presence of anyone between fifteen and thirty. No teenagers live here, they need bright lights and big cities. I hope all the small children mean the community isn’t dying and I doesn’t feel that way. People walked and chatted in the street, doing shopping at the two small and dingy shops or drinking in one of the sparsely populated cafes. I love this island, it’s silence and its simplicity, but I feel the tug of the sea, the urge of the wanderer, I want to go to the next place now.

Two days on and we are in a new place. Lagos to be exact. We left at five thirty this morning from the anchorage at Culatra and arrived just before lunch time after a rather boring trip. The forecast southerlys that should have blown us nicely along the coast never materialised so we motored most of the way. The last few days have been quite wild though so there was a rather nasty swell from all directions, the short sharp lumps of sea made me seasick for the first time on this trip. We also had the first decent rain storm of the whole trip, the others went below and I took the watch. Laughing maniacally and singing happily I got fully soaked, which was nice because it washed the salt off from my swim in the sea the day before. Dawn was uneventful really, which was a shame because I was looking forward to it. Sunset the night before had been fantastic, bold and massive, filling fully half the sky in a hundred shades of grey pink and yellow. I sat on the foredeck listening to pink floyd and smiling at the tremendous beauty of it.

I realise I use the word beauty too much on this blog, but I see so many beautiful things I can think of no other word to use. It is something I have come to realise here, you see so much more. I assume that there sky looked as fantastically awesome as it does here, ok I couldn’t see quite as much of it due to buildings etc but it must have still be great. On any ordinary day in Edinburgh, the chances of me stopping what I was doing and staring at a particular cloud for half an hour are pretty slim. It did happen from time to time, but so rarely. Here I can sit and do nothing but look for hours on end without getting bored. When you slow down a little, stop rushing to work or lectures or a friends, When you can stop for an hour and not feel guilty, when you can watch the sun set uninhibited by the rest of the world you realise how much you have been missing. I’ve said it before but the world it fantastically beautiful, not just the great dramatic sunsets and that wide open beaches but the pattern of light on the ground or the way a bird flaps its wings. Next time you have to go somewhere, be it lecture, work or friend leave early. Walk slowly. Look. Stare up at the way the leaves shine luminous green in the sunlight, look down at the shapes of rain on the ground. Watch the faces of people you pass. I rarely looked at things back home, I don’t even know if it can feel the same when you don’t have all the time in the day. But try it. Let me know if it works.

Gibraltar

Approaching Gibraltar by sea is an exciting experience for history geeks. For more than two thousand years it has been a feature of Mediterranean maritime events. It is one of the Pillars of Hercules which marked the extent of the known world to the ancient Greeks. Beyond it was the terrifying Oceana, the wild and unknowable encircling sea. Greek ships couldn’t possibly have survived out of the benign Mediterranean, and so Gibraltar was as far as they ever went. The Rock has functioned as a defensive station for a thousand fleets, it sheltered the British fleet before Trafalgar, and allied fleets in both World Wars. It survived a Spanish siege from 1779 to 1783, more than a hundred miles tunnels fill the rock, dug out during this and later times.

The height of the Rock relative to the surrounding land means it has it’s own weather, as we motored towards it a large white cloud stood above it alone. This jaunty and friendly looking hat of cloud welcomed us to this famous port. Twenty tankers were anchored in the bay, I tried to imagine them as ships of the line preparing for Trafalgar, great forests of masts and swarms of men. Boats rowing and men working. The crash of hammers and the whistles of bosuns. This image amused me for some time, till the shouts of Michael woke me. We moored without difficulty, in a slightly scabby looking marina in the shade of the Rock. Building sites surrounded us. Teams of people were reclaiming land, filling in the marina to make more room for housing. Behind them more tower blocks were being put up, optimistic pictures showed a haven of sunshine and relaxation. Beautiful people rising to a clear sunset in their perfectly clean apartments. The reality of Gibraltar is quite different.

It is seedy, run down, scabby, decrepit. Actually, none of these words are quite right. Gibraltar is all of these, but really it is weary. It is a place too exhausted by time to actually have anything left. Now it is visited by tankers and sailors, Spanish looking for cheap fuel and cruise liners filled with tourists. The main street, cleverly called Main Street, is lined with shops selling electrical goods and perfume. Cruise passengers wander up and down here, taking advantage of the tax free status of the town. Americans joke and laugh, French chat, Spanish gesticulate and the English swagger. We wander along here, looking and talking. I find a bookshop and George Michael leave me looking. After half an hour I buy Nietzsche a Dostoevsky, though I want more I try and control myself.

