One of the sailor's biggest fears on passage comes not in the form of bad weather, bad fishing, or even the odd period of dead calm. It comes in the form of massive hunks of steel moving across the seas at speeds exceeding ten knots: freighters. If you hang around a port long enough you'll hear the whining begin: "I was nearly rundown, and the SOB never even deviated so much as a degree. I yelled at him through the radio, flashed all sorts of lights, and still nothing. They must have been asleep." I've never had one come closer than about a half mile at night when it wasn't the fault of the boat I was on (see the Atair), so I was always skeptical about the sleeping freighter theory, figuring surely it would be too costly for the ship's company to have to explain away the wreck of a sailboat and potential loss of life of its crew. After last night my thoughts have changed, thanks to the "Counter Unity" if I heard the name right. Luckily (I suppose) the debacle occurred while I was on watch and I have nobody to blame but myself (and that damned freighter). Perhaps after weeks of no close encounters I was lulled into being too carefree, and despite it being the second ship I had seen on my watch I paid little attention till it was clear it was going to come very close to us. By the time the end of watch came around at 0200 he was just two miles away, and though I was quite sure he SHOULD pass to starboard of us he still seemed to be growing and the drone of his engines were getting louder. My numerous calls over the VHF went unanswered, so I started the motor and followed my first instinct to turn to port and get the hell out of his way. Perhaps it was just my imagination but he was STILL getting bigger and closer. My heart was pounding, I was sweating despite the cold night air, and I feared for the worst. By this time I had turned the strobe light on to complement our running lights, and my father was downstairs repeatedly calling the freighter. Finally, after closing to within a half mile of us the freighter seemed to stop in her tracks and began falling away astern. It seemed somebody had finally woken up and spotted us, probably jolted awake by our repeated radio calls. Moments later a reply came over the VHF in heavily accented English. I finally learned that he did indeed see us on his radar and he would be maintaining his course and speed; we were okay. I said a few choice words thanking him (dripping sarcasm) for his quick response, and learned his ship's name and that they were a container ship heading from China to the Panama Canal (an 18 day trip), no doubt with the cheap junk to fill your local Walmart, and the various shops of Europe. The encounter left my heart racing, and it took a solid half hour to unwind from the stress of it before I could consider fading away to sleep.
On a lighter note, we've now lost our wind. The breeze had been faltering all afternoon and into the night last night, and by this morning it was on its last legs. I did all I could to keep the sails full, going as far as sailing wing-on-wing for a bit, but to no avail. At 1030 we decided to haul in the sails, and before turning the motor on we all leapt into the sea to take a quick saltwater shower in the chilly 65 degree Pacific. We're now back under power with fuel enough for four and a half days (under 500 miles), with 782 miles left to go. Thus the search for wind is back on and we hope to find more in a couple days as we leave the confines of the Pacific High which has built back up around us now that our friendly low is long gone. All else is well on board though the Atkins boys are longing for a big helping of salad to be followed closely by a massive fruit salad. Canned food and fish is growing old.
Somebody let Antl and Graveyard know I say Happy Birthday; and Happy 4th to everyone.
July 3-1245.
34.03N by 132.42W
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