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Posted at 10:05AM on 14 Apr 08. Permalink.

I nearly lost my boat. Heres half the yarn:

Lucky boat.
I was quoted two thousand dollars to transport my twenty-foot yacht Vitamin Sea to Wellington from Auckland. Having had five Auckland Wellington voyages behind me, I opted to test the boat for a possible west coast passage. I understood the reality of such a mission after two seventy knot plus blows, once as an eleven year old on a Ferro cement keeler then ten years later aboard a Pivor loadstar trimaran.

I had confidence in the Vitamin Sea. It was professionally built, Resorcinol glued, diagonal Kaori planked. The adventure almost ended before it began, at the Westhaven tidal grids. I preformed the undies on head stunt of returning to the grids after the boat had hung it self out shipwreck fashion rather than leaning into the poles. I bunged all the thru hull fittings and restored the rudders integrity. After several days navigating Auckland traffic, my supplies where aboard. This included an inventory of tools and materials in case running repairs were needed.

I’d built and fitted a plywood self-steering gear, hung a Mercury 3.3 and still found stern space for the windmill. All was stowed anticipating a quite motor sail out to Rakino where I removed the stanchions, replacing the side decks with spectra harness
lines. I went up the mast with two spare halyards and the radar reflector. After hearing the long range forecast on National radio predicting SE up to 30 knots over the next 48 hours, I elected to head NE over to the Barrier. A possible 30-knot SE powered run from Barrier to Brett seemed a reasonable shakedown for the following day.

We had a mild SW breeze which started to fizz out over near the tip of the Moehu ranges. The 3.3 Mercury pushed me at around 5 knots until the wind picked up from the east. We put in a few big tacks into the Colville channel. To my delight Vitamin Sea climbed well to windward, and the steering gear did all the work. I made myself cups of plunger coffee. When dusk appeared, the tide also changed. Being that the easterly wind had freshened, I decided against beating up the channel to Tryphena. Instead sailing one nice beam reach along the Barriers western coast thru the night.

After a night of half to an hour nod off ‘sleeps, we only had the Moko Hinau group to clear from the leeward. I pulled a Bonito of the lure, but I’d started feeling a bit queasy to deal with it. So it sat in the cockpit for a few hours. Around midday I dropped the main, leaving the middle size jib aloft, then reset the wind vane. I moved
the fish into a white bucket, then into the cabin for gutting. During that bloody ceremony, I realised that I was still feeling green about the gills myself. I rinsed my hands throw the iridescent creatures corps into the sink and bunked down for a bit more kip.

The East-south-east wind continued to pickup. The number 2 jib, while stressed seemed to have an amicable arrangement with the wind vane. I estimate the wind to have been pushing 40 knots with seas rapidly mounting when I dropped the jib in favor of the storm sail. This put the wind vane out of set. Besides, the sea had started
to take on a more catastrophic aesthetic. I was starting to see the tell tail patches of heavily oxygenated water left over long after the wave brakes. It was starting to look reminiscent of some of the stuff I’d seen on the west coast years ago, but with out the ultra strong wind. It was a sensibly reckless couple of hours sailing flat stick, at times longitudinally along the tops of the crests. The only real concerns I had, was in the rig. I had to re-hank the sail several times, the storm sails whipping and shivering was
working the spring loaded pins open.

I was concerned about approaching the potential lee shore at night. There was still a good bit of southerly left in the easterly. Yet my worry was that it might swing around more from the north. We still had a good thirty miles leeway. That’s when I made the
fateful decision to see if me boat could ‘lay a hull’ in big seas, woops! The Vitamin Sea was about to start kicking and bucking like a kaimanua horse. I had tied the storm sail into a bundle on the foredeck; everything relaxed. I climbed into the cabin, took of my wet gear then as an after thought climbed back out with out a harness to lash the tiller when a big wave set showed up. We swung beam on put the gunnels I was sitting on under. I got a good two-hand hold on the main sheet as the hull tipped over the top of me, emptying a fish bin of water bottles an anchor, chain and warp plus my fuel tanks around me. When we righted, I quickly took stock. The patch of flotsam was already a considerable distance apart from us. As I was checking the deck to see that the life raft and deflated rubber duck was still secure, I noticed one eye blurred. It turned out to be blood gushing out of a small cut above my eye. never the less, it ramped up my dramatic affect. Blood was showing up on the deck, I wondered if I had a serious head injury or not. The big EPIRP came to mind as a possible option.

