us up the west coast of Guadeloupe during the night. By 0600 we had put
that island astern, in spite of a light and fickle breeze in the lee,
which kept up most of the night nursing us along, and Montserrat was
almost abeam to port. We were finding that Caribbean cruising, as many
yachtsmen had discovered before us, has much of beauty and fascination
to recommend it. Almost never were we out of sight of at least one
island, mountainous and green, each one unique in itself. Only a growing
eagerness to reach our own shores, after six years in foreign lands,
kept us from stopping everywhere and lingering indefinitely.
The entrance to English Harbor is not too easy to spot from the sea, and
even after we had identified its landmarks and knew from the charts that
a harbor would open up sharply to port after making the narrow entrance,
it took an act of faith to approach what looked like certain disaster.
The directions had also been quite right in saying that a head wind
usually blows through the pass and that an engine is desirable. It was.
At English Harbor we found a spot so hospitable, so historic, and so
quietly relaxing that, for the first time in our mad rush homeward, we
were tempted to linger. As Jessica said, it was like _living_ in a
museum, for we were surrounded by buildings which had been erected at
the time of the British-American “incident” of 1776. A few hundred yards
from the _Phoenix_ was the Admiral’s House, where the commanding officer
resided when English Harbor was the naval fortress of the British West
Indies and Nelson was a young lieutenant.
Jessica had a wonderful time scraping around in the dirt of the ruins
and coming up with likely-looking coins and buttons. One coin turned
out, upon polishing, to be a beaten-up halfpenny of 1954, but a brass
button, bearing a crown and anchor, looked sufficiently authentic to
have dropped from the cuff of Nelson himself.
There is no village at English Harbor, no stores, and no accommodations
for overnight guests. A single family, the Nicholsons, live in what was
once the “Pay Office.” They had arrived nine years earlier in their own
yacht, _Mollihawk_, from England and stayed on as “squatters” in the
ruins. Now, with their tenure officially recognized and their untiring
contributions to the restoration of a historic site commended and
encouraged, they remain the sole permanent residents.
From English Harbor we made another overnight hop, this time to St.
Martin (or St. Maarten, as the Dutch spell it), an island which is
amicably shared by two European powers. The apocryphal story goes that a
Dutchman and an officer from a French ship set foot on the island
simultaneously. Each laid claim to it, but they agreed to settle the
argument by walking in opposite directions from a given point, meeting
on the other side of the island. The Frenchman, who walked faster, had
secured the larger northern section, but the Dutchman gained the land
containing the salt flats, which yield the principal staple of the
island.
There is a sand bar across the entrance to the bay fronting Philipsburg,
so we entered cautiously, watching the color of the water and sounding
as we went. Once inside, we anchored just off the town and were quickly
and efficiently cleared by officials who spoke absolutely correct
English. We found Philipsburg an exceptionally clean and attractive
little town. Jessica and Barbara, who went off for a walk by themselves,
claim they even saw women sweeping the beaches. The rest of us were
somewhat more interested in looking for a cold drink, but found that
because we had arrived on a Sunday no cafés or shops were open. So we
strolled the streets, greeted the villagers—who always smiled and gave
us a hearty “Good day” in English—visited the salt flats, and wandered
back to the beach to meet the girls.
The next noon we left St. Martin, bound for the American Virgin Islands.
Twenty-four hours later we had covered the 120 miles and dropped anchor
just off King’s Dock in Charlotte Amalie, the port of St. Thomas. With
the national ensign and our yellow quarantine flag flying briskly, we
waited to be cleared.
Two hours later we were still waiting. There was plenty of activity
ashore and we could see officials moving about, but none of the activity
seemed to be directed toward us, nor did we get any signals. Finally we
upped anchor and motored over to Long Bay, where we could see many
yachts at anchor. No sooner had we arrived and anchored within happy
hailing distance of the Carstarphens, of _Shellback_ (fellow members of
the Seven Seas Cruising Association whom we had long been waiting to
meet), than a peremptory message was sent out from shore: “Return to
King’s Wharf and go up to the dock!”
With our quarantine flag still flying, we headed back across the bay and
nudged our way in among a flotilla of interisland boats, a very tricky
procedure. There was less than a foot of clearance between the _Phoenix_
and her neighbors when we finally tied up at the dock.
