All in the same boat

It was almost dark before visitors ceased to stream aboard the Phoenix, now riding at anchor in the bay. Then it was time for me to go ashore for a conference with the owner of the sampan we had wrecked during the launching.

After that, I told Barbara, Ted and I would attend a party ashore, given for everyone even remotely connected with the building of the boat—except, of course, females. For the first time Barbara appeared recalcitrant.

“Do Jessica and I stay on board here alone?” she asked.

“No, you go on back to the house. The Yacht Club boys will keep anchor watch. Come back out tomorrow.”

“It was nice knowing you,” Barbara said, climbing down into the dinghy. “I hope you and the Phoenix have a wonderful honeymoon.”

Only after Barbara had left did it occur to me that she had really wanted to stay on board, even without bunks or conveniences. I suddenly realized that my actions must have revealed my misgivings about the family, their adaptability and willingness to “take it.”

The conference with the sampan owner was protracted. His boat, badly holed, had been hauled up on the beach, a mute testimonial to the ruggedness of the Phoenix, which was barely scratched.

The victim readily admitted his responsibility. He had been warned to stand clear and had ignored the warning. On the other hand, it was the Phoenix that had been launched. Otherwise he wouldn’t have been there. If he hadn’t come he wouldn’t have lost his sampan. Obviously, it was nobody’s fault—it was the will of the gods. However, since the captain of the Phoenix was a rich man—

I hastened to correct that statement.

—Well, anyway, richer than the sampan owner, and since this was an auspicious day when everybody should be happy, perhaps a sympathy offering....

“How much sympathy would the sampan owner need?” I inquired cautiously.

This required a long conference, but it came out to 2,000 yen—about $5.50 American. I announced that I could be that sympathetic, and the offering was duly made. With mutual expressions of esteem and satisfaction the conference broke up, and we moved on to the evening’s festivities.

This party, for which preparations had been under way for weeks, cast me in the dual role of guest and host. As guest, I was given the seat of honor; as host, I was expected to foot the bill. I hasten to add that I was by no means being victimized; it is the custom of the country. Besides, the whole affair came to less than a hundred dollars, including a bonus to each worker in proportion to his work.

It is also worth mentioning that Yotsuda-san never so much as hinted that a bonus should be given to him or that he should be paid more than the contract called for. This, in spite of dire predictions by fellow Americans—“old Japan hands”—who had warned me gloomily throughout that I’d be “taken for a ride.” What they failed to recognize was that Mr. Yotsuda was a completely honest man.

Late that night, after the party, Ted and I relaxed on deck, listening to the rustling of the tide as it slipped gently past the hull. Our first night aboard our yacht! In fact, I mused ruefully, it was the first night I had ever spent aboard any yacht. Ahead of us lay an unknown future but here, tonight, lying on deck and watching the stars overhead swing slowly in gentle arcs, I was at peace.

Early the next morning the Phoenix was towed to Hiroshima harbor, and the next stage of work began. A cabinetmaker and three workmen, complete with tools and lumber, moved aboard and began to carry out our plans for the interior accommodations.

Four main areas had been laid out. There were to be seven permanent bunks, each a tiny unshared domain. Two bunks were in the forecastle, just aft of the forepeak and chain locker. Between the forecastle and the main cabin an area was laid out to starboard for the head (American fixtures) and to port for a large and waterproof sail locker.

The large central cabin contained two more bunks, the main companionway, galley, lounge, and food and storage lockers.

Aft of the main cabin, and raised two feet, was the “ladies’ cabin.” It was to be finished in Oriental cabinet woods and ornamented with a ramma, or carved bas relief, and a miniature tokonoma, a replica of the family shrine that graces the main room of every Japanese home. Beneath the floor of this cabin was a large area for food storage.

At sea, there would be no traffic through the ladies’ cabin, everyone forward using the main companionway. Aft of the ladies’ cabin was a small cabin for the skipper, with navigation table and chart drawers. Beneath the floor was the engine space, and a small hatch led directly to the cockpit abaft the mizzenmast.