I had plywood shutters for the ports, a small drogue; at that stage I could have got the sail back into action. I was in shock and probably seasick, I couldn’t function, It wasn’t to dissimilar to the time I got my fingers jammed in a machine, ripping both finger nails out from there roots. I lay down on the leeward bunk like I was in an accident and emergency clinic.

The second knock down wasn’t messing about. The wave picked the boat up then dumped it upside down. Everything onboard smashed into the cabin top I was trapped in the quarter birth with foamy water gushing in from the companionway. I felt claustrophobic; I realized that there was a very strong possibility that I was about to die. My thinking cycled back around to taking action, it was another hit of adrenalin. I got back on deck to discover the starboard shroud had ripped itself from its swage. I considered putting my
spectra emergency halyard plan into action. I pondered the idea of hoisting the storm sail, but keeping it on the one tack secured by the good shroud, maybe squeaking in around cape Brett.

My VHF radio was dead. The boat was still in workable shape apart from the broken shroud. I was shell shocked with a rapid cycling fight and flight sort of paralysis. I throw some shards of glass that had been my coffee plunging jug out of the cabin, then activated the ships EPIRB. I set the life raft up in the cockpit along with a grab bag with fresh water. I initiated my second pocket sized EPIRB and added an extra layer of polypropylene to my attire. We had a
few more knockdowns, more like sudden severe gunwale dunkings. The cockpit was often awash with white water.

In hind sight my own weight, 70KG, had likely set up the full capsizes. I was on the gunnels during the worst rollovers. When the boat landed at Matauri there was no evidence of continued total capsizes. However bystanders say it dipped its mast several times on its way to ground.

The helicopter was an ominous technological sight, hovering nose to windward. But the presents of people witnessing my predicament from above came with candid jubilation. My personal EPIRP came from the Trademe website. It arrived in my
letterbox at Wellington from Auckland. I was interested in communication technology applied as virtual reality in the arts. This experience took it the the next dimension. With in twenty minuets, I’d be sitting in a bromeliad garden, having a cup of coffee with the Ecuyer’s. John Ecuyer was the art technician from my art school.

The chopper pilot and crew made it all look easy. They dropped a high line with a bag containing the VHS radio, then the line leading the harness. These waited lines were dropped in the water to wind ward then dragged along the chin. It was like grabbing for an inverted mooring. Once properly in the harness, I went for the ride of my life.

Once upon a time, I almost lost my mind. But thats a another story.

Posted at 8:31PM on 14 Apr 08. Permalink.

I lost a border once. Syria - about 11 years ago.

I was trekking out in the east of the country being shown the sites by an itinerant Palestinian. We were a bit lost and stopped at a village to get our bearings.

Turned out we were in Iraq.

Posted at 8:14PM on 15 Apr 08. Permalink.

My family lost my sister in law, Mahinaarangi Tocker, today. Sad, sad, sad loss to NZ music, and to us all. She is precious, and irreplaceable. One less good person in this cold world.

Posted at 12:40AM on 16 Apr 08. Permalink.

My family lost my sister in law, Mahinaarangi Tocker, today. Sad, sad, sad loss to NZ music, and to us all. She is precious, and irreplaceable. One less good person in this cold world.

Jackie, I am so sorry to hear this - I never met her but I have certainly heard her music - NZ is such a small place, the loss seems to resonate all the more.

Posted at 1:27PM on 16 Apr 08. Permalink.

We lost Sue at the end of March. When I say “we”, I mean pretty much everyone who ever knew her: family, friends, family of friends & friends of family.

It is easy to see symbolism in the circumstances surrounding someone’s passing, we lost Sue the day the drought broke, the day a glorious Summer that she wasn’t able to enjoy, effectively ended. As her body was taken from her house to the hearse, a tui hopped about no more than a metre away from the gurney, trilling a farewell song.

Her faithful border terrier was with her when she died, the dog knew something was up & ran to Sue’s husband for comfort, or perhaps to comfort.

Sue was diagnosed with Crohns disease, when she was in her 20s, after her first (but not last) emergency dash to hospital suffering from dehydration & starvation. She was kept alive in the intervening decades by periodic doses of steroids, and assorted experimental treatments, all of which came with side effects, and risk. Risk that would never go away.

Two years ago Sue had, and beat, breast cancer. She received 6 monthly scans & all seemed well.

