The Deadliest Dullest Catch

In which the author leaves a perfectly comfortable home and his wonderful family for three months at a time to pursue a paycheck by running a fishing boat far, far from home.

Sunday 19 July, 2009

Noon position: Salty’s On Alki, Seattle, WA

Today was departure day. I spent the morning enjoying brunch with Kathy, Whitney and Drew at Salty’s on Alki. Always an enjoyable experience, we think we might make it a regular happening in the week leading up to my leaving for sea. Afterwards, Kathy, Drew and I went to see the new Harry Potter movie. It was good, and took all our minds off the impending good-byes that awaited us. The drive to the airport, while short, was very difficult for all of us. Thank god for curbside drop off. The actual goodbyes were quickly over with and I was on my way. A quick two hour flight to Los Angeles was uneventful except for the most beautiful look at Mt. Rainier I’ve ever enjoyed.

View of Rainier on my way to LAX. Leg one ot he trip to Honiara.

Once in LA, a shuttle took me to the International terminal for my flight on Qantas to Brisbane, Australia. Walking through the terminal took me past a sign advertising a one-day admittance pass to the Admiral’s Club. I bought the pass and went on up to the lounge, and it was probably the luckiest move I made that day. I was able to check in for my flight in the lounge, and when the agent asked if I had a visa for Australia, I of course did not. Panic! No problem, they can be arranged electronically. Had I waited to check in at the gate I would have been in a bit of trouble as they can’t print the boarding pass without your having a visa. Some computer keystrokes, a call to Canberra, and the visa was taken care of. They even waived the $25.00 fee, I suppose because I’m so cute and cuddly.

Two drink vouchers transformed into a fine single malt scotch and a comfortable chair with wireless access helped me pass the remaining three hours of my layover in Los Angeles. Again, my charm and good looks worked in my favor as a page came over the PA system for “Captain Doug Pine”. I went to the desk to learn that the kindly agent had moved me from a mid-center section seat to a bulkhead row aisle seat just aft of business class! A gift indeed, as the flight was overbooked and there were no empty seats.

The fourteen hours flying to Brisbane were primarily occupied with sleeping, thanks to Valerian and Melatonin thoughtfully provided by my naturopathic physician Kelly Wright. Much better than Xanax, I think. The Qantas service was top-notch, and the food was decent. Once on the ground in Brisbane, I had to clear customs to then fetch my bags, and re-enter to check in with Air Solomon for the flight to Honiara. The form that I neglected to fill out on the advice of a Qantas flight attendant was, of course, of vital importance to the process and so I lost my place in line whilst (yes, whilst, it’s Australia you know) filling it out to the satisfaction of Australia. I was, being a single white male traveler from the USA, despite the aforementioned charm and cuddliness naturally assumed by the Australian security forces to be a potentially drug smuggling threat to their national security, next treated to the full suite of security screenings, pat downs, explosives sniffing, and many questions about the nature of my CPAP machine. I soon learned that the CPAP questions were derived more from human interest than from issues of national security, as the woman who was searching my bags was concerned for her husband who apparently has his own Australian version of obstructive sleep apnea and was, that very evening, scheduled for a sleep study. Having thus bonded with a new friend whose name I’ve now forgotten, I exited the security apparatus and spent my three hours in Australia waiting for an airplane to take me to Honiara.

Air Solomon takes people from Brisbane to Honiara, which is kind of a nice place, and then on to Nauru, which is a not at all nice place, twice a week. Fortunately, I got off at the first stop. The flight was truly from a forgotten era: three hours of open cockpit doors, we don’t care if you wear your seatbelts, and apple juice, sorry no ice. I declined the apple juice in favor of water, which was tropical-ized by the addition of a slice of warm orange. After an exciting approach to Henderson Field, which gave me a balcony view of all the fires and other smoke producing endeavors that seem to be the popular way to pass the time in Honiara, we landed on a very short runway (but oh, how wide!) and pulled up at the terminal building. The cabin door (which had been closed during flight, thank goodness) opened and it suddenly got hot. Very hot. Now I understood the warm orange slice in my water as warm is a theme in these latitudes, discovering this as I stepped off the airplane. I thought that after having lived in Hawai’i I was ready for the weather. In comparison, Hawai’i is cold. Good thing it is winter south of the equator right now, as the 90 plus degrees and 99% humidity gives the locals a chance to cool off from the summer heat.

Clearing customs in the Solomon Islands is quick and easy, once you’ve stood in line for over an hour waiting for the agents to show up. That adventure behind me, I stepped outside and found a Korean gentleman holding a scrawled sign advertising for “Capt. Douglas”. Mr. Kang is the shipping agent in Honiara, and he claims to speak English. I make no claims to speak Korean, and we babbled along for awhile, about god only knows what, with translation help from a Japanese woman who was in the car with us. She spoke no English or Korean, and so I have no ideas at to the content of our conversation. It was probably information of vital importance to my job.