The next day Barney joins us, he is eighteen and shy. His thick dark eyebrows give character to a friendly angular face. We walk into town again, stopping for lunch at a pub we take advantage of the British status of the place. A pint of Speckled Hen and a Steak and Ale pie make for most satisfying sustenance. Later after trip to the supermarket Alex arrives. He is boisterous and friendly, with dark eyes and a square jaw. A mop of slightly curled, slightly greyed hair adds to the look of joviality. We eat dinner and chat, getting to know one and other.

In the bright morning sunshine we walk towards the rock. There is a little used path that leads up the west face of this great pillar. No signposts point to it, the only evidence is a hand painted scrawl on a rock “To the apes” with an arrow pointing up a broken set of steps.

We climb for twenty minutes through dry and broken ground before joining the road again. The air is still and dusty, big old cacti grow through the rubbish and wasted earth. I swig water and feel unfit, though this is mitigated by everyone else’s similar reactions. Back on the road we come across he two defining features of the Rock simultaneously, the quiet and pleasant Barbary Apes that live there, and the raucous and embarrassing Human Tourists who visit. The apes are small, red coated and vaguely aloof. The tourists cackle at their every movement, jeering and poking. They push food at them and then snatch it away, looking shocked when the apes look angry. I take some photos, not of the apes but of the spectacle of their interaction. One half sit resignedly staring the other half swing and shout and cry loudly into the heat. I hurry to get away, we start walking again.

The path leads up the top of an old wall now, though it is blocked of with signs that read “Danger” we climb over these and walk up. It is a beautiful walk, though it is dangerous. With a bit of effort this path could be made safe, the crumbling steps rebuilt, the handrail repaired. But no-one wants to walk up the hill, and no-one in Gibraltar cares to make it easier. Taxis and the cable car bring in more money. Eventually we reach the top, out of breath and hot we sit in the shade and calm ourselves. Joining a group of American tourists on a viewing platform we look at the sea and across the straight to Morocco. The Americans are chatting:
“Look at the Baby…”
“Take a photo of this Hank…”
“It’s got an apple look…”
“Where is Africa?”
At this last question I help them out pointing across the straights at the great mass of Jbel Musa, the other Pillar of Hercules
“That is Morocco”
“That’s Morocco you say, so where is Africa?”
“Morocco is Africa” I say just keeping a straight face.
“Oh yes sorry” Says the smiling American lady in big sunglasses and a visor. Her husband, smiling at her wife’s mistake interjects.
“Say, do you know where the Rock is then?”
I can’t answer, I don’t know what to say. I mumble something vague and walk off to join the others. Together we climb to the cable car station, here there is more of the same, tourists and apes and photographs and views.

We walk around further, to the top and look at the view. I tire of feeling embarrassed by my fellow Homo Sapiens so leave as soon as the others are ready. We walk down through by a different road, through Ministry of Defence scanning stations, old and abandoned. The chain link fences guarding them are rusting and broken, lumps of concrete sit bereft of the pylons they used to support. It is sad and weary. We rejoin the tourists outside the entrance to the old tunnels, Napoleonic era tunnels dug to provide gun embrasures against the Spanish in 1780. We (Michael) pay and walk down through the stone, the tunnels are impressive and reek with memories, I imagine people fighting and living here, beds made on the stone and the report of cannon crashing through the stone. The tourists are still here, dummies are dressed to impress them, talking displays and lighting changes happen automatically, I don’t like it. We leave, heading home, back to Blue Sky.

The next day we leave, heading out into the straits, heading to Oceana, leaving the gentle Mediterranean we aim for the wild Atlantic. Between the oil tankers we hoist the spinnaker, well, we start between the tankers but it takes us half an hour as we haven’t done it before so we are in open sea by the time it is flying. The sea is growing and the wind powerful. We watch the anemometer, the wind grows, fifteen knots, twenty knots, it gusts higher. The spinnaker becomes difficult, reckless in fact and we hold on. With the wind this strong it isn’t easy to get the sail down, it is up for now and we have to deal. I helm, Barney helms, Michael takes the helm we surf down breaking waves at twelve knots. And still we hold on, scared but excited. Michael’s attention wavers as a plane passes over and we loose control, we come round and broach. The sea rises up, pours over the gunnels, we hold on tighter still. Before reaching Cadiz we broach twice more, once in a sort of controlled way, once wild and dangerous. Ropes and people are everywhere. Alex having never sailed before sits smiling, doesn’t realise the seriousness of the situation:
“That broach was nice” he says, I look on in wonder.
We get the spinnaker down in the end, we regain control, the adrenalin stops pumping. I start to laugh, sailing is occasionally exciting and dangerous, it is like a trip to Alton Towers for free. I love it and fear it, I guess it’s all part of why I’m here.