Eventually we were boarded by an immigration official, who seemed
extremely irked because we had not come in at once. Being in an
irritatingly mellow mood for once, I did not get my back up but only
pointed out mildly that a ship entering from a foreign port does not
usually dock until told to do so. We had been waiting to be boarded.
“How could we come out?” the official responded angrily. “We don’t have
a boat!”
This seemed a good reason, but I wondered why the Coast Guard, which had
three boats tied up alongside the dock, could not be induced to offer
the services of one of them to Immigration. Meanwhile Barbara joined
with me in applying the soothing treatment to our visitor, by serving
tea and cookies, and although he made it difficult, we remained almost
unbearably pleasant. At length he was sufficiently mollified to say that
we might consider ourselves officially entered.
Once again we motored over to Long Bay and this time were allowed to
stay.
Charlotte Amalie combines the bizarre tourist atmosphere of a Waikiki
with the indolent, quaint flavor of an old Danish town revamped for a
modern age. The stores, remodeled in what used to be warehouses, are
deep, cool caverns with great steel doors that fold back by day and
close to form a solid wall at night. Inside are subdued lights, tasteful
decorations, and a display of wares from all over the world. Because St.
Thomas is a free port, it is possible to buy luxury items at substantial
saving: perfumes from France, clocks and music boxes from Switzerland,
Swedish crystal, Danish silverware, tweeds and cashmeres from Britain,
and of course liquor and tobacco from any country you care to name.
At the invitation of our fellow yachtsmen we spent one evening in a
night-clubbing expedition to hear the renowned “steel bands” of the West
Indies. The instruments themselves are ingenious—being fashioned from
the cross section of a large steel oil drum, open at the bottom. Some
drums are shallow, some deep, and each is made by the individual player,
who tunes it by heating the drum until the metal is soft, and then
pounding it until he acquires the exact tone he desires. The actual
musical quality of such an instrument is a matter of opinion, but the
combined effect of a number of them playing in concert is certainly
unusual.
It was fun for an evening, but for me once was enough. The pleasure
seemed highly artificial, and I suspected that most of the people packed
into the room were there not because they actually enjoyed the heat and
the noise and the crowd but because they had never learned how to find
pleasure in themselves as individuals—only as members of a swarm. By
contrast, I found myself recalling (and looking forward to) our peaceful
evenings at sea, with familiar constellations wheeling overhead, the
soft slap of the waves against the side, and a game of Twenty Questions
or an animated discussion to unite my family in a contented,
self-sufficient whole.
We sailed on May 20, bound for NEW YORK CITY, as Jessica announced in
very large letters in her journal. Ever since leaving South Africa she
had been getting more and more impatient to reach “home,” to renew
contact with friends whom she had not seen in six years but who remained
as dear to her as her family. One of them, indeed, Joan Clark, was her
avowed “blood sister”—they had pricked their fingers and exchanged red
smears by mail to prove it; and the first six months of 1957 had been
designated, by Jessica: “January, February, March, April, May, JOAN!”
Our first four days were pleasant and we made good distance but as we
worked our way out of the friendly trades our speed fell light. The
sixteenth day marked our smallest run, when we recorded 16 miles made
good. Most of the night was spent in slatting around, which is most
unpleasant, as the wear on the gear and sails is excessive, due to the
constant motion, and the noise is irritating.
We were sailing slightly to the west of the Sargasso Sea area and a new
problem arose—keeping the rotator log free of floating Sargasso weed,
which we passed in great patches. Another annoyance that was becoming
well-nigh unbearable was bugs. We had gradually accumulated every kind
and variety known to man: cockroaches, small, medium, and huge; biting
ants, ants with wings, and ants without wings; moths; borers; fleas and
bedbugs; weevils; and an infinitesimal insect which Jessica dubbed “red
mouths” because they were all red and all mouth. But I am exaggerating;
we did _not_ have mosquitoes, sand flies, or hornets—although, as
Barbara said, “We hardly miss them.”
The girls, not to put too fine a point to it, were getting fed up. Land
fever was undermining their morale, but they nobly kept their feelings
to themselves and it was not until long afterward, when I read their
very outspoken journal entries, that I realized with what eagerness they
were straining toward home and the reunion with family and friends.
