ESTRELA THE CRUISE SHIP

by Kyle

7/15/04 1530 local: I’ve just come up from a swim off Estrela in the middle of the ocean! The sea is like glass, not a wisp of breeze in this benevolent and clear sky. After motoring for many hours we needed a break from the engine’s drone as well as a break from our own self-imposed schedule of getting to the Tuomotus. Doug stopped the engine and called us all on deck for a swim-time. What a blast. We jumped off Estrela into (finally) warm water and swam and splashed and took pictures. After a quick fresh water rinse Abigail said that she didn’t want to go to an island. She wanted to stay right here and just keep swimming! I had an epiphany—Estrela isn’t a boat to just get us somewhere; we don’t need land to have fun. Estrela is more like a cruise ship! So here is my rendition of Estrela as the LOVE BOAT.

THE LOVE BOAT

ACTIVITES FOR 7/15/04

Today’s Culinary Theme: Mediterranean Madness.

EARLY BIRD ACTIVITIES:

0600 LOCAL: “Sunrise, Sit-ups, and Scripture”—exercise your heart, mind, and body with Kyle every morning on dawn watch. And for those early-early birds there’s always dish duty executed by Kyle with a smile (tea and cookies provided for extra energy!)

BREAKFAST (served in the cockpit—an Italian café):

0700-0730 local: Start your day off right with hot instant coffee—pretend that it’s espresso! And once again enjoy last nights Italian pasta dinner—a real Mediterranean treat.

MORNING ACTIVITIES:

0830 local: Jump to the other side of the Med and learn how to make your own hummus and pita bread. Join Chef Kyle and sous-chefs Eliza and Abigail in the galley. Learn how to make the delicious spread with shear muscle power—no blenders or food processors here! Have fun playing with (and throwing) flour while rolling out the pita bread circles. Chef’s hat not required.

1100 local: Resident teacher, Mrs. Hopkins, will start home school/boat school for all the children on board. For the olders, we begin adding fractions with uncommon denominators and for the youngers, learning words with the “e” sound. Our group lesson will be either French or piano, depending on weather conditions, e.g. heeling. As customary, chocolate will be served at snack time.

LUNCH (served in the galley—a kitchen in Marseille)

1200 local: While Chef Kyle naps, Captain Doug will raid the larder for lunch—slices of home-baked bread served with wedges of delicious canned fromage (from Kraft), chunks of tasty Hormel saucisson or smeared with dollops of chocolaty Nutella. Today’s special Mediterranean-style Ramen Noodles.

AFTERNOON ACTIVITES:

1300 local and 1600 local: Captain Doug has two seminars today—the first, “For Ladies Only: Tool Identification” really hammers home the importance of tools. Don’t hand your husband pliers when he wants the channel locks! Quiz at end. The second is called, “Weather Predicting for Idiots—how to read those fuzzy lines in the weather fax”. Watch the Captain stand in front of his computer and receive a weather fax. Listen to him talk with other sea captains on the ssb radio about the weather fax. Learn all about the weather fax: isobars, wind direction and frontal systems. Quiz at end.

1400 local: For this afternoon’s continuing cultural series, “Lifestyles at Sea”, Miss Abigail Calnen Hopkins takes us to the other side of sea-life. She follows-up yesterday’s well-attended presentation, “Living it Up on a Mega Yacht”, with “How to Cruise on a Shoe-string Budget”, with demonstrations on washing clothes in a bucket and techniques for hanging laundry while underway or in a very windy anchorage.

1500 local: Don’t forget the afternoon swim off the boat. Whether in your bathing suit or birthday suit, have fun jumping off the vessel into crystal blue water. Captain Doug will turn off the engine for an hour so we can enjoy this tranquil sea. And this time the first mate will stay on board until the captain gets back on—it’s a good idea to have someone on the boat!

EVENING ACTIVITES:

1730 local: Watch the sunset from the “Lido” deck. Kenny G will play for your listening pleasure.

DINNER (served at the Captain’s Table—a night in Tunisia):

1800 local: Eat the delicious pita and hummus sandwiches made earlier by guests and crew. Curried chicken salad will be served on the side.