This Free

The last day or two have been fantastic. Not that we have done any sailing, we have motored from Almerimar to Gibraltar arriving at three o’clock this afternoon. These days have been so good because I have been thinking so much, and so creatively. My mind has been flying around philosophy and purpose and the sea and people and anything else I can get into my head. It all began yesterday morning…

I woke early, really early five o’clock maybe. Lying watching the sky lighten through the small hatches in my cabin I was kind of thought free. Unable to sleep I found music and listened to a current favourite – The Postal Service. We had another lazy morning, walking up to the chandlery and doing a bit of shopping. As we motored out into the bay, sails were set for the gentle breeze, I stood on the foredeck staring out across the bright water and started talking.

For a few years I have found great pleasure in making up lyrics of poetry on the fly. Speaking or singing and seeing what pops into my head. I am sure the product is never great art, but it is fun and a nice way to play with words. Trying to create sensible, meaningful sentences that fit with the tune or meter and rhyme from time to time can be quite tricky. More than this however it is an interesting way of loosing your subconscious. In speaking this quickly I often find that I have said something I didn’t realise I thought before I could stop my self saying it.

So, I was standing there and started talking like a madman to the waves. As I talked I kept coming back to this one line:
“They don’t know what it feels like to be this free”
I think something in me snapped. The tie that had been holding me to home, to family, to friends just went. I no longer wished to be there, to be back with them telling them about my doings, I wanted to be here and free. I didn’t understand what I meant to be free, I didn’t realise just how strong a feeling it can be. I have no ties, I have an infinite amount of possibilities and I have a whole world to enjoy them in.

This sensation has lent a sort reckless happiness to everything since. I played guitar with such new passion, my calloused fingers moving with a precision that pleased me so much I laughed loudly. I cackled at a new combination of notes, I sang words from my head, forgetting them as soon as they were sung. I danced on the foredeck to music in my head, I read Graham Greene and shook with mirth as Our Man In Havana’s situation worsened. It was really quite superb.

Later as the sun was setting I sat up at the Michael’s shout of dolphins. Off the port bow we could see ten maybe twenty black fins in the water, bursting to the surface in search of air. They got closer and closer, soon all around the boat we could see some kind of small whale. They were in front of us and behind us and under us. I could see their black heads glistening in the falling light as they broke the surface. A minute after they had passed dolphins joined us, four of them joined the bow wave, playing in it. Sat on the bow seat I could see every detail of them, their long slender bodies, their sharp powerful tails, the gleam of their pale underside and the sparkle in their eyes. For ten or fifteen minutes they played in the sunset, and I jubilantly happy, clapped and laughed and poured superlatives down at them from the bows.

My watch that night was fantastic too, the big fat moon, one day off full lit up the world. It was so bright it sparkled on the sea and I wondered about the lack of a good moon-tan lotion on board. I listened to the Cinematic Orchestra and ate a mars bar; I watched a ship pass and thought. Every hour or so the dolphins returned, splashing along side they cheered me still further. After a cup a soup I got lost in my philosophical bug bear that is Free Will, Determinism and Fate. As always finding no answers but thinking better, more clearly than I had in ages. Tolstoy made an appearance, as did Asimov bizarrely.

I thought of the sea and how alien it is, how scary. I compared my panic stricken fear at a jelly fish sting to the more controlled reaction to the similarly painful hornet that stung me last summer. I had shouted in shock and pain at the time of the hornet, and shaken uncontrollably for an hour but I was never scared only sore. The jellyfish grabbed at something much more primal, with no recourse to fight I had to choose flight. Being out of my element I couldn’t flee, I just splashed and got scared. I wondered about how happy the dolphins made me, not just because they are beautiful, but because they are safe seeming. They breath air, they look after their young, they play with each other, they join yachts and are sociable. They seem like a safe presence in a scary alien world.

