Sports Day for Sailors!
Wednesday, January 11th, 2006
Location: Port Mathurin, Isle Rodrigues, Indian Ocean
The ship was stowed and ready for another passage at sea, but it was decided by late morning that our departure from this hot, tropical island would be delayed one day, so that Danie and the Mates could take advantage of the perfect conditions alongside to complete some maintenance on the Picton Castle’s windlass. What is a sailor to do when a sailor’s already seen and done everything there is to see and do in a sleepy fishing community? At the Captain’s suggestion, the Mates and Bosun set to work to organize a Sailors’ Sports and Seamanship Day!
We were already all-hands, and we had already spent all of our Mauritian rupees (currency), so the Captain came up with the idea of splitting our crew into three groups and have them pass the afternoon rotating through different activities. These activities included one item of ship’s work and three items of seamanship skills. As a few curious residents looked on from the opposite side of the fence, the Picton Castle crew got down to some good, wholesome fun and got work done, too!
I was in Group 3 of 4, and our first rotation before lunch was painting the rusty spots on the bulwarks beneath the Port Pin Rail and on the Port Topgallant Rail. The newly oiled deck was boiling and blistering hot under the noonday sun as each member of my group sat on the deck in front of our chosen section of bulwark, and began applying white paint to the pin holes and patches of rust that had formed in the steel. We inched as far under the rail as we could in search of protection from the sun, but due to the sun’s angle, we could never be entirely in the shade, and the sticky deck oil stuck the seat of our pants to the deck where we sat, as if to thwart our escape into the shade.
After a lunch of curried stir fry, the groups rotated and began a new activity. Group 3 handed off our painting supplies to the next lucky group and we boarded the Monomoy (the Picton Castle’s whaleboat, formerly a surf rescue boat) for our expedition in rowing training with Assistant Bosun John Kemper as our Steering Oar. Amanda took the position of Stroke Oar aft of me on the port side, and Mike held the oar forward of me on the port side. Kathleen, Maggie and Kjetil rowed the oars on the starboard side. With John’s command of “Give way together!,” Amanda set the pace for the oar strokes. I followed her pace and Mike followed mine. Just when we would get into near-perfect synchronicity, John would have us do what he called “Power-Tens,” whereby he challenged our supposed skills by having us “sprint” for the count of ten strokes. Amanda rose to the challenge, and we followed her lead. Much to John’s pleasure, every oar lock sang out in time with one another. We had the hang of it. Then it was, “Starboard side, hold water!” The starboard crew repeated John’s orders and held their paddles firm in the water. “Port side! Back paddle!” We repeated John’s orders and began to row our oars in the opposite direction that we had been rowing so as to turn the boat around. Our muscle memory made it difficult for us to smoothly transition into a new stroke, and mine, Amanda’s and Mike’s oars all collided as we fumbled to sort out the new rhythm! Soon it was time for the next group to practice in the Monomoy, so we tied her alongside again and hopped onto the deck to see where we were headed to next.
“Heaving Lines!” We squealed with delight. On the dock were six coils of heaving lines, and downwind about ten meters, was a plastic fish tote that was set up as a target. The distance and specific target were reasonable recreations of the distance and specificity one might be required to toss a heaving line to a waiting hand on a dock. It is important to throw with accuracy because, obviously, it is important to get dock lines on and secured so that the crew has complete control over the ship when she is coming alongside in port. Since it was the first time for some of us handling heaving lines, we cheated and let the wind blow aid our efforts downwind. “Take your length of line and make two coils,” John told us as we lined up along an imaginary line, facing the fish tote. “Larger coil in your left hand and only put as much of the smaller coil in your right hand as you can hold. Let the monkey’s fist drop just below the little coil so it does not get fouled.” We imitated the way that John made and held his coils of heaving line. When we were all set, John tossed his heaving line, missing the tote by only a foot to the right. If it were a real-life scenario, John’s line would have made it onto the dock and would have been close enough to the mark for someone to retrieve the dock line quickly. We all wound up and were ready for our first attempt. Since we had plenty of space between us, we could heave whenever we were ready. In an instant, there were monkey’s fists and coils of line flying willy-nilly through the air in every direction, most landing only a few feet away. My heaving line landed in a tangled mess about ten feet away, and I had let go of my bitter end. If I had been on the ship and I had dropped the bitter end and missed my mark, I would have had a devil of a time trying to get the line back on board quickly in order to try again to get the dock line ashore!