The entire arrangement seemed well adapted to our needs, giving adequate ventilation, but allowing a certain amount of privacy.

Once the Phoenix was afloat and nearer the house, family participation picked up. Barbara took a particular interest in the galley, and made a number of changes in cupboard and drawer arrangements. She and Jessica also ran a series of experiments in food preservation and provisioning, including a number of methods of preserving eggs. Each egg was carefully marked as to process used and date, and every few days one of the batch was tested—naturally on me. In the end we found the simple practice of greasing the eggs with oleo to be the most practical.

Meanwhile, most of my free time was spent away from home, working on the boat or roaming the streets and alleys of Kure and Hiroshima, with a few jaunts as far afield as Kobe, Osaka, and Yokohama. Only too well did we learn that cruising is not just sailing—it is walking, talking (in halting Japanese), buying, planning, scrounging, compromising—for months and months—and all on dry land. Nevertheless, we did manage to save several thousand dollars by these efforts.

Our sails were made up by the Ohara (that is not an Irish name!) Company of Yokohama and required, before negotiations were completed, three trips upcountry—a day’s journey each way. Drawing up the sail plans was a task on which I had burned a lot of midnight oil, and after the contracts were let I could only hope there had been no slip of the pencil.

At last the day came when a dozen bundles, carefully wrapped in rice straw, were dumped on the Hiroshima dock. Eagerly we opened them, to be greeted by an exciting odor of canvas, manila, and tar. Inside were the sails, gleaming white. One by one we checked them, stretching each in its appointed place. Outwardly businesslike and matter of fact, I was tremendously relieved to see that each sail had been properly designed.

We now had a mainsail, mizzen, forestaysail and jib (these four lowers giving about 1,000 square feet), plus a mizzen staysail, topsail, top jib, storm trysail, and storm jib. We had spares for the main and foresail. (Later, in Honolulu, we added a genoa.)

The arrival of the sails was a high spot during a time which was otherwise rushed, uncertain, and confused. Crew problems were beginning to emerge. We had been aware that Takemura-san was becoming increasingly uneasy. Instead of moving aboard to help with the rigging and final fitting-out, as we had agreed upon, and as Nick had done, Takemura became less and less dependable and often failed to show up at all. One night, after a long conference which put a heavy strain on both Nick’s English and his loyalties, the two men went up on deck and talked for several hours.

The next morning Takemura-san came to me, shook hands long and earnestly, and with real tears in his eyes, said “Sayonara.” He rowed ashore and out of our lives, leaving us not only without a mate, but without a dinghy, as this had been his contribution to the Phoenix.

Well, we thought glumly, we can always buy a new dinghy, and at least we still have Nick.

This was the cue for Nick to appear and explain that, under these changed circumstances, he would have to reconsider his decision to join us. Since he had been Takemura’s protégé, constant satellite, and uncritical admirer, we were sure we knew what that meant.

“Okay, Nick,” I told him. “We understand.” I held out my hand.

Nick looked a little startled. “I will go home, talk to family.” He was obviously trying to let us down easy, passing the ultimate responsibility to his parents.

“Fine,” I said, “you do that. Good-bye—and thanks for everything.”

Hailing a passing launch, Nick too went ashore. We sat on the deck and watched the harbor traffic, too dispirited to talk. Below decks, Ted and Jessica were shouting at each other, in an overheated sibling dispute. Here we are, I thought—what remains of my crew. One woman—with only half a heart in the venture. One son, age fifteen—willing, but a bit absentminded and not too good with his hands. One daughter, ten years old and small for her age, expert at handling dolls—but what good will she be on the mainsail? And myself—an armchair sailor, an untried skipper, who can cope fairly well with things mechanical but has little finesse with human beings, even his own family.

The inescapable conclusion of my gloomy inventory was: You’ve had it. A foreign country, a half-finished boat, a dwindling bank account, a divided family, and your crew has just walked off. I hardly noticed when Barbara reached over to slip her hand into mine. Nor did I note that the wrangling below had stopped of its own accord—as it always did—and that Ted was now busily entertaining Jessica with a story.