Barbara, on June 4:
The combination of sleepless nights (thanks to BUGS), becalmed days,
and a diminishing larder makes it difficult to keep one’s spirits
aloft. We are now out of potatoes and all other vegetables except one
(1) onion. We have four cups of rice left (our usual allowance for a
single meal being six!); and only enough tea for today’s tiffin; we
are completely out of oleo and canned butter; ship’s biscuits (except
for the emergency supply lashed in the life raft); and baking powder
(I’ve been souring milk with vinegar and using baking soda for
pancakes and dumplings, but now the flour is also gone and only the
weevils are left). Eggs are down to three which, supplemented with
(ugh) egg powder, will be sufficient for tomorrow’s scrambled
breakfast.
We have one more “weekly sack” but it would go fast if we had only the
canned goods it contains to fill us. The spaghetti is gone—and the
last of the macaroni (without cheese) will be our supper tonight.
Dehydrated soups, which usually eke out the canned variety, have also
been finished, so lunches will begin to be a problem.
At any rate, we shan’t starve, for we have plenty of dried peas, beans
and apricots; vacuum-packed cans of oatmeal; tins of pineapple juice;
and lots of evaporated milk. A monotonous diet, but loaded with
vitamins and calories. If only the wind would do us right, we could be
there in two days!
However, the wind did not do us right, and on the morning of June 5
fog—a condition we had devoutly hoped to avoid—overtook us. As it
gradually cleared, rain set in. We were now making three knots after
sixty hours of mostly calms. For two days we had been unable to get a
good position because of overcast and had to rely on dead reckoning.
During the night we passed many boats. The most baffling encounter is
recorded as follows:
Small boat, dead ahead, showing green side-light, green masthead
light, and all-around white light same level as side-light. As we
approached, he turned off green light and headed directly for us.
Could clearly hear engines. No running lights. He stopped several
hundred yards away. We altered course and finally left him behind.
Mysterious!
The next day we were again in fog, with cold rain and only a very light
breeze. Our foghorn, hand operated, sounded small and insignificant, but
we pressed a mournful wheeze from it every two minutes, in response to
the hootings from ships around us, and hoped that the sound would carry.
Eyes and ears have little relaxation in a fog. The known world contracts
and all beyond the narrow range of vision becomes intangible and full of
menace.
We had begun to feel that the small circle of visibility in which we
moved was the only clearing in an otherwise opaque world, when suddenly
a distant foghorn metamorphosed into a very large and close ship. It
seemed to erupt full blown from the curtain of fog, complete with
navigation lights, and passed us to port. Silent as a ghost ship it
glided by and vanished gradually like the Cheshire cat, on the other
side of our tiny circle, until only its stern remained, glowing more and
more remotely. Yet, as the ship disappeared, the bellow of the foghorn
doubled in volume, because its warning was now being carried to us from
upwind, with far more urgency now that the danger was past.
We stood double watches, sounding our bellows continuously all night,
but even when I was off duty I got precious little sleep.
In the morning we altered course to north-northwest, to pick up the
Jersey coast, still operating by dead reckoning. We passed Scotland
Light at 1000 and started the engine to go up the channel.
Just after noon we pulled up to the dock at the U.S. Quarantine Station
at Staten Island, 19 days and 1,500 miles out of St. Thomas. I don’t
know about the crew, but Barbara tells me she had a lump in her throat
at the sight of the U.S. flag waving over the buildings—and I felt
pretty lumpish myself.
14 EVERY KIND OF CRUISING:
NEW YORK TO PANAMA,
BY THE CORKSCREW ROUTE
“A man must stand up for what he believes.”
At Rosebank, the Quarantine Station for the Port of New York, we were
given another example of the unreliability of hearsay predictions. In
St. Thomas we had been warned that it would be foolish to enter at New
York City, since it was not only dangerous for sailing craft (a point we
were now willing to concede) but because the treatment given yachts was
high-handed and arbitrary.
On the contrary, we were cleared in less than half an hour, and invited
by the officials to move to a more secure spot inside the docks where we
could relax for a day or two before going over to Manhattan. We were
happy to accept, especially since it included showers and a chance to
get in touch with family and friends by telephone.
