Today was sunny with lovely blue skies and little white clouds, the sea was still rolly, but not too uncomfortable. Tonight its a different story; it’s 10pm, I’m just starting my 3 hour night watch and the ocean looks as black as engine oil, it even looks greasy, its so shiny. The moon is huge and full overhead casting a wide silver pathway behind us, the skies are mostly clear just a few clouds hear and there. But the sea feels angry to me tonight, the waves are huge as they break over the sides of the boat flooding the walkway and tipping us violently from side to side. The wind is gusting to over 30 knots and Daisy skips from a comfortable 6.5 to 9.5 knots as we glide like a surfer over the waves. I shouldn’t be nervous, but I have too much respect for the ocean to take my safety for granted. I can’t stop staring across at the instruments confirming our speed. I’m not comfortable, and I’m sure that even a lifetime at sea couldn’t change that in me.
With luck we should arrive in the Marquises in about 8 – 9 days, it can’t come soon enough for me, I’m not seasick, but I’m so sick of the sea. The constant rolling and having to continually brace against the movement is exhausting. The sails crack loudly every so often as the wind jumps about, it makes me shudder each time as I fear they will tear. I spend way too much time worrying about what is going to break or go wrong next. The pessimist inside me, who is usually fast asleep, is now wide awake and jumping around screaming. I want the seas to still and the wind to drop, but that would only delay our arrival and mean we would have to motor, so even though I hate this I need to accept it for what it is; a means to an end, I just want to get there fast.
I’ve never understood people who are driven to climb mountains, sail across wide oceans, plunge into dark caves, leap out of airplanes and other brave but to my mind, daft, life threatening pursuits, and yet here I am sailing across the largest ocean on the planet. I wonder about my sanity at times. I’m definitely not brave so I must be quite stupid!
I obviously didn’t think this through; for someone who is as frightened of water as I am to be doing this I really must have lost my mind.