The rest of the day passed like a funereal dream. In the afternoon I went ashore and bought a secondhand rowboat. That evening we sat on deck and were uncheered by the nightly visit of the local sightseeing bus, which had added to its itinerary a visit to the docks to see the American “Around-the-world-boat.” “Around the world!” I muttered bitterly. “We couldn’t even go around Hiroshima harbor.”

Early the next morning we were aroused by the sound of oars and by voices alongside. Onto the deck clambered Nick, grinning broadly, and with him were two young fellows I recognized as members of the Yacht Club.

“Ohio gosaimasu!” Nick greeted us cheerfully. “Good morning! My father said, You promise to go, you go. So—I go. Okay. Oh—and these my friends—Fushima-san and Suemitsu-san. They will help make boat ready. They both want to go with us, which one do you want?”

From that day on, Motosada Fushima (Moto) and Mitsugi Suemitsu (Mickey) slept and worked aboard the Phoenix, splicing rope, wrapping blocks, and in general competing, in a completely friendly fashion, for the berth vacated by Takemura. In the end, unable to decide between them and perhaps feeling that we might make up in manpower what we lacked in experience, we took them both. Now all our bunks were filled, with a ship’s complement of seven.

We were an oddly assorted group: two sexes, two races, two languages and nationalities—and seven personalities, with a wide age range. How these personalities would act—and interact—would, I knew, have as much to do with the success or failure of our voyage as the seaworthiness of the boat itself. At the moment we could only guess—and hope.

Our crew selected, there remained the matter of obtaining the consent of their families, which proved not too difficult; and of acquiring Japanese passports and American visas, which turned out to be very difficult indeed. We finally got them, but it took several weeks of correspondence, several trips to Kobe, and several times the amount of patience I normally possess.

During this summer we had still another problem to contend with, and it was one we couldn’t do much about. This was the weather. In three years in Japan, only one typhoon had come close enough to Hiroshima to cause any real concern. However, in the summer of 1954, after the Phoenix took to the water, no less than four typhoons paid us an unwelcome visit.

Typhoon June, the third of the unwonted—and unwanted—series, was the worst of the lot. At the advice of the Coast Guard we took refuge in a sheltered cove behind the island of Eta Jima. On the way we tried out our newly rigged mainsail and, for the first time, had the experience of heeling. As we tilted in the breeze, Barbara, who had been making lemonade in the galley, began to pick up broken glass and lemon peel, while Jessica, a bit shaken, took refuge in the cockpit. “I don’t like it,” she said. “I’d rather live in a house where things don’t fall around!”

That night, however, she slept unconcernedly through the worst of the blow, and by the next day was ready to brag of her experiences and feel more than a little superior to her shorebound friends.

For the rest of us, however, the night of Typhoon June is one that will not soon be forgotten. Around midnight, with the center of the typhoon less than twenty miles away, the wind shifted abruptly. We were no longer in the lee of the mountainous island, but much more exposed, and the waves in this little bay built up to enormous heights. Suddenly Nick, on anchor watch, let out a shout in frantic Japanese. I rushed on deck, and though I couldn’t understand Nick, could see at once what had happened. Our anchor chain had snapped. Endless minutes passed, as we drifted inexorably toward the nearby shore, while we struggled to get the spare anchor over the side. Only a few feet short of grounding, the anchor caught—and held.

Two souvenirs remain of that wild initiation night: the broken link of our brand-new half-inch anchor chain and a sheet from our recording barograph, which charts the pattern of Typhoon June. The line of barometric pressure descended sharply until, at the passage of the eye of the typhoon, the ship was bucking so wildly that the ink was spilled out of the pen, and the record stopped.

We also gained some valuable information and experience from this episode. First, we began to appreciate the difficulties in communication that were to plague us in time to come. Regardless of how well the men improved their English, and I my Japanese, in a crisis they lapsed into “man’s talk”—rapid, peremptory vernacular—which conveyed nothing but a sense of extreme urgency. The normal, formal Japanese language, which we knew a bit, was gone with the wind.