1900 local: Resident Astronomer Eliza Ayres Hopkins will point out important constellations, esp. the differences between the Southern Cross and the false Cross, how to follow the path of the Scorpion, Orion and his special belt—more than just stars. BYOB: Bring Your Own Binos.

2000 local: Slumber Party with story time and lights out. Get out your pillows and blankets for a cozy bedtime ritual. Captain Doug will put on his pajamas and read to all the good little boys and girls from the latest Redwall series book, Mattimeo. The First Mate promises to stay awake long enough to check for clean teeth and faces before story time begins.

2300 local: Caught handling your genny when the captain called staysail? Then tonight’s topic, “Running Rigging”, for our continuing series, “Late Night Between the Sheets with Captain Doug” is just for you. Join Captain Doug in the cockpit for this special time, his dogwatch. Over black coffee, Captain Doug will bring running rigging to life in a way that you’ll never forget. Quiz at end.

ON PASSAGE: GALAPAGOS TO PITCAIRN

by Kyle, with apologies to Bob Dylan and The Dixie Chicks

HALFWAY POINT SONG

(sung to Blowin’ in the Wind)

How many times must a fish fly on deck,

Before one grabs a hook?

How much grease can I store on my scalp,

Before my head slides off my bunk?

How many crystals of salt must be left,

On my hands til I lose all my skin?

The answer my friend is Waypoint #6,

The answer is Waypoint #6.

How many coffee grounds must I spill,

Before I switch to Nescafe?

How much banana bread must I eat,

Before the whole bunch is gone?

How many cans must whiz by my head,

Before Doug installs bungee cords?

The answer my friend is Waypoint #6,

The answer is Waypoint #6.

How many loaves of bread must I bake,

Before I’m a real Lin Pardey?

How many times must I write in the log,

Before I’m Jimmy Cornell?

How many times must I say, “Roger that”,

Before I’m a junior Gordon West?

The answer my friend is Waypoint #6,

The answer is Waypoint #6.

GODSPEED LITTLE BOAT

(sung to Dixie Chicks’ song Godspeed [Sweet Dreams])

On dawn watch and sippin’ tea

Stars are smiling down on me

Wind is free; we’re sailing on the big blue sea.

Crew wakes up to fresh baked bread

So many nets confuse my head

Math and grammar, homeschool time, and books we’ve read.

Godspeed, little boat

Keep up speed, little boat

Oh God’s love will fly to you each night on angels’ wings

Godspeed, Godspeed

Fresh fruit gone and engine fails

Salty hands begin to scale

Laptop wet, girls fight again—forepeak jail.

See a rainbow in the sky

Humpback whales go swimming by

Snared a tropic bird we pray that he will fly.

Godspeed, little boat

Keep up speed, little boat

Oh God’s love will fly to you each night on angels’ wings

Godspeed, Godspeed

Start to laugh instead of cry

Feeling patient by and by

Drunk on family more than wine, I’m so high.

Goin’ north and heaving to

“Piggyland” sustains the crew

We celebrate, eat cake and count our blessings, too.

Godspeed, little boat

Keep up speed, little boat

Oh God’s love will fly to you each night on angels’ wings

Godspeed, Godspeed

Heaving to again today

Pitcairn seems so far away

God gives us strength to carry on another day.

The weather clears, we finally land

Legs are wobbly but we stand

Seems a miracle we’re on Pitcairn sand!

Wouldn’t trade a day we’ve had

Spirits up and hearts are glad

A life at sea and when it ends, we’ll be sad.

Godspeed, little boat

Keep up speed, little boat

Oh God’s love will fly to you each night on angels’ wings

Godspeed, Godspeed.

ON (FINALLY) MAKING BREAD

5/26/04, 0100 Zulu

Bread making seems to be a right of passage in any cruiser's life, particularly women cruisers. I don't mean to sound chauvinistic, but I can't imagine a man turning a homemade loaf of bread into anything else but a food item. A woman, or maybe it's just my neurosis, places her whole femaleness onto that little loaf. The bread becomes a barometer of femininity. The more well rounded the loaf, the more well rounded the woman. So you can imagine all the psychological baggage I brought along on my bread making attempts, so much, in fact, that my nervousness turned into an anguished terror. OK, Kyle, its time to either call a therapist or get baking. I decided to get baking.

