Stranded

A day’s sailing turns into a battle for survival for Ted. But who will win, the sailor or the sea?

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The crimson sun rose slowly into the grey dawn, turning darkened, stunted trees into twisted, red statues that swayed in the gentle morning breeze. As the light touched the tips of the craggy cliffs, the island’s gulls took to the air in screeching circles. Their cries echoed off the crags, as small crabs scurried across weed draped rocks in search of tiny food.

Curled on a bed of dry leaves, and sheltered from the morning dew by a woven mat of branches, Ted Drover cursed the noisy birds and rolled over. The leaves crackled and small twigs scratched and poked him in the back. But after two weeks sleeping rough on the island, these small annoyances were the least of Ted’s worries. His growling stomach reminded him that last night’s dinner had been five small mussels and a raw seagull’s egg.

With a grunt, Ted shuffled from the shelter and stood facing the rising sun. Rubbing his fists against swollen, gum filled eyes, the marooned sailor once again cursed his luck that had wrecked him on this lonely island. What had started out as a day’s joyride sailing his Hobi-cat around the harbour, had turned into a bitter fight for survival, with no quarter given. Ted was discovering first-hand just how cruel nature can be.

Two weeks earlier –

Alone and finally at peace after a hectic working week, Ted was enjoying the freedom of skipping across the ocean before a stiff westerly wind. The swell was slight and the sun warm as he pulled the main-sheet in to tighten the sail and get as much speed as possible.

His heart pounded with excitement as the craft skipped across the blue waves, throwing up salty spray that tickled his face and danced in his hair.

He laughed as black-backed gulls raced alongside him, crying out encouragement as he put more distance between his worries on the mainland and himself. This was what Ted lived for - the sea and a good ship to sail her by.

He had long since passed the point where he should turn and head back in, but that didn’t worry him. “Sailing at night is no different to sailing during the day,” Ted mused. “The ‘sun’ is just a bit cooler, and more moon-like.”

He laughed out loud at his own joke, and pulled the mainsheet in just a bit more. Looking ahead he saw the wide expanse of the horizon with wavetops glinting in the sunlight. There was nothing to break that line to infinity except a small rocky island, a lonely desolate spot beneath clouds of wheeling gulls.

The wind suddenly shifted and turned icy cold. Ted glanced back astern and felt a chill that was worse than the wind. The sky behind him was black. Not just the black of approaching night, but the black of a huge storm prowling behind him like something out of a nightmare, threatening to swallow him whole.

Like a wall into the underworld the dark line stretched from horizon to horizon. In the shadow of the wall the sea was also black, with menacing foaming waves tossing their heads like enraged wild stallions.

All at once the friendly sea of pleasant summer sailing turned angry. Swells started pounding the boat from all sides and it bucked and jerked like a rodeo bull trying to break free from his control.

Once blue waters now turned black and flecked with foam as the waves started breaking. Spray was now hammering Ted, not only from the pontoons ploughing their way through the waves, but from waves bouncing and colliding all around him.

The icy sting of salt spray caused him to wince and duck his head. His soaked hair was plastered to his face like some alien thing trying to lay its seed.

Desperate to return to shore, Ted tacked, turning the bow towards home. He ducked as the boom came across, careful not to get hit on the head. He jumped right to shift his bodyweight as the small boat skipped across the top of a wave.

Like a dancer, the nimble craft settled into a trough and then shot up another wave to hang for a moment on the crest. The treacherous wind chose that moment to shift violently and the sail whipped back across the deck.

Ted barely had time to duck as the boom came hunting for his head. Another shift in the wind and the entire boat jerked as if it had hit rocks.

A loud crack, followed by a hiss of rope coming free, marked the breaking of the mast, and the turning of Ted’s fortunes.

The wind gleefully grabbed the sail and its rigging and slammed them into the waves, then danced around the dis-masted boat howling in delight. The sail filled with water and sank, dragging the port pontoon down into the maelstrom with it.

Ted scrambled to the starboard pontoon and clung on for dear life as the seas pounded his craft. He scanned the gloom desperately for a light that might indicate another ship. But he was very alone and the storm now had him in its grip, and was in no hurry to let him free.

As the light failed completely and Ted’s world was reduced to angry flashes from lightning strikes, and the pounding roar of surf, Ted’s boat decided it had taken enough abuse from the sea and began to break up.

The island had seemed a God-send then - a solid, unsinkable refuge from the fury of the storm. Just when Ted thought he would have to abandon what was left of his pride and joy and cast himself adrift in nothing more than a cheap life jacket, the dark rocky silhouette loomed above him.