Beyond this I learned the absolute necessity for anticipation if this voyage was to be a success. At all times we must expect the worst, and try to be ready for it. Had the second anchor been ready for instant use, precious minutes would have been saved. On the credit side, I profited, because never again were we caught without ready anchors.

Typhoon No. 4, Marie, caused no great damage in our area, but roared past us and northward to Hokkaido, where she overturned a seagoing ferry with the loss of over a thousand lives. Locally, however, she did play havoc with the tides, and drowned out the machinery in the local shipyard, so we had to postpone our haul-out, for bottom painting, more than two weeks—another unavoidable delay.

However, by September, in spite of typhoons, troubles, and tape (red), we were far enough along to be thinking about a date for our departure. We still lacked such extras as electricity, running water, gimbaled stove, radiotelephone, and a host of minor items, but we ignored these and concentrated on the absolute necessities. Provisioning, of course, led the list, and Barbara took the brunt of this terrible task. Now that she had a better knowledge of the crew’s daily food consumption, she doubled her original estimates of rice, fruits, and canned foods, and then doubled the amount again as a safety factor. The total was prodigious. Day after day, carrying yardlong lists, she set out in a taxi-jeep, to return in the evening with a mountain of supplies to be hauled aboard and stowed.

Ted, meanwhile, when I informed him that he had been promoted to chief navigator on the defection of Takemura, redoubled his studies. With a textbook and the help of a navigation officer friend, Ted gained a competent grasp of at least the theoretical aspects of his assignment. However, when we worked out our practice sextant shots, we often found the Phoenix not in Hiroshima harbor but somewhere up the slope of Fujiyama.

Jessica, too, had been given an official role, that of ship’s historian. She took her assignment seriously and, from the day we moved aboard, she kept a daily record of our activities—as she saw them (a very important qualification). I might add that this diary was continued without a break for the next six years, and by the time we had completed our voyage around the world she had filled seven large ledgers with about 200,000 words. Unprompted and uncensored, Jessica’s Journal provides a detailed, refreshing, and sometimes chastening picture of our rather unconventional family life.

Time had now become an important element in our plans, for it was late in the season. After many conferences with family and crew, after a careful (and prayerful!) study of the North Pacific Pilot Charts, and after consultation with the Japanese Coast Guard, we finally decided that November was the very latest date we could leave Japan and still have a good chance of a successful crossing to Honolulu, over 4,000 miles to the east. This would put us at the tag end of the typhoon season and, we hoped, ahead of the worst of the winter storms which roar down out of the far north Pacific.

We decided upon Honolulu as our first landfall, because it was an American port, where we could have the Phoenix registered as an American ship and could obtain certain supplies and equipment lacking in Japan.

The numerous unavoidable delays had made it impossible to fit in the shakedown cruise in the open ocean, which we had planned, but by leaving Hiroshima early in October we could have a short cruise up the Inland Sea and give ourselves and the boat at least a smooth-water test. We could then complete our fitting-out at a northern port, make any adjustments that seemed necessary, and still depart by the appointed date. It was not an ideal plan, perhaps, but it was the best we could do. For a number of cogent reasons, mainly financial, it was impossible to lay over until next June, the optimum month for crossing the North Pacific under sail.

Our departure was set for October 4, and throughout the day gifts poured aboard: flowers, candy, fruit, rice cakes, a painting of the Phoenix, a new heaving line, a can of metal paint, a gallon of used oil (“to pour on troubled waters”), and most formidable of all, a magnificent Japanese doll for Jessica, complete in a fragile glass case. This present brought Jessica exquisite joy and the captain exquisite pain, for he knew tears would flow when he had to jettison the case over the side—in anticipation of the inevitable.