At Christmas this year Sue was diagnosed with pneumonia, her immune system was shot from years of Crohns & its treatments. A week or so into the new year the diagnosis was changed alarmingly, if she ever had pneumonia, the doctors weren’t concerned anymore, Sue was now suffering from lung, liver and bone cancer. And possibly kidney cancer too, they never really made that clear. The next few weeks resembled nothing so much as a nightmare episode of House, as ailments were discovered & announced.

It was the sheer array of foes lined against her that had us worried. She’d been close to death before, and pulled through, but this time we were rattled. Her doctor spoke of treatment & long term remission though. We were slightly reassured.

Sue had some trouble breathing & was hospitalised. Her white cell count was way down & there was insufficient oxygen in her blood & she was to receive some massive transfusions in order to build her strength so that she could face chemo therapy.

She contracted an infection from the blood & we feared we would lose her that night.

Then she staged a remarkable recovery, was kept in for several days under observation, before being allowed home with oxygen supplies, painkillers & a walking frame.

Oh, and the blood problem was caused by bone marrow cancer. If anyone deserved a lucky break it was Sue, but it wasn’t to be.

She was in constant pain & nausea throughout all of this. She waxed for a few weeks, then waned…

Sue had two or three chemo treatments, before she was deemed too weak for any more. A scan confirmed what we already suspected: the drugs didn’t work, they just made it worse. But there was an alternative treatment. Did I mention side effects? Well, let’s not.

Throughout all of this, Sue’s husband & her mother tag teamed caring for her, with some help from the rest of us. Her mother said she really wished it was her suffering & not Sue, but Sue told her she’d not wish it upon anyone.

Later, she admitted that yes, she’d quite like it if someone else had it now. She’d had enough. She was scared she was dying, and fearful of not seeing her sons grow up.

The next chemo session was cancelled too. And it is likely that that was the last straw, psychologically. Sue declined that week, and although we all displayed hope, and we & she were working on building her strength for the next dose, deep down we knew that there would be no more recovery, neither remarkable nor mundane.

I saw her last on the Thursday, she sat up in bed, ate a little of a blueberry muffin I’d brought & told me about her week. She was slightly delirious by now, something we hoped was caused by an anti anxiety drug she’d begun taking.

On the Saturday, we got crushing news – there would definitely be no recovery, the end game was beginning. I confess I was knocked off my feet & spent the afternoon feeling nauseous & crying. The heavens opened & it poured down.

And yet still, we thought we had weeks with her. As it turns out we had less than 12 hours.

I got the call around 1.15am Sunday morning, she’d passed peacefully in bed at home, surrounded by her family. She’d been up & about that day (to some extent) and speaking with her sister in law minutes before.

It seems some “event” took her, a clot, or something. It was quick & painless & in some ways maybe, was the best way.

I arrived at her place 10am, just in time to see her being zipped up by the undertakers & removed. My brother Richard had flown from Auckland early in the morning & beat me by couple of hours. The next week up until the funeral was awful. Horrendous, but preparations kept us all busy, and the family huddled for comfort.

The send off itself was magnificent. But now there is a Sue sized hole in everyone’s lives that will never go away, but will surely become easier to negotiate around as time passes.

For Sue.

Posted at 4:27PM on 17 Apr 08. Permalink.

On a far more trivial note... this week I lost my treasured replica of The One Ring.

It must have slipped off my finger. Possibly in the Botanic Gardens.

Should anyone come across it, you may as well let me know as the invisibility & middle earth domination features have never worked.

Posted at 4:52PM on 17 Apr 08. Permalink.

Andrew, that was a beautiful piece of writing, as was your blog about your sister. Condolences and large enveloping hugs.

Posted at 5:00PM on 17 Apr 08. Permalink.

Thank you. I wasn't going to mention it, but in a weak moment I did. No doubt it helps, but it doesn't feel like it right now.

And I just got an email from an old mate, wondering if I remembered abseiling into the Mangatepopo Stream, on a school trip at OPC in the 1970s. And I do.

It is all so gut wrenching.

Posted at 6:36PM on 17 Apr 08. Permalink.

Do you know, it may not help how you feel right now. Nothing could make you feel better, right now. However, you just shared your beautiful sister with alot of people who will read that, and care that she lived. And that will help in the long run.

Posted at 9:32AM on 23 Apr 08. Permalink.

I lost my way, once.

Posted at 5:53PM on 29 Apr 08. Permalink.

Andrew I can't finish reading what you wrote right now, cos I'll cry and cry, but I just wanted to add my big hugs too. It's been a pretty sucky couple of weeks for personal and public tragedy imho.