This is all getting a bit long but just time to mention that as I came on watch again at nine this morning I climbed into the cockpit clutching at my oh-so-essential coffee they came back. So once again I stood at the bows, this time as the sun rose, and watched the dolphins play. Morning coffee, cool clear air and dolphins to watch; I wish you all knew what it felt like to be this free.

Mallorca To Almerimar

Mallorca to Ibiza

The sun hides behind a marbled wall of streaky grey, and yet beneath it the clouds gleam golden and bright in the early evening light. These shapes, possible homes of impossible angels, look false, painted. In front of this beautiful backdrop glide great grey submarines of cloud. Line after line of these menacing forms sit between us and the glory beyond. Closer to the horizon the sky is clear, though lost is the brilliant blue that remains over our heads. This hazy space seems subtly shaded the palest of blues, tinted by the sun it looks almost green.

And now, later, the submarines have marched past and the sun shines free of its marble prison. The tip of every cloud shines a radiant gold, even the clear sky is a brilliant yellow and the sea is vividly gild.

Here away from the heavens the day is peaceful. We sail gently but happily in the healthy breeze. Michael helms, the wind blowing his short hair, a squint in his eyes. His soft features seem content and relaxed. A sound from below announces George as he potters around, coming on deck he is well tanned and healthy looking. He wears his sunglasses balanced on his head, now pulling them down to cover his eyes, then up again, unable to settle. His small mouth, defined by a closely trimmed moustache and beard, is also restless changing from a smile to a frown pausing neutrally for some time. A grimace passes at some thought then he too assumes a contented comfortable expression.

The wind falling away as the evening progresses forces us to motor and the peace is broken. These moments are for me one of the greatest charms of sailing, a time when free from distraction, I am free to watch an ever changing world. On land there is always a task to do, a place to go, here at sea there is so much more stillness, so much more time.

Sunset that night was subtle but beautiful, complex layers of cloud, in shapes to innumerable to describe glowing pink then deep, rich red like embers in a fire. Slowly the fire left them and they turned ashen grey, yielding to the moon rising. Slender and yellow it cast its reflection on the still water, clouds catching it’s light dispersing it, hiding it briefly only to reveal it again. By the time we could see land again the stars were out, scattered like dust across the sky, the great band of the Milky Way glittering gently. We anchored shortly before ten o’clock, the sky was dark but for the moon and the stars. After dinner we slept soundly, cured of my harbour rot a smile played on my face as I drifted off to sleep.

Ibiza To Spain

The next day was quite spectacularly uneventful. We motored slowly round Ibiza, which on its northern coast far enough out from the coast not to see the people is really rather nice. Big white cliffs topped with old fortifications, pleasant bays and bright sunshine. I sat on the foredeck and played guitar happily, working on a few new tunes, one that I started when the morning I left Edinburgh is now a most satisfying piece of rhythmic classical guitar with hints of Explosions in the Sky. The other a piece of simple oom-pa type finger picking is just sort of fun. Oh and I’ve been playing the Guillemots – “Made up love song #43” which is just super nice. After three hours we stopped for lunch in a very small bay, it was maybe seventy feet in diameter and practically circular, as Blue Sky is 49 feet long it was very cosy. Really pretty though, we went snorkelling which I’ve never done before. It was most fun watching all the fish swimming around, flashing in the rays of sunshine. At which point I got stung by a jellyfish, despite the fact that he was only about four inches from end to end he left a fantastic red welt across my arm which four days later is still present. It was so painful, and so shocking that I got a little freaked, had a bit of a panic in the water for a minute of two involving much splashing and shrieking. Then I calmed down and got out of the water. Interesting.

That night we anchored in a remote bay on a small island west of Ibiza, I sat up late after George Michael had gone to bed. I sat on deck, drank whisky, listened to John Coltrane and watched the beams of a lighthouse sweeping across the sky.

The passage from Ibiza to the Spanish mainland was brilliant. A very fine reach in wind which increased from a 2 to a 5 over the course of the day was just brilliant. Towards the end, when George had stopped smiling and Michael was arranging for shelter I got a bit manic. It is a powerful feeling to stand at the wheel of a big boat, well heeled in a stiff breeze. I stood and sang loudly, rejoicing in the spray, fighting with the weather helm. I chortled loudly as a particularly big gust threw open a locker in the galley showering the saloon in plates and mugs. It was exciting sailing, safe and sensible but very fun, and it was beautiful. The sea was fairly flat and the water glistened and sparkled in the sunshine, birds flew with perfect control though the waves, pausing occasionally to investigate something in the water. The approaching shapes of Spain were layered mountains and rocks, behind each hill was another bigger one lost slightly more in the haze.