We grew more and more harassed as we found our last-minute preparations and stowing of supplies continually interrupted by the need for greeting another well-wisher, making a short statement to yet another gentleman of the press, or posing on deck for one more group picture. To load last-minute supplies, we had come alongside the dock. All our friends, many of whom had never been aboard, now wanted a tour of the ship. They charitably assured us that they didn’t in the least mind if everything was a mess, and asked us literally hundreds of well-meaning questions, to most of which we didn’t know the answers. “How long will the trip to Honolulu take?” “Won’t you be bored?” “But isn’t it dangerous?” “How will the children go to school?”—all very good questions.

But the one most frequently asked, and the one we were least able to answer, was “But won’t you be seasick?” All we could reply was that we never had been—which was perfectly true. On board the President Wilson, en route to Japan—our only other experience on the high seas—none of us had been in the least sick. Of course, this wasn’t quite the same thing.

Shadows were already long when we left the dock, with all the ceremony of tossing bright paper tape, singing “Auld Lang Syne”—in Japanese—and shedding copious tears. The tears, I might add, were all in the eyes of those who saw us off. We ourselves were much too busy to have time for sorrow or regret—then—but to our hundreds of friends the whole venture was nothing less than a gallant form of suicide—for which no one has a more subtle appreciation than the Japanese.

A fleet of snipes and sailing dinghies from the Yacht Club accompanied us halfway across Hiroshima Bay, while a plane circled overhead to drop a tiny silk parachute carrying a hand-lettered scroll of good wishes and prayers for our safe return. One by one, our escorts waved and turned back until at last we were on our own.

Our first day’s destination was not far—the shrine of Miya Jima, just across the water from where the Phoenix had been hatched. There, while Barbara started supper and the men tried to find places to stow the piled-up gifts, I made my first entry in our nice new logbook:

Dropped anchor at Miya Jima Guchi harbor, opposite the shrine. Itsukushima is one of the famed “Three Most Beautiful Places in Japan.” All secure by 1900. Big spaghetti dinner to celebrate—too busy at noon to eat. Decks in good shape, but considerable of a shambles below—2 tons of last-minute ballast, now on floor of main cabin—169 iron pigs.

Many last-minute gifts—even a stack of old newspapers for Mi-ke. Poor Mi-ke—her box was forced to give way, in its nook under the starboard water tank, to a pile of iron pigs. The box is now in the aisle of the main cabin, where she is doing her business in the middle of traffic. Doesn’t seem to worry her too much.

That night, while the rest of the crew slept, I went on deck. Across the bay the shrine gleamed faintly in the moonlight. The Phoenix stirred gently in the swells from a distant ferryboat. Above were the heavy masts, the intricate web of sturdy rigging, the white sails, furled now but ready to be raised at our command. We had our boat, and though she had not yet proved herself at sea, I knew she would, and proudly. This was not entirely a matter of wishful thinking. During her construction, a number of experts had looked her over, and their reactions had been unanimously favorable. But even without their praise I had faith in the Phoenix.

About the human beings aboard I was not so sanguine. None of us had ever been to sea in a small boat. The Japanese boys were good sailors of snipes in the Inland Sea, and I had done some sailing in an 18-footer, but this was a far cry from cruising outside.

And the family. How would the children take the trip? Would they be able to adjust to discomfort and occasional hardship? How much would they miss the companionship of others their own age? What of their schooling? We were taking along plenty of textbooks and teaching materials for both of them, and Barbara, who had been a teacher, would handle their lessons, but would this be sufficient?

And what of Barbara? We had made a contract with each other—for better, for worse—but was a situation like this anticipated in the contract? Suddenly I felt a surge of deep respect and admiration for her, as it came to me with full force that I was going because I wanted to go, but she was going only because I was, offering me a rare and precious loyalty.

Our Japanese crew—what of them? How would they wear? How would two groups of diverse backgrounds get along, in weeks at sea under confining conditions? So far the men had shown themselves to be fine companions and hard workers. Moreover, on that wild night when Typhoon June almost had us on the rocks, they had proved themselves courageous and resourceful. Would these qualities last during the long grind?

Finally, the captain. Could he take it? And could his companions take him? Could he curb his temper, learn to control his impatience? I deeply felt my inadequacies, my faults, and especially my lack of experience. Whenever one of the family called me “Skipper,” as they had begun to do, I felt uneasy and self-conscious. One of the biggest unknowns was the ability of this so-called Skipper.

