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“…but I would be content with nothing but going to sea…? - Robinson Crusoe, Daniel Dafoe

Across the South China Sea - Six days in the life of a Siberian Sailor

Rob Lilwall
2007-12-01 14:46:30

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to keep sailing in a straight line (not as easy as it sounds) and avoiding catastrophic collision with the oblivious super-tankers who slink across the horizon. Being on watch at night is especially dramatic - your 17 tonne, 36 foot, steel craft crashing poetically through the deep, dark seas - shifting skies watching down on you and empty seas stretching out to the horizons all around you. It is almost unbelievable to realise that all your movement is achieved just from the wind blowing on a big piece of outstretched sail.

One of the most melodramatic tasks on board a ship is cooking. One day I (foolishly) volunteered to fry up some chicken. Down below deck I find is this no simple task. The boat keeling over at forty five degrees and not at all steady, I wedge my legs out between the sink and the galley panels (doing the splits, in a manner of speaking) and try to keep the pan sizzling whilst simultaneously avoiding getting boiling fat thrown all over my embarrassingly sweaty bare chest. Reaching over for pepper pot, all of a sudden the boat lurches over a bit further and I find myself flung across the cabin to smash my back against a cupboard. A drawer of cutlery at the same time chooses to empty itself all over the floor. There is rarely a dull moment when the wind and waves are playing their violent games.

Then gradually, on our fifth morning, as the wind began to die and the skies to clear and the ocean to take on a more friendly turquoise blend of blue, we at last began to see signs of land. First of all it was the precarious little fishing skiff darting around in the distance. Then I noticed the occasional coconut floating past - on one of which perched an an unwittingly doomed crab, now a good hundred miles from shore. The next day, we sighted the grey shades of mountains rising from the edge of our world... and with a final puff of wind and a few dramatic thunder storms, we raised our sails and swooped joyfully into harbour.

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