Don't need no stinking lighthouse!

We were sailing to Kieta, Bougainville from Gizo after clearing customs. We got word that someone we had sailed with had been forced to buoy an anchor to mark it's location as they could not free it from the ocean floor. We thought we might swing into this little island, pick up the anchor, have a little relaxing dive and brunch. One half of the Solomon Navy didn't agree. They had this little gun boat smaller than President Kennedy's PT boat! They let us know that we had cleared customs in Gizo ( after spending three months in the Solomons) and were not welcome in their territorial waters any longer! There were no tense moments. We invited all four of them aboard for lunch ( they liked my bread ) while they checked with the proper authorities to see if we could be allowed to dive for our friends anchor. After a lot of posturing and a wasted four hours we were told in no uncertain terms we were persona non grata! It was a disappointment not to be able to bring our friends anchor to Kieta. We had the abillity and the technology but Governments love to exihibit their power. I loved paying the light bill in the Solomons. All the lighthouses were built by the U.S and maintained through WW11. After that they were maintained by the country itself for about a month! In the entire Solomon Islands we found one of twenty-one lights working. They charged us in Haniara $ 210.00 for light fees! I wonder what it is now? As far as I know that anchor is still sitting in that bay waiting for someone to come and get it! The island can't be accessed because it belongs to the Solomons and there is no way to clear customs. You only can clear at Gizo or Honiara ( Guadacanal )! This island is only about 8 hours from Bougainville. Sticky wicket! When we arrived at Keita they had a perfect Jap Zero mounted like a model a kid might have in his bedroom. Royal and I later found one in 15 feet of water in a channel. You could free dive it and actually sit in the cockpit! Both wings were attached and all the gages in place. It was really erie! Royal took one gage as a sovenier which I am sure he still has to this day. Thus his name Royal Gage! Ha!

P.T 109

Story time not" Dream Time" boys and girls! We said our goodbye's to Phil at Gizo, Solomon Islands. Worst case of Malaria I've ever witnessed. He's alright. Saw him a few years later in Adelaide, Aus. He's a grower of organic foods and has a great spread. Still gets knocked down by the bug but handles. Back to Gizo! We all meet this guy ( American ) named Royal Gage. I know his name sounds contrived kind of fictional, well he is all of that and then some! This guys life stories of which he never embellished put mine in the corner. I liked him ( still do )! He was the first American I had seen or spoken with in many months. He was in Gizo to dive J.F.K's sunken PT 109. After realizing Australia's southern coastline was a bit much even for an ocean going kayak he was headed home to Seattle to continue building boats. After downing a few schooners we figured I may as well join him and dive Kennedy's wreck! So we did with a dive group package that does these kinds of things in the south seas. After that we drank a few more middies and Royal was asked if he would like to go sailing? Dave, the skipper of Guinevere, asked if he would consider continuing his journey for a bit longer? Everyone liked him. A family of four and me. We were going to pick up Andrew Pete later. But for now he said," cool "! And this is where it gets interesting. It's my fault. I had been making, " Hopi ", alcohol for months. I had a really good batch begging for consumation. It's 2 O'Clock in the morning and Royal and I are yarnin on the second spreader with a gallon of firewater in a very still clearing habour with fifty free anchored vessels trying to sleep. For once not one generater was running. Guinevere's mast is 62' off the deck. We, without knowing it, were broadcasting laughter, bad jokes, meaningless babelings, selfish giggles and were totally unaware that we had offended everyone. And because we were so high up,( no pun intended ) the amplifcation factor carried us into a state of unpopularity only ascribed to a few! Our boat ( the family ) held court the next day. Should Royal sail with us or not? He did. I never made Hopi again as part of the deal. Don't think for a minute that it wasn't loved. It was just time for something else. I still made bread and we still drank beer when and where we could find it! But to sail with Royal to Cairns, Aus was priceless. Let me tell you of the time that one of our cockpit cushions flew overboard off of Papua. He- but that is another storie!!