Beset with doubts I finally turned in.

The next day we slept late, and did not get underway until midmorning. The doubts and introspection of the previous night were swept away in the sparkling breeze. We had made our choice, we were on our way, we would do our best. From now on, all thoughts and energies would be directed toward making a successful voyage.

Slowly we drifted past the shrine, so that the men could say their farewells to the goddess, which they did, standing in a row on the foredeck with caps in hand and heads bowed. Suddenly I realized that there was still another possibly divisive factor—one I had not thought of: differences in religion.

We continued up the strait and drew abreast the Yotsuda shipyard. We broke out the foghorn, Mickey blew lustily, and the entire shipyard crew—all four of them—came down to the shore while Yotsuda-san ran up the Japanese flag, and we dipped our American colors in a return salute. Just four months ago the Phoenix had been launched from here.

The next several days were idyllic. The fall weather was perfect, the breeze light but fair, the scenery unsurpassed. We found out now that cruising may take a lot of work ashore, but that cruising is also sailing, and this is the reward.

And we were beginning to learn our boat. From the log of October 8, which was also Ted’s sixteenth birthday:

Good sailing practice today—many tacks, brisk breeze, getting smarter and smarter in handling her. If only the time element didn’t enter into the picture! But each day that passes puts us later and later in the season. Four days out and still not in Onomichi—only 72 miles (by land) from Hiroshima.

That night we dropped anchor in the beautiful harbor of Mitarai. Fishing boats were close about us and one of them, as it happened, was a bit too close, since we rammed him slightly while maneuvering for a berth. In the log, I virtuously recorded that the accident was a combination of poor judgment on my part and a shifting wind that pushed us down on the larger boat before we could stop our way.

From this we learned something about the momentum of our thirty tons and of the inability of our small engine to handle the boat properly in reverse. Later we called on the captain to apologize, and to have the damage assessed. It came to 556 yen, about $1.50 American. Accidents come cheaper in Japan!

During our trial run up the Inland Sea we made quite a few changes and improvements. We put downhauls all around, so we could get the sails down even in a gale. We rerigged our mainsail peak, painted and stowed most of the ballast, set up a third anchor aft, and got things more shipshape below decks.

We practiced, too, in the open areas, tacking over and over, learning to jibe smoothly, and establishing routines for various maneuvers. We loosed the dinghy, and practiced rounding up to it. When the breeze freshened, and we had our first taste of really brisk sailing, we found we could make seven knots with ease, using only the four lowers; moreover, the boat had a very easy motion.

We reached Takamatsu, at the upper end of the Inland Sea, on the morning of October 13. This would be our base for the final stages of fitting-out before the long ocean crossing to Hawaii. A Coast Guard boat came well out to meet us and escorted us to the Prefectural Docks, where a crowd was waiting, and we went through the usual gamut of questions.

The following morning we accepted the kind invitation of the Takamatsu Yacht Club to use their private dock, where we remained for a very busy two weeks.

Takamatsu is a pleasant city, and at this season was gay and bustling in preparation for the Hachiman Festival. In the evenings, after a day of hard work, we usually wandered into the city where the open-front shops remained ready for business. We would stop to watch groups of strolling actors, or try out our Japanese in the process of making a purchase, or enjoy a nightcap of soba—Japanese noodles—in a tiny booth before returning to the boat.

During the days, however, we worked, and worked hard. Ted and Jessica finished the job of painting countless iron pigs, and emerged at the end of each day with a new layer of orange paint. In the course of this job Ted uncovered a hitherto unsuspected talent: that of raconteur extraordinary. Time passed quickly as Ted gave the iron pigs personalities and guided them through a series of imaginary escapades in the course of getting their faces painted. As we watched the young ones at work we could sense a growing solidarity and identification with the voyage.