A rocky reef finished the sea’s job and the Hobi-cat came apart as the wind thrashed the sea into a surging mass of white water.

Ted was thrown into the maelstrom of swirling currents and pounding surf.

Swimming was not an option. Ted was barely able to keep his head above the waves long enough to get sufficient air to stay alive. Each breath was a frantic sucking of air and seawater, trying to breathe in and cough at the same time.

Waves and currents thrust him one way then another. His legs bashed against rocks and barnacles, ripping his knees raw.

Any thought of trying to do more than thrash about desperately fighting for life giving air, seemed ludicrous.

But the waves and the wind seemed to favour Ted’s survival as they drove him onto an exposed beach and dumped his battered body on the debris strewn sand. Each successive wave pushed him further up the beach, as if in encouragement, before retreating back into the raging pack of waves.

Alive and not at all sure why, Ted scrambled up the beach and sought shelter from the bite of the storm. He was cold, wet and exhausted. The terror of nearly being drowned ebbed to be replaced by thoughts of his survival until the rescue party found him.

The first two days ashore had seen pounding waves continue to tear at the cliffs and beach heads. The roaring southerly had blasted the open hills and scoured the valleys as if in malicious search of Ted’s pathetic shelter.

Those first days had been a nightmare as a bruised and battered Ted huddled, sodden and terrified in the cleft of a boulder. His ribs hurt and his legs had been scraped raw by his scramble ashore.

He had hugged his sodden clothes to himself and shivered violently until exhaustion had overtaken him and he surrendered to sleep.

Then, on the third day, the madness of the storm abated. The sky cleared and the wind calmed until the island seemed quiet, eerie and isolated. It was as if the wind, having blown the island far from the mainland, and rescue, had decided to leave the desolate rock to drift in an endless expanse of blue.

The fine weather brought a small measure of relief to the stranded sailor. He dried his clothes, built a rude shelter and foraged for food. The pickings on the island were slim at best and Ted knew the resources there would not last him long. “But” he surmised, “They only need to last until I'm rescued.”

Two weeks later rescue had not come and Ted knew that it was unlikely a search party would find him now.

Not yet ready to give in, he improved the shelter and tried once again to build himself a fire. His efforts earned him blistered hands from rubbing sticks together, a splinter of rock in his eye from trying to make sparks by bashing rocks together, and a gash on his leg where the rock had slipped as it shattered. His efforts at fishing had yielded similar results.

Small scrubby flax bushes lined a small stream, the only source of fresh water on the island, and from these Ted fashioned a fishing line. A twisted manuka branch served as his pole. The whole picture was so fanciful that Ted had laughed as he strolled down to the beach.

Here he was, a kiwi “Huckleberry Finn” off in search of fresh fish for dinner. But this was no Mark Twain story where the fishing idled away a young boy’s summer. This was a pathetic attempt to imitate the skills lost through the civilisation of generations. Where others would have brought home three or four fish to be fried up and served with kumera, Ted brought home the manuka pole with a tag of flax line left hanging, having broken it when he caught the improvised hook on a rock.

Back to the present…

The rising sun did little to lift his spirits as Ted faced another day, isolated, alone, adrift. His torn and stained trousers flapped about spindly legs wasted from lack of food, as slowly and carefully he walked down to the beach. Each step brought small stabs of pain leaving Ted, a man in his thirties, shuffling along like an ancient of ninety.

The sea is the great provider, the larder of the world. From it, many countries were able to feed their populations and earn money from exports. Ted need only feed himself, but even that was proving to be too great a task. It was true he had access to the world’s larder, but it seemed to Ted that the only shelf he could reach held leftovers and cast-offs that even the rats wouldn’t eat.

Sand dragged at his feet and stringy grasses scratched at the festering scabs on his legs. Ted cursed them, knowing that his legs would itch for hours afterwards.

Once on the beach, Ted decided to try a different tack today. Instead of heading to the rocky pools in search of trapped fish caught by the receding tide, he wandered along the crescent stretch of sand, pausing now and then to inspect a shell or stone.

The golden sand crunched under his feet, getting into the cracks in his toes and heels. Ted barely registered the pain his feet anymore. The hunger in his belly drowned out all but the most serious of hurts.

A shiny shell caught his eye, and with a grunt, he reached down and picked it up, turning it over to inspect it in the sunlight.

He explained to Boris how the paua shell he held got its holes. Boris listened intently to everything Ted said and never argued or disagreed.