My first two attempts were on land. I figured, start easy.---in a kitchen whose only motion was the slamming of the fridge door, not a rolly boat galley. I could just imagine hanging on for dear life as my (hopefully) beautifully risen dough careened off the mini-counter onto the floor, dough and ego deflating in rapid succession.

So it was, "Girls our homeschool lesson for today is bread making." "But Mom," said Eliza," how can you teach us when you have no idea how to make bread yourself!" "Recipes, my darling daughter, I found a Martha Stewart recipe that was designed specifically for baking bread with children." I should have known better.

Somehow I think that Martha intentionally puts a small glitch in each recipe for her beautifully photographed, simple, but elegant gastronomic fare. That way she is always a step ahead of her female following. The bread was harder than a stone, so much for "forgiving" dough. Maybe she meant forgiving in the sense that the cook must forgive Martha, who once again prevailed in the kitchen. We poor cooks fall a notch lower on the femininity barometer, while she rises even higher than her so-called "quick and easy" bread dough.

Take two, a different recipe (this time a no-fail oatmeal bread recipe), same result. Hmm. Maybe baking is genetic. My mom was not a big baker, and neither was her mother. I always thought that her not baking was a weight control strategy, not a matter of genes. My mom can put even the best of chefs to shame in the entrée department. She's more Julia Child than Betty Crocker. I felt defeated. Time to rebuild the boat's toilet and varnish interior bookcases. That was more my speed.

Once on board and finally at sea, I procrastinated for about 1,000 miles. I mean, why bake it when you can buy it, right? I could buy it all the way down the Intra-coastal Waterway, in little shops in the Bahamas, and in big Panamanian grocery stores. What's the hurry? All the while, the Pacific Ocean loomed in my subconscious. 3,000 miles without a bakery. And before I knew it, we were days from transiting the Panama Canal. We had all our fenders in place, our extra long and strong dock lines on board, even our line-handlers all lined up for the big day. Yes, I still had a bail-out strategy. I could purchase all the bread in the entire city of Balboa on the Pacific side of the Canal. But how do I keep from creating a penicillin factory that would rival Pfizer ? I realized that once we passed under the Bridge of the Americas,, I would be left to my own culinary devices What do I do? I had chained myself to a dead weight-the ego. And I was starting to sink. How do I break free? What should I do? I finally did the only thing I knew how to do. I prayed. At first my prayer was more like "Dear Lord, help me make this blasted stuff". Gradually the main ingredient in my recipe changed. Instead of 6 cups of flour seasoned with 7 cups of ego, it became 6 cups of flour folded into 20 cups of love. Like the Grinch, my heart grew in size. Now my heart was large enough to care for and feed my precious crew.

So I started anew.

A wonderful book for children became my bread bible, "Knead it, Punch it, Bake it: The Ultimate Breadmaking book for Parents and Kids."-published by Houghton Mifflin. The authors, Judith and Evan Jones, beautifully capture the aura of bread making, "There's an old saying in the valleys north of the Persian Gulf that bread is older than man." Ahh. The recipes are just as satisfying. Not only is there a whole page entitled, "About Yeast", but also the recipes themselves explain basic principles in ways that grown-ups and children, alike, can understand. This is done with joy, not condescension. I didn't know that bread making clean up should be done with cold water, or that by knocking on the loaf's bottom, one can test for doneness.

Suffice to say that those two loaves made on that hot day in Colon, Panama were received with wonder and thanksgiving. It seemed like a miracle. The loaves were puffed over their pans, with golden crusts protecting the white, chewy and yet fluffy, insides. The entire ridiculously selfish past melted like the butter on each delicious slice. And all at once I was connected to all women of all races and ages since the beginning of time. Bountiful bread, the sustainer of nations, had come to my table. Finally.