We made a number of changes in the rigging, based on our brief experience in the Inland Sea. We unstepped the topmast, suspecting—quite correctly—that we wouldn’t need it in winter in the North Pacific. We made stormcovers for all the hatches and portholes—hoping we would never have occasion to use them. Also, we installed additional pinrails on either side of the mainmast, having quickly learned that our one bank of pinrails was inadequate.

On one day only, October 18, I exercised my prerogative of declaring a holiday. By coincidence, it also happened to be my birthday. We took this occasion to visit Kotohira, where Kompira-san, the god of the sea and patron of Japanese seamen, holds sway. We toiled up the thousand steps to the shrine and paused at the summit to admire the magnificent view, while Nick, Mickey and Moto went inside to pay their respects to the priests and to inform them of our plans.

When they emerged they were smiling broadly. Kompira-san, they had been assured, viewed their venture with favor and predicted a successful outcome if—and this, to us, seemed to be the joker—we promised to revisit the shrine at the conclusion of our trip. It seemed to me that a sort of Delphic aura surrounded this promise, but the boys seemed satisfied, and we were only too happy to agree.

After this single day of relaxation we began our final preparations in earnest. One by one jobs and purchases were checked off, from a list which originally contained several thousand items. On the day before our departure Barbara’s most recent provisioning efforts were delivered to the dock: a box of apples packed in bran; 100 pounds of potatoes; 70 pounds of onions; 40 of sweet potatoes, 5 of carrots, 6 of green beans; and some two dozen heads of cabbage. All that day, Barbara and Jessica sorted out vegetables, setting aside the doubtful ones for early eating, while the rest were packed in wooden crates and lashed to the cabintop.

Also on that day they coated and packed some thirty dozen eggs with oleo. That night we had scrambled eggs for supper.

That evening Nick and Mickey stayed in the forecastle writing stacks of last-minute notes, while Barbara, Jessica, and Moto went out to dinner with new-found Japanese friends. Only Ted—and already I was coming to depend upon him more and more—seemed to share a realization of the enormity of the step we were undertaking. Of his own accord he turned down the dinner invitation and remained to help make a final inventory.

Together we made one more check of the entire list of Things to Do and Get. The water supply had been topped up—300 gallons in five unconnected tanks. Canned food for twelve weeks at normal consumption had been divided into separate duffle sacks, a week’s rations to a sack, and stowed beneath the floor of the ladies’ cabin. The fresh produce was aboard and stowed securely. For ship lights, stove, and engine we had 120 gallons of kerosene.

There were ample replacements for all expendable and vulnerable items, from flashlight batteries to sail needles, and safety equipment was complete from flares to heliograph.

In the navigation department we had six compasses aboard (master, steering, inside telltale, lifeboat, and two spares); four watches and a chronometer (rated); three barometers and a barograph; a sextant; anemometer; inclinometer (never used); thermometers of various kinds; a complete set of signal flags; several pairs of binoculars; and, of course, the necessary navigation books, sailing directions and charts, and the 1954 nautical almanac which Takemura had left with us at his departure.

We had a spare battery radio, with batteries, wrapped in a moistureproof package, and an emergency fresh-water still. We had adequate sail repair equipment and materials, tools of every description, and a quantity of spare lumber, in case fairly extended additions or repairs proved necessary at sea.

Our medicine chest, a gift from the doctors at the Casualty Commission in Hiroshima, was unusually complete, from antibiotics to scalpels. Barbara had taken a survey course in emergency medicine under our good friend Dr. George Hazlehurst. She had passed the final examination with honors by successfully injecting a grapefruit and suturing a sausage. As Ted wryly observed, if anything went wrong with grapefruits or sausages, we were all prepared.

As for education and entertainment, we were supplied and oversupplied. In addition to textbooks, we had a complete set of the Encyclopaedia Britannica, the Book of Knowledge, and some three hundred additional books. We had decks of cards, and kits for checkers, chess, and backgammon; and sets of Mahjong and Scrabble for family games. We had a handcranking phonograph and a wide selection of records. Ted’s grandmother, Minnetta Leonard, had even sent him a plastic ukulele, evidently in the fond hope that he would be prepared for the beach at Waikiki.