We drove away from the airport into town. Oh, by the way, they drive on the wrong side of the road in Honiara. I’ve not had that experience since I was in England at age 12. It is not pleasant. Any thought of renting a car to go sightseeing flew out the window with Mr. Kang’s cigarette butts and occasional wad of phlegm. They don’t have lines on the roads in Honiara, at least not where we were driving. No lights, no signs except the occasional “Please drive safely” sign. Like signs everywhere else in the world, these are largely ignored in favor of adventure. The sport seems to be in dodging pedestrians who dart out from both sides of the road without much thought to the state of traffic at the moment.

THE Place to buy betel nut!

Roundabouts are all about, and they complicate things, of course, but the locals have got it figured out apparently and we made it to the first hotel without incident. After unloading my bags, hauling them to the front desk and waiting for the Japanese lady to get checked in, I learned that there were no more rooms.

Producing smoke in Honiara is second only to chewing betel nut.

Back into Mr. Kang’s car we went. He said something about “this quiet hotel, next one no quiet”. I told him I vastly preferred quiet, to which he responded that “you will love casino, prelly good disco action!” And that’s where we wound up, at the lovely Pacific Casino Hotel (www.solomon-hotel.com) where I spent nearly a week waiting to join my ship.

Manners, children!

This was a not at all unpleasant week, as the casino and noisy bars were located some distance from my room, and my employer paid for everything, including my wages. I spent the first couple of days doing nothing but enjoying the air conditioning in the room, and trying to get someone from the local telecom company to come to the hotel to unplug and re-plug the wireless router that wasn’t working. This is something we do at home on a regular basis, and so I innocently offered to do it for them. You would think that I had offered to deflower the Prime Minister’s teenage daughter given the shocked looks at the front desk. A lesson in boundaries that one apparently does not cross in Honiara. But I could see the router from where I stood! It was frustrating but I had alternatives, the “internet café” across the hall, which shared space with the Sunshine Car Rental agency. They had three computers there that they claimed were connected to the internet, but you could have fooled me. They all three reminded me of my sister’s computers. Full of virus and spyware nastiness, and slow as molasses. But I was able to get a few emails out.My iPhone worked from time to time, kind of like the electricity which went out occasionally, and I was able to text message the folks back home and update my facebook status without having to get on a computer.

I went diving one morning, on a couple of old Japanese shipwrecks that lie on the beach. Bonegi I and II the wrecks are called, and they were fun to dive on. The water was over 80 degrees, warmer than the Hawaiian waters I dove in just a couple of weeks prior, and being closer to the equator (8 degrees South latitude) there was an abundance of corals that I had never before seen. Lots of different fish as well, many I had never seen before. The wrecks themselves were eerie to explore, and the sense of history was ever present. One of the most intense battles of WWII was fought on the Island of Guadalcanal, and it was with a sense of reverence and honor that I visited the final landfall of so many.

Bonegi II Dive site, Honiara

This boat was built in 2008, mine in 1972. Their US Captain has a Taiwanese crew, and his personal translator follows him wherever he goes. They take good care of these guys, is what the Pohnpei Pilot tells me. Gotta find out how to get hold of them!

When I got back to the hotel, the wireless was working and so I spent some time Skyping with Kathy and hanging out online. It is pretty cool to be able to have a video call from halfway across the world for just a few dollars. One purchases wifi internet access from the government telecom in Honiara in 250mb chunks, and I learned that Skype video calls use about 1.5mb per minute. 265 Solomon dollars for 250mb of bandwidth. Works out to about thirty dollars US.

The Majestic Blue showed up the morning of 23 July, and the departing Captain came ashore and found me at the hotel. Mark had been on board for four months, and was happy to meet his relief. We spent some time together talking shop, and then as sailors will we hit the town for a night. I spent the next day paying for it, laying low and finishing up Season Five of Lost. The best season yet, I think. That pretty much brings me to today, when I joined the boat.

27 July, 2009

Noon position: L09-25S λ159-58E

Up here is where you'll find the Fishing Master in the mornings, and the Chief and 2nd Officers in the afternoons, looking for fishies.

We motored out in the agent’s launch, which was interesting. Good thing it was flat or we would have gotten drenched. Mark spent an hour or so showing me around the boat and giving me the summation of my job description:

1. Sign the log every day.
2. Sign the reports that the Radio Officer prepares for you.
3. Make sure they do drills once a month.
4. Try to keep yourself busy doing something.

It will truly be a challenge to keep myself occupied, but I came prepared. I bought a Kindle from Amazon and filled it with books before leaving home, I brought my Strat and Line6 POD and a pile of tabs of songs I want to learn to play, and I hope to dust off my celestial navigation skills if I can find the sextant which is alleged to be aboard. I have, thanks to my pal Rick Dahms, close to seventy movies on disk. I also brought 150 gigs worth of music in my iTunes library. I ordered a book on how to speak Korean but it failed to arrive prior to my leaving. My book on Korean culture and supervisory relationships did arrive however, and I might crack that one. I’ll learn all I ever want to know about purse seining for tuna, that’s for sure. If the first two meals aboard