In no time at all representatives of various “communications media” got
wind of our arrival and began beating a path to the main hatch. Also,
the families at the Quarantine Station, which is a surprisingly isolated
community, were interested in the _Phoenix_, and most of them came on
board to pay a visit, sign the guest book, and more often than not,
leave a youngster or two behind to climb the masts or chin themselves on
the ratlines.
Our first act was to get in touch with Tim, who had come into New York
to await our arrival and now lost no time in joining us. It was our
first meeting with our older son since he had left us back in Japan in
’53, and naturally we had a great deal of catching up to do.
In spite of the bustle, the weekend at Rosebank was most pleasant. As
the reports of our arrival began to appear, friends sought us out and
telegrams and letters of congratulation poured in.
We had an overflow crowd as we set out on Monday for the momentous trip
across the bay. It was a sparkling day and lower Manhattan was a
spectacular sight, especially as seen from the deck of the _Phoenix_. We
were under both power and sail, but the breeze was too light to do us
much good and it took four hours to inch our way up the Hudson, against
the outgoing tide, to the small-boat basin at West 79th Street. On the
way we tried to stay on the fringe of the busy harbor traffic and did
not forget to make our bow to the Statue of Liberty, as we passed her
very close on the port hand.
At the commercial dock we settled down to ten days or so of combined
business and pleasure in Manhattan. The dockage fee was higher than in
any other port we had visited—5 cents a foot per day—but we had
Riverside Park at our bow, a view of the Palisades across the river, and
fast connections to midtown within a few minutes’ walk. There was no
need to remind ourselves that a cheap hotel room would have cost even
one of us several times what we were paying for all seven.
It was a hot and hectic time. Just a list of the things we did would be
exhausting, but they included many of the rubbernecking activities that
Barbara and I had experienced before, but which were new and exciting to
Ted, Jessica, and the three M’s. In addition we had a good deal of
business to attend to, including a series of conferences with Lurton
Blassingame, our indefatigable agent, and a number of radio and TV
interviews.
One of these—a half-hour interview-type program called “Night Beat” on
which I was interviewed alone—was particularly interesting to me and, in
retrospect, perhaps crucial, as it served to crystallize some hitherto
rather amorphous thinking. I had no idea which of the many subjects we
had discussed before going on the air would be emphasized, and was
completely surprised when John Wingate, the interviewer, chose to ignore
the yachting and travel aspect entirely and concentrated instead on my
scientific work in Hiroshima and on the problem of radioactivity and our
government’s foreign policy as a whole.
The program was well known for its controversial nature but Barbara,
watching with friends, was as unprepared as I was for the series of very
direct questions regarding my attitude toward nuclear testing and
disarmament. She told me later that she actually had not the slightest
idea what my answer would be when Mr. Wingate brought up the issue of
the recently announced “clean bomb” and asked what I thought of it.
My first remark was almost instinctive. “A ‘clean bomb’ is like an
antiseptic bullet. It kills you just as dead.” I went on to amplify my
feelings, pointing out that even the “ideal” clean bomb described by Mr.
Eisenhower, 96 per cent “clean,” would be twice as radioactive as the
bomb dropped on Hiroshima, from which victims were still dying of
long-term effects of radioactivity.
Questions followed in quick succession. I didn’t resent the fact that
they were “loaded,” since I had come on the program of my own free will
and was intent only on answering as honestly and frankly as possible.
“Dr. Reynolds, would you unilaterally stop the testing of nuclear
weapons?”
A host of thoughts crowded into my mind. To have given the audience a
fair and comprehensible survey of the thinking and knowledge that
determined my answer would have taken at least an hour. Anything less
than that would have seemed equivocating. I simply answered, “Yes.”
The interviewer continued smoothly, “You realize, of course, that
President Eisenhower has stated that people who express that point of
view are giving aid and comfort to the enemy?”
This, of course, was the climax of the show, and the spot toward which
the interviewer had been building. Strangely enough, to me it seemed an
anticlimax. The President’s statements were his, my statements were
mine. I answered briefly that a man must speak and act as _he_ believes
and not tailor his thinking with no view but to oppose the enemy. The
United States would be in a sorry state indeed if our only reason for
saying “No” is because Russia has said “Yes.” This merely plays into the
hands of an antagonist.