alcohol and bread

Shit! I hated not being able to make a sandwich while sailing from north to south! Even rice was hard to find. Eventually a cigarette became a luxury! All of these necessities become a story but not yet! Let's do bread and alcohol! I can turn these into many stories or processes that one who has traveled the distances I have, just, might understand the need for one and maybe the other! I learned, at sea to make loaves of bread on a rolling deck! I was able to feed a large crew, at sea, sandwiches only because of my need. I love bread and I also love booze. I have a formula for the finest kine sailing alcohol that has ever been found. We call it Hopi. It is an interesting combination of local fruit ( sugar ) yeast, water, containment, aging, a process that only requires a rolling deck, a desire to believe and a hope that your behavior might be affected/effected by the consumation of said " Hopi "! After eating the bread I made I sat on the secound spreader, fifty feet off the deck of Guinevere, drinking " Hopi ", with Royal Gage, contemplating our sail from Gizo,Solomans to Cairns, Aus- This will be another story! arrugghh

Rabaul-PNG

Water is very important to a sailor. One of the greatest quotes ever stated was by Magellan. " Water, water everywhere but not a drop to drink"! What did he mean by that? Oh yea! He hadn't been able to catch rain and wasn't near land to gather fresh water from a river but was surrounded by an ocean of salt water. Well in a small way sailing into Rabaul was like this but different. In the " South Seas " good water is still a blessed thing. Some atolls only fresh water is the rain they catch off of their tin roof, guttered into a barrel to be used casually as they deem fit. In Raboul the drinking fountains taste of sulfur from the active volcano which shaped the underwater cauldron you sailed into thinking, Oh what a natural harbor! Sorry, I have found out that since we were there it blew! The sulfuric content Guinevere ( our vessel ) was floating in killed all the skirting ( living moss ) clinging to our hull. We normally had to dive and scrape off our hull so we could maintain a forward speed under sail without unneccesary drag! If the water from their town tasted like and smelled like sulfer why would anyone contaminate their water tanks with smelly water? We didn't but the alternative is just as rank! We found a man in Rabaul, an expatriot, who said we could take on water from his rain catch on the other side of the bay. The water was sulpher free but it had mosquito larva in it o'plenty. We siphoned the water through a screen-filtering, jury-rigged process before it ever entered our 300 gallon tanks. After we loaded the water we dropped in just enough clorine to kill all micro-organisms but not taint the tanks. Sticky wicket but! It took a team effort but the sulpher contact to water storage tanks from an active volcano is way more lasting than the smell of rotting eggs. What happens is your water tanks have to be replaced as the taste and smell can never be put aside. All new water takes on that flavor which is not desireable. I do recommend however, that whenever possible pull into any volcanic harbor as it cleans your bottom as it has never been cleaned before! AARRGHH, Matey

Fatique

When does one reach the farthest limits of one's endurance? When does metal bend over and over again while it becomes red hot and then loses it's tensil strength? Ask a samarai sword maker as he heats metal and beats it over and over again until it folds into itself making an edge sharper than a razer by the heat, pounding and cooling of an artists attention! I have been that sword. The oceans I have sailed with Masters, have tempered and shaped this sword and more! The waters with a cooling effect have affected the Master and myself, being crew and then shaping/ merging into a oneness/sameness, becoming togetherness and then-forgetfulness. Complete in a fugue of fatique that by the force of a combativeness, the violence of extremes seemed brought together by a mystery it seems/ a fellowship that has lasted and will last. The ocean and people who ride Her understand Her diverse personallity and because of their fatique understand that She has not that thing!

I Live In "The House Of Pain"!!