The next morning we had a proper early start heading south and west, hoping to get to Almerimar before the forecast levanter (strong westerly wind) blew up and made life difficult. There was however no wind at all, so we motored, it is 187 miles from where we were anchored to Almerimar, so we motored for thirty three hours non-stop. It wasn’t the most exciting passage ever. However I did see the most beautiful sunset yet, a massive sky alive with red fire. And we had company in the form of a dolphin playing across our bows for ten minutes, a whale appearing briefly off the port beam. Fishing was also successful including the landing of three small red tuna which made an excellent dinner and a particularly beautiful fish called a girelle (French name). It was long and slender and bright, brilliant green, with a fantastic fin running down it’s back and nicely curved tail. George has yet to decide how to cook it, though it may become lunch today. I took the dog watch that night, which runs from three to six in the morning. It is often the worst watch, though I enjoyed it mostly, the stars were amazing, Orion was the brightest I have seen him for a long time and it was nice to slowly watch him rise into the sky. The night was warm and I kept sleep at bay with mars bars, cocoa and danceable indie fun from my MP3 player.

Now we are in Almerimar as planned, by Friday we should be in Gibraltar where we will get more crew. Little Barney – an eighteen year old gap year kid, who hopes to come with us across the Atlantic and Alex – Michael’s nephew. So we shall have to wait and see what they are like.

Waiting For Company

Note: As may happen quite frequently this is the second of two posts put up today, the other post "Learning to let go" was written the day before this one. If getting the chronology right matters to you, read that one first. But it doesn't really matter. B

Sort of a fun day today, George Michael get back today so I have been sorting the boat out. Over the last while I had moved my possessions around the place liberally. Books sat on the table, Lucy on a seat, a pile of dirty dishes by the sink and paper was scattered everywhere. Now I am the veritable paragon of cleanliness. My stuff is all in its home neatly in my cabin, even Lucy is in her bag snugly fitted next to the hull. The washing up is done, the surfaces cleaned, the floor swept and moped. I have brushed and washed the decks, wiped dirty marks away and piled any loose things neatly.

Last night the gas ran out as I was cooking dinner, of course. Luckily everything was pretty much cooked, I just had very al dente pasta. Today I successfully negotiated my way to a new gas canister, and made restocked all the boat supplies I had used up in the last few days. I have also managed to fit in writing a new tune on the guitar with a nice but very complex altering bass line that requires the use of my thumb on the bottom strings of the fret board; got all the way to the four hundred and seventh page of War and Peace and contact juggled for an hour with an orange (almost as good as the proper ball but with the advantage of being soft and floating).

I am expecting George Michael in the next hour or so, it’s a little odd I had kind of got used to being by myself. Ok so yes, I am going so crazy I have named my guitar and given her a personality (she is a lovable but cheeky little minx who has a habit of being rude though no-one could ever hold it against her). Yes, I caught myself proclaiming to the skies last night about scales of morality and when something should be placed on said scale. And yes, have read two books in a day each as well as reading a third of Tolstoy. But I was enjoying being slightly mad, now I’ll have to be all chatty and witty and the effort will be just too much.

Oh I almost forgot, I haven’t been wholly alone. A lovely English couple are on the boat next door, so I’ve had some nice chat with them over the last few days. Last night me and Lucy gave a concert to a boat full on slightly crazed Germans who spoke about as much English as I do German. They invited me onto their boat, gave me a beer, I played for twenty minutes. They applauded and laughed in a very Teutonic way, one of them ever had a daft moustache and would not have looked out of place in lederhosen. I left fairly quickly scared by their beaming smiles and odd questions (You are alone on the boat? You like salami? You staying here alone? Why do you play guitar? Is anyone else with you?). As I stood on the gangplank (yep they really had a gangplank) to get ashore they applauded again, I turned round, bowed, smiled and promptly fell into the dock.

Much laughter ensued. Lucy was safe though don’t worry I threw her at the Germans as I fell. Fifteen minute later I had showered and changed and was sat feeling quite daft rewarding myself with a whisky and a gentle bit of blues.