“A man must stand up for what he believes.” I finished, “even if this
occasionally means agreeing with the enemy.”
Following the broadcast we were quite unprepared for the reactions it
caused. Within the next few days I was (a) hailed as an individual of
heroic courage, (b) regarded with suspicion as a fellow traveler or dupe
of Communists, (c) chided for being so foolhardy as to “stick your neck
out.” Frankly, I was amazed. I had been asked certain questions and I
had answered them as honestly as possible. I didn’t think I knew all the
answers but, on the other hand, neither did I consider myself completely
uninformed, and in the area of radioactivity and human well-being I felt
I could speak with some authority. I felt that I had the interests of my
own country at heart as well as did most Americans, and better than
some. Why all the fuss?
On June 22, after checking the tide tables carefully, we rounded the
foot of Manhattan and started up the East River, with the tide in our
favor. The trip was quiet and uneventful. In the late afternoon we
dropped anchor off the west end of City Island, outside a small cluster
of boats. Curious yachtsmen soon boarded us, and after dinner we spent a
fine evening ashore as guests of the Stuyvesant Yacht Club, off whose
pier we had chanced to drop our hook.
The next morning we had a good day’s run among the Sunday sailors on
Long Island Sound. In the afternoon we were met by Barbara’s cousin,
Dave Dorn, and his family, in their cruiser _Grand Slam_, and with a
convoy of boating friends were escorted to an anchorage off the Sprite
Island Yacht Club near Norwalk.
There we were introduced to the sociable custom of “rafting.” With the
_Phoenix_ in the middle and our anchor responsible for the entire
flotilla, we found six launches tied alongside, to port and starboard.
Hampers of food were unpacked, and ice and drinks materialized, and
people began to drift back and forth from one boat to another. Without
more ado we found ourselves in the center of as cheering a welcome party
as I have ever experienced.
After several days here we moved to a small shipyard in Rowayton, up the
Five Mile River, where it had been arranged that the boat would spend
the summer.
Here Ted left us temporarily to join Minnetta in Madison and enter
summer school at the University of Wisconsin, where he was accepted, in
spite of his unorthodox schooling, on the basis of entrance exams. Tim,
too, checked out in early July to enlist in the army, while Jessica and
Barbara made a semipermanent home ashore at the invitation of the Dorns.
The rest of us embarked on an extensive haul-out, including the
installation of a new engine, courtesy of Universal Motors, who had
offered to replace our doughty kerosene-burning model with a gasoline
engine of the same type, even-steven. (Why they should want an old,
slightly beat-up engine which had been over 35,000 miles and across
three oceans is anybody’s—or maybe only an adman’s—guess.)
Using Rowayton as a base, we worked out a schedule which would permit us
to do the necessary boat work and still visit friends and relatives in
the Middle West. We planned to take Nick, Mickey, and Moto with us, so
they could see as much as possible of the United States. To do this, I
bought a very secondhand station wagon. But when we were ready to leave
for Wisconsin, we learned that Mickey and Moto had decided to remain.
Only Nick elected to go with us. To me it was another indication of the
chasm that was widening between the men, but we said nothing and set off
with Barbara, Jessica, Nick, and myself.
Back in Connecticut after this pleasant break (the longest time I had
been away from the boat since the launching), we found a number of
problems awaiting us. First, I had a bill from the shipyard for $914.92,
a figure which will remain engraved in my memory. I was aghast, for I
knew that the dockage had been without charge, the materials at a
discount, and we had done most of our own work. “Labor,” however, was
still the chief item on the bill, and I was forcefully reminded of an
incident I had witnessed earlier that illustrated most vividly how labor
costs can mount. While installing the shaft, one of the workmen happened
to touch a spot of wet green paint on the engine. He stopped work
immediately, with a curse.
“That does it!” he exclaimed enigmatically, eying the green spot with
disgust. Throwing down his tools, he left the boat.
Half an hour later I went from the boat into the shed and saw him still
sitting there, idly rubbing his fingers with a rag, while smoking a
cigarette. I said nothing, but later, while checking over the bill, I
figured that that little spot of paint had cost me about $4—the cost of
the time needed for the workman to recover his mental composure and
restore his fingers to their former pristine condition.