Alone at Sea

DQ 03574 photo: Howard Johnson ALONE AT SEA Hannes Lindemann EDITED BY JOZEFA STUART Hannes Lindemann (5) Copyright, 1958, by under International and Pan-American Copyright All rights reserved House, Inc. and Conventions. Published in New York by Random Random House of Canada, Limited. simultaneously in Toronto, Canada, by Card Number: Library of Congress Catalog 58-9874 America H. Wolff, New York Manufactured in the United States of by CONTENTS First Voyage 1 THE START OF MY VOYAGE, 3 2 WHITE SHADOWS IN THE GULF OF GUINEA, 1O 3 EMERGENCY LANDING, 28 4 THE BIG JUMP, 50 5 THE LAST STORM, 85 Second Voyage 6 RESOLUTIONS AND PREPARATIONS, 7 AN IMPOSSIBLE VOYAGE, 1OQ 8 CONCLUSIONS, 177 Voyage 1 THE START OF MY VOYAGE From a very early age I have loved the sea and sailing. When I was a small boy, my grandfather, a sailor from the old windjammer days, stirred my imagination with the lore of sailing and the legends of the sea. Under his guidance I first learned how to handle a boat. As I grew up, my interests and activities widened to include long trips in sailboats and in folding boats small, kayak-like boats with collapsible wooden frames and rubberized canvas covers. I sailed the rivers of Europe, and when my skill and confidence increased, I sought more exciting voyages. Single-handed, I rounded the Iberian Peninsula and sailed through the Mediterranean. Out of these experiences gradually grew the idea for the greatest adventure in single-handed sailing an Atlantic crossing. In all of us there is an impulse though it may be deeply hidden to leave behind us our ordinary lives and go beyond the morning to seek our fortunes. This urge is usually 3 thwarted in our time by the restricting responsibilities of fam- ily or society. Yet some continue to climb almost inaccessible mountains or to explore the distances of the sea, dreaming of other coasts. And the curious thing is that when this impulse comes to the fore in some individual and is acted on, most men are puzzled; so remote and fantastic, perhaps, do their own dreams seem. I am a doctor by profession, trained in Hamburg, where I always intended to settle down and practice. But restlessness and curiosity drove me instead to travel and work abroad. In 1952, when I was twenty-nine, I found a job at a U.S. air base in French Morocco, and while there I signed a two- year contract to work in the plantation clinics of the Fire- stone Rubber Company in Liberia. When I was working in Morocco I had met a man who, as a voluntary castaway, had studied the problems of survival at sea. One of his most firmly held convictions (which came to be widely known) was that it is possible for a castaway to survive by drinking salt water. I found it impossible to ac- cept his thesis. I was convinced that acceptance of such ad- vice might easily endanger the life of a castaway, that the human is not body capable of surviving the rigors of expo- sure and the danger of dehydration without recourse to fresh water. I felt challenged both as a doctor and as a sailor to put his theory to the test myself. The idea of experimenting with the problem of survival at sea continued to excite me after I moved to Liberia. In free my time, while tropical downpours drummed on the roof of I studied my bungalow, books on boats, sailing and the experiences of other single-handed sailors. By the end of my first year in Liberia, I decided the time had come to for an Atlantic plan seriously crossing. My first step was to a acquire boat. Clearly, I could have done what so many THE START OF MY VOYAGE have done before and bought a small sailboat, but, living in Liberia, where the dugout canoe is the vessel of all native fishermen, I was inspired to try one of them. This would be original and exciting: to sail across the ocean in the most primitive of all boats. If, as some scientists believe, an early cultural tie may have been established between the West African coast and the Caribbean Indians by early canoe voyages, I would be emulating the explorers of prehistory. In, any case, to test my survival threshold and my seamanship, I would remove myself as much as possible from the crutches of our comfortable civilization. I had the choice, when I first started making my plans, of buying a second-hand canoe or of 'building one myself. As I had twelve months in which to make my preparations I planned to leave Liberia as soon as my Firestone contract expired I decided to build one. In that way I could be cer- tain of the strength of my canoe, which would have to with- stand battering Atlantic waves. Also the boat had to be care- fully designed in weight and balance to be able to ride out storms without capsizing. I knew I would have to make cer- tain modifications in the crude coastal canoe of the West African fisherman. So I decided to begin at the very begin- ning and pick out a tree in the jungle that I could fashion into a suitable dugout. For its strength and size, and because I knew that the Fanti fishermen of Ghana use it, I chose a kapok, a common West African tree, which can grow to a height of one hundred and eighty feet and a diameter of six to nine feet. Without much difficulty, I found a tree suited to my purposes, growing on the territory of one of the local paramount chiefs. I ex- plained my need for the tree to the chief and offered to buy it from him, but he insisted I take it as a gift. My troubles began after I had the tree. I started enthusi- 6 First Voyage astically and innocently, unaware of the difficulties that any unusual venture in the tropics is sure to encounter. I offered the job of cutting down my tree to three stalwart young men. After studying the tree, they refused. So tower- the of ing a giant, they claimed, must be home evil spirits, who would revenge themselves for the loss of their tree by taking a human life. I offered more money, but their fear of love for I the spirits was greater than their money. was almost prepared to fell the tree myself when I learned of a vil- lage whose inhabitants are professional woodcutters and whose evil spirits do not haunt treetops. Further negotia- tions with their chief bought their services; one week later, my tree was felled and a thirty-six-foot length cut from the trunk. I had chosen my tree well; the wood proved healthy and easy to work with. In eight weeks, two young natives, working with axes, chopped out the interior. The trickiest part of hollowing out a canoe comes when one tries to get an even thickness of the trunk walls. Our method was crude and simple: we chopped on the inside with a transversal axe and held our hands to the outside to get a sense of the thickness of the trunk. At the end of eight weeks, we carried my roughly hewn boat to my hous-j on the plantation and stored it under the porch. Once a week I sprayed it with insecticide (a necessary precaution in a tropical climate), mean- while looking for a skilled carpenter who could finish the job. I found Alfred. His first contribution was to write on the stern: This boat is sixty-four feet long. My two houseboys were very much impressed by Alfred's erudition; I less so, for the boat measured only thirty-six feet. Alfred's carpentry proved no better than his mathematics; so I looked around for a replacement. My next helper was William More; but, THE START OF MY VOYAGE as it turned out, he could not work unless he got his daily ration of fermented cane juice. And sometimes he could not work when he did. Despairing of reliable carpenters, I set to work to do the job myself with the help of my two houseboys. After four months of hard work the canoe was finished, ex- cept for the keel. We drew the boat up in front of the house and set to work smoothing the final rough spots. To my con- sternation our planes uncovered insect holes. Out of my boat crawled fat white maggots, small black bugs, big black wood beetles and bark-colored stag beetles with antennae as the the long as my finger. Lying for eight weeks in jungle, trunk had become a haven for the rich, varied insect life of the rain forest. The insecticide, which I had sprayed and rubbed on the wood with such care, had betrayed me. Hop- ing that I might be able to smoke out the insects, I asked the canoe. Sunday, my houseboy, to light a smudge fire under The biting smoke forced me away from the house. I re- turned a few hours later to find the Liberia as I had chris- tened the canoe and six months' hard work, burning the bonfire. brightly. Sunday slept peacefully beside I started afresh the next day on my search for a canoe. I a was still hopeful of acquiring a new one; so I visited canoe- building tribe in the interior. I made them the tempting to offer of four times their usual price, and they promised an- do the job for me.

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