-- Kyle

ON LIFE IN 15 MINUTE CHUNKS

5/16/04, 1040 Zulu

Beep beep beep. There goes the alarm on my wristwatch. I stop whatever I am doing below and pop my head out, look up, and take stock. Are we on course? What is the wind doing? Is there any weather coming? Is there any boat traffic? Every 15 minutes the person on watch must answer these important questions. A fast freighter could steam from out of sight into our "danger zone" that quickly. Sometimes the checking process takes mere seconds: pop out, everything's cool, back down. Other times it takes time as well as strength, courage, concentration and patience to keep Estrela on the right path. Beep beep beep. Time to look up.

This past 15 minutes turned into 45 minutes. A sustained gust of wind pushed Estrela "to weather". She went hard to port, gaining speed and heeling angle. It took strength to pull the tiller to me. My heart started pounding. Could I do this myself while my precious crew was below sleeping? Should I wake Doug from his much needed sleep? God guide my hands-courage. I had to tweak the self-steering and guide it back on course. Oops. I overcorrected and Estrela fell-off the wind so much that her sails started to slat. I tried various combinations to balance her-concentration. And then it took patience to wait and see if all these alterations really succeeded. 45 minutes later, it worked.

(I just heard a bizarre noise up on deck. I donned my headlamp, went back above and found a flying fish flopping around the scupper. Back into the water you go. Your cousin was not so fortunate. He was lunch yesterday.)

So here is a very brief outline of a day at sea, played out in 15-minute chunks.

Doug's day ends at 0200 local time (right now that's Galapagos/Central Standard Time) when mine begins. My dawn watch is my most precious time. I'm finally alone. Believe me, on such a small boat where there is no place to hide, getting alone time is critical. I like it so much that I may have to incorporate this time into my land life! I finish any dishes or chores left over from the evening. I write on the computer-emails, essays-and also by hand in the logbook and my personal journal. I read books. I listen to a lot of music from, gospel to Monteverdi, as well as sermon tapes that a friend gave me to keep me going. I sing to the stars. I try to exercise, plies and sit-ups. I bake. The 5 hours go very quickly. Everyone is up by 0730-0800. We eat breakfast while Doug participates in the various cruisers' nets on the SSB radio. Nets are radio check-ins with sailboats that are also traveling-safety in numbers. I'll clean dishes and do some home chores-laundry in a bucket, make bunks-while Doug continues his work at the navigation table-plotting, emails, weather faxes---or on engine maintenance or other boat projects. He is now officially on watch from 0800-1200. I fall into a bunk, exhausted, and sleep while the girls start homeschool with Doug or do crafts-needlepoint and knitting-or play with dolls. They turn our boat into a dollhouse, using cushions and pillows and extra line hanging around. I must be a real cruiser now, because it doesn't bother me anymore!

I'm up at 1200 and start lunch. Doug tries to sleep from 1400-1600, while the girls and I clean up lunch, finish any homeschool, play card games, read aloud or listen to books-on-tape. I participate in a radio net at 1530. This is our quiet time. By the time Doug wakes up, I'm pooped and the girls need some daddy time. They all mess around while he is on watch. There's a lot of laughter and fun going on below or above deck. Doug and I also try to sneak moments where we can just sit on deck and feel the awesome wonder of this planet. There is never enough time to contemplate the heavens. I start dinner prep while listening to some sort of psyche-up music-usually Harry Belafonte or the Dixie Chicks. We try to eat around 1830. Beds are made up before dinner to avoid that cranky pre-bed time. Then teeth brushing and off to the bunk-the girls sleep foot to foot in one bunk-while dad reads a book aloud. Doug tries to catch a nap from 2000-2100 while I do dishes. Then he's up on his long watch while I collapse into the sea berth in the main cabin for my long-4-5 hour-nighttime sleep. Ahh. Another day on passage and we're all healthy and very happy.

There is a beautiful rhythm to a day at sea; a simplicity that can't be achieved on land. With no distractions we focus on the boat. And every 15 minutes we look up.

-- Kyle