Captain Moreland came by to check our progress and had all of us gather our heaving lines and follow him to the edge of the dock. He had us dunk the length of our heaving lines in the harbour a number of times before returning to the imaginary line to try again. Wetting the line would help to firm up the lay and to add mass to the line, ultimately giving you more control over the toss.
Mike quickly became very good at heaving lines. Maggie’s always went straight up and down or fell way short and to the right. Andrea D. stood at the far right of our line of people and her heaving line always wound up to the left of Maggie, who stood at the far left of the line of people. Kjetil did very well in terms of aim, but he had trouble releasing the big coil in enough time so that it would pay out exactly when the little coil ran out, so his line always fell short. My heaving line went mainly to the right of where I wanted it to go. Though it always fell way short of the mark, I did gain a foot or two in the right direction by the time my arms had grown too tired to throw again. Practice makes perfect!
The afternoon was already drawing to a close and there was time left for a handful of us to complete the optional event that we had signed-up for: Skiff Handling. Bosun Lynsey had us pile into the skiff in groups of three. Maggie, J.D. and I climbed in with her and she gave us a refresher speech on responsible boat handling before she let us each practice starting the Yamaha 30 outboard motor that we had on the skiff that day. We learned which of our three engines takes pure gas and which take a gas/oil mixture, then it was time to cast off and practice driving and “landing” alongside the ship. First was Maggie, then me, then J.D. We each had an opportunity to figure out which side of the skiff we were most comfortable operating from, and we each took turns driving around the sheltered harbour to get a feel for the steering. Soon it was time to “come in for the landing.” Each of us in turn had two opportunities to dock alongside the ship and to pull away from her again. Maggie did an excellent job steering and while her first landing was a bit more astern than was desirable, she had sorted it out on the second pass and made a perfect landing. I, on the other hand, had more trouble getting used to steering with even less than 2/3 of the throttle open than I did with the landings (which are difficult, but it is important to not T-Bone the ship or to land too far astern and scrape your way forward along the beam). While I bumbled around the protected harbour, I did reasonably well at lower speed and nailed both of my landings, bringing the skiff to a rest gently against the fenders that were hanging over the side of the ship. The landings were so soft, the tires did not even squeak! Then it was J.D.’s turn. He had done this before, and you could tell he enjoyed it. He opened the throttle up about as much as he figured he could get away with, with Lynsey in the skiff, and his landings were impeccable. “Best landings I’ve seen all day, J.D.!” Lynsey told him. He was very pleased with his turn as skiff driver, but all good things much come to an end, and it was time for us to board the ship and let the final group of the day take to the skiff.
When the skiff was finally safely tied up alongside, First Mate Sam called a muster amidships. It was now 4 PM and the work day was done. All of us who were not to be on watch for the evening were sent “Watch below” so we could go out for dinner at a restaurant, or take a shower, or do as we pleased until the dinner bell rang. Hot and tired from the long day in the sun, we all trudged across the hot deck, aft to where cool water awaited us on the Aloha Deck. We were tired but were in no hurry to go ashore—the banks, post office, internet café, and calling card store had all closed at 4. Instead, we all exchanged stories from our day with shipmates who had been in other groups. The question on our lips was, “When will be our next Sports Day?” but a quick look over the rail and onto the dock answered our question. The day was done but instead of the crew racing for a turn in the shower, the crowd of us gathered again on the dock, or along the starboard pin rails where we could watch as each heaving line was retrieved from its coil on the dock and a serious contest was immediately underway to see who could hit the fish tote the most times.