In everything except that important commodity, deep-sea experience, I felt we were ready. If we were fools to embark without that vital item, at least we were fools who were operating within a framework of adequate preparation and common sense.

As to the mental preparation of the ship’s company, that was difficult to assay. Barbara had taken over without demur whatever tasks were assigned to her, and Jessica wrote faithfully in her diary, but neither of them asked questions or appeared to be overly concerned. Whether due to an inability to imagine what deep-sea life would be like or utter confidence in the Skipper, it seemed to put an extra burden on me.

As for the three Japanese men, they were, during the preparation and the trip through the Inland Sea, completely unconcerned in certain areas, and very active in others. Although well-educated men, they seemed quite content with manual skills: carpentry, painting, sail handling, and deck seamanship. They appeared to have no interest in the sailing plans, navigational methods, or the operation of the radio or auxiliary engine. Also, as far as I could detect, they didn’t seem to be worried.

On the morning of October 26, the Rev. Raymond Christopher, a British missionary, visited us and held a short service aboard, asking a blessing on our journey. His solemn words sent a sudden chill through us and more than any other event made us realize some of the implications of our departure.

That evening we sailed from Takamatsu.

Our leave-taking was strongly reminiscent of Hiroshima: crowds, press, last-minute gifts, bilingual confusion, tears. But there was one vital exception: we knew that this time we were heading not for the quiet waters of the Inland Sea but for the Hawaiian Islands, across more than 4,000 miles of open ocean.

The day was hectic, culminating in a formal send-off, for radio and national TV, presided over by the governor of Kagawa Prefecture. The circumstances surrounding our departure are shown in the log:

Final preparations completed, immigration cleared, and check made with Coast Guard; decided to leave on afternoon of Oct. 26. News of Typhoon 18 (now making up near Philippines) was received, and decision made to proceed until more details available. Decided to try to get through Naruto Straits if possible, rather than go all the way around Awaji Shima.

Also I notified the U.S. Navy in Yokosuka of the date and time of our departure, our approximate route, and the estimated length of our trip (45 days, based on an assumed distance, by sailing route, of 4,500 miles, and an average of 100 miles per day). I informed them, as I had the local Coast Guard, that we had no facilities for sending radio messages, only for receiving. We did, however, have a small hand-operated emergency set (Gibson Girl) on which we could send an automatic SOS at limited range, but this would be used only in direst emergency.

We crossed Harima Nada during the night and reached Naruto Straits the following afternoon. The narrow passage to the open ocean looked formidable. Even without binoculars we could see a white wall of foam as the tide fought its way through, at a peak speed of 11 knots. The rips were between 6 and 9 feet in height. Even as we watched, a large ship battered its way through but another, which had not been so lucky, could be seen stranded on rocks in mid-channel.

We decided in any event not to attempt the straits at night, but to check with the local fishermen and get their opinion. If they agreed it was feasible for our boat, we would try the passage at slack tide the next morning. So we crossed to Marugame, where we anchored, while the Japanese men rowed ashore to talk to the inhabitants. From them we received a golden nugget of advice: “When the fishing boats go through, you go through.”

After the others had gone to bed, Ted and I reviewed the strategy for perhaps the hundredth time. It was very simple—in theory. We would head east as fast as was consistent with safety, to get beyond the area of the late-season typhoons as soon as possible. We would sail as far south as we could, though still keeping within range of the prevailing westerlies and the eastward-flowing Japanese current. In this way we would get the benefit of warmer weather and less severe storms.

In handling the boat we would try to keep a good margin of safety, never overpressing, and we would reduce sail at night during unsettled weather, until we knew our ship and had gained experience and confidence in our abilities.

When we finally reached a position north of the Hawaiian Islands, we would turn south, using the engine if necessary to help us through the band of Horse Latitudes and into the northeast trades. We would try to raise the island of Molokai, the long island in the center of the group, and proceed to Honolulu.

This, in brief, was our plan.

There was only one way to find out whether it would work.