What is pain Jim Davis?
Do we choose to feel it? Where is it felt? In my mind that received a signal from a damaged area of my body? I stubbed my toe. Does my toe hurt? It doesn't have a mind of it's own, so it tells it's representitive, " My mind " to feel pain for it. In a way " my mind " beingthe awareness center of all the appendages called, " the body ", can simply say, " I am uncomfortable with pain "! " Pain is disallowed "!! You think? What is bizarre to me is a thought process. One chooses or holds on to a " type of thinking ", a (in German) veltinshoung, a world view. A way of looking and a perception that defines oneself, kind of a, " What I stand for ", concept. Unbelief is a choice, One chooses to believe or disbelieve based upon a personal relationship with a particular idea. It doesn't matter what the said idea may be about! It doesn't matter who brought it up, where it came from or who expressed it! What does matter is your willingness to explore a dicey idea and see if it has any merit? Without prejudice. That is hard. I prefer, The Absense Of Pain"! I am having fun writing down these thoughts. While I am FOCUSED on writing, I have forgotten or am so focused on what I am sharing, the pain that I am feeling from the car that threw me unto the street yesterday!!Off the bicycle I was riding is simply pushed into an un-focused, non-essential, de-prioratized, appathetic,un-feeling Sea of Forgetfulness. Sea ( as in the ocean ) what I'm driving at? It seems that fixed ideas, opinions and the strength of our convictions determine our identity or who we " think ", WE ARE. Does this remind you of captivity or prison? When my focus is outside of myself there is no pain. There is no doubt! However, there are many questions. In the pursuit of answers to these questions I witness myself changing. The desire for truth leads one to an under going which brings froward an overcoming to a thought process that is continually active. Not Static but in motion. Re-difining itself daily. I took a break and thought about Emerson and Thoreau. Sipped my beer and the pain hit me. My ribs might be broken but when I focus on what I am discourseing with you there is no pain! When I look at the " American River ", and the bicycle that brought me here, I can only wonder at how I have and still am having a great adventure. There are many phases of pain, but truly, where are they felt? You decide. Is the pain you are experiencing physical, mental or spiritual? When you can ask this question you already are the proud pocessor of the answer even if you don't know it YET! But you Will. A few Quotes...... Heal thyself physician To thine own self be true.... Me Thinks thou protesteth to much! Love thine enemy as thyself! Paved paradise, put in a parking lot........ Remember the things we used to know, Please photograph them before they go! Just because I said it doesn't mean it's not true! Better living through chemistry. To be or not to be, That is the question. What is wind? I can't see it' But........ Is trust a type of faith? Does hope float? Sin or swim! Is; Honesty is the best policy. Oppisition breeds good composition. Good from far but far from good..... Measure twice cut once. A wise man asks what a fool pretends to know. A stitch in time saves nine. All is vanity You shouldn't have took more than you gave. Give onto Ceaser what is Ceaser's! Ask and ye will receive. The journey of a thousand miles begins with the first step. Don't ask me, I'll tell you..... If I want your opinion I'll give it to you! Is a glass half full or half empty? Might is right!!!! Possession is 9/10 the of the law Seek and ye will find!!!!!!!!!! ``

Elixer

Alan Turk, Linda, Ru-Ru ( the baby ) and Buster. Where are you? I'll be in San Francisco October 5Th for a kind of " Gathering of the Tribes", fete! Is Elixir gone? Larry is! Where did time and us go? I think a terrible mistake was made so long ago. It was a Rolling Stones song sung while we were rafted together on Maui, " Send me dead flowers in the morning"! Take me down little Susan, take me down! I know you think you're the queen of the underground! And you could etc!! This, however is the story of us leaving Nawiliwili to Oahu and not making it! Are you up for it? Elixir is a "42ft" Gaff rigged schooner-lean and mean! What! 12' beam? With top sails and a flying fisherman she goes. Just a puff ( not a bullet ) knocks her down. (as we found out the hard way off the south shore of Oahu) Hopefully, Gut, all your portals are closed! (not) So where was/am I? Oh yea! Gut needed to get to Oahu and decided to leave Nawiliwili Harbor with a storm brewing. We got our asses kicked. The lightning accented the size of the swells which we couldn't see because it was raining so hard not only was visibility extinct but one needed a snorkel to breath!! I must admit we were game and learned more about " to weather ", sailing than any of us had known before. God, gaff rigging has a peak and a helm, double halyard system that needs to be addressed and balanced. In heavy seas and weather it is a nightmare ( especially at night )to get it right! Ru-Ru thought it was great fun! Alan and Buster ( I was just an able bodied seaman ) decided enough after 12 hours of in your face on the nose beating to weather ass kicking winter Hawaiian/Aleutian crap!! With the lightening and " the lighthouse " guiding us downwind it was excellent to be home on Kauai in a safe harbor and a safe anchorage. Later we sailed to Oahu. It was magnificently uneventful! Ha! Go figure.