He was always interested in what Ted had to say. Sometimes he would offer advice or helpful comment, but mostly he just listened. He was the perfect companion for a man stranded on a rocky island, waiting to be rescued.

Ted tossed the shell back into the sea and continued walking along the sandy curve, leaving a single trail of footprints in his wake.

All manner of things had washed up on the beach after the storm, most of it completely useless to the stranded sailor. A half empty bottle of cologne, probably dropped off a Russian trawler, the chewed rim of an old tire, and - strangely - an old oil lamp.

Ted rubbed and scrubbed the lamp for hours giggling with glee and shouting his wishes to the wind. His only answer was the cackle of the circling gulls and burning fatigue in his arms.

Throwing the now gleaming treasure back onto the waves in disgust, Ted continued shuffling along the sand, complaining loudly to Boris about the unfairness of it all.

So engrossed was he in his one sided discussion, Ted almost passed a large fishy lump at the tide’s end. But a glint of sunlight off the scales caught his eye and he stopped short and stared at his find, unable to believe his luck.

The fish smelled a little rank but, Ted surmised “Everything that comes from the sea smells like that.” Two weeks ago that smell had been the sweetest scent for a man trapped in an air-conditioned cage for ten hours a day. Now it was something that turned his stomach, and he vowed that when he returned to the city, he would leave this tiny island nation and live in the middle of a continent. He hadn’t decided which one yet, but Australia was looking a likely candidate.

He grabbed the tail and dragged the lump down into the surf. Gurgling water washed the sand away revealing a gaping hole trailing the fish’s innards. It had obviously been attacked by a larger fish, or perhaps been hit by the prop of a small boat.

Ted looked up and scanned the horizon, looking for any movement that might indicate a small boat powering across the murky green surface.

There was nothing to lighten his spirits. Not even a boat heading in the wrong direction. “Typical” he sniffed as he flipped the fish over his shoulder and began the long shuffle back to his shelter.

After the tortuous climb back up to his makeshift home, Ted was almost too spent to eat. The fish seemed to gain weight with each stubbed toe, each mis-step and each time the sharp, cutting grass clawed at his legs.

Puffing and blowing, he unceremoniously dropped the fish and flopped down beside it, staring at the meal though tangled locks of salt encrusted hair.

His stomach cramped and his hand shook. Gulls swirled overhead eyeing his prize and crying out to the leaden sky for him to share his bounty.

Ted wanted to cry back at them, to laugh at their pleas, but his breath was too ragged already, so he focussed on cutting away the worst of the damage so he could get to the good meat and finally fill his belly.

A rough edged paua shell served as cutlery as Ted sawed his way into the fish. Nausea battled with hunger as the stench assailed his nostrils.

Hunger was the winner and as the chunks of flesh came off Ted gulped them down greedily. He gagged on the taste, but forced more of the raw fish down “It’s either eat this or die” he told Boris. His friend remained silent, perhaps annoyed that Ted did not offer to share his find.

Most of the fish was gone by the time Ted crawled back into his shelter to rest. His distended belly had that sleepy, full feeling, and Ted decided the best thing was to catch up on the sleep disturbed by the gulls that morning.

As he curled into a loose ball, the gulls descended on the leftovers, cackling and squawking as they fought over the remains. They carried their spoils off to feed their young nestled in the crooks and crannies on the rocky cliff face.

Ted barely heard them as his body surrendered to sleep. His last thoughts were to wake up early the next morning and go to the top of the cliff and shout at the annoying creatures to wake them up early.

A smile creased his face as the visions of grumpy gulls woken early, played across the inside of his eyelids.

Soft golden rays heralded the dawn of a pristine day that would be calm and clear. The sea was like a mirror, reflecting the brilliant blue sky with not a single cloud to mar its perfection. The horizon was lost to the distance as sky merged seamlessly into the bay.

Already, far in the distance, small triangular sails marked the location of yachts out early to make the most of the beautiful weather.

Sweeping into the morning air, flocks of gulls descended the cliffs in black and white waves, circling out to sea to hunt for breakfast for growing chicks.

No curses complained about the raucous noise. No stones followed their flight in clumsy arcs. A whisper of wind sighed sadly through Ted’s quiet shelter carrying with it the stench of vomit and rotten fish.

Boris sat looking down forlornly on his friend’s still form. His normally chatty companion was forever quiet. With a sigh he stood and walked out into the bight dawn, then as the gulls circled back to overfly the shelter, he faded into the sun.