Man (Almost) Overboard

A tale untold to both my captain and my parents, shamefully now, to be splurged for the good of the blog.

It was exactly as it says on the tin and it occurred during our longest passage, at a point about 700 miles from the nearest land.

Without a water maker the non-hygienic reality of a 29 day passage is that there's insufficient fresh water to take showers. One option is to use a bucket of sea water. It's refreshing at the time but it leaves you covered in a salty crust which in the evening absorbs moisture and leaves you feeling like a greased axle. The remaining option?

Rain 'showers'

On this rare occasion where rain showers were a plenty my captain had thankfully 'showered' earlier. I say thankfully as it thus avoided the dubious sausagefest that was two naked blokes lathering up their bratwurst on the deck of a small yacht (not that anyone could see us - but that's not the point!). This did however leave me on the aft deck alone and with no means of communication with my hard of hearing captain who was down below.



Death Deck

 

The confused seas, such a part of that passage, resulted in our boat occasionally taking on a fairground style corkscrewing motion. Up-round-down and then accelerating round again, quite an entertaining force really. Although not in the middle of a rain shower whilst lathered up from head to toe and dripping soap all over the deck. 

I have to take full responsibility for what happened and say that I ignored my own Death Road safety briefings about concentration being the key to survival. With my guard down, my very own 'Death Deck' was the result. 

 With one super turn of the corkscrew the deck fell down and away from me, this robbing me of the traction afforded by my weight. Then as the boat screwed round to the side the proverbial rug was pulled from under my soapy feet. No longer firm footed on the deck my bare ass, bratwurst and body were scooped over the life rails.

Thankfully though and for the good of this story, my soapy hands got ahold of the wind generator mounting (right at the back) and I caught my feet under the solar panel just in front of me. Still, the memory of heaving my body mass up and back over the life rails fills me with shivers. 

Making light of it though; renewable energy? I suppose one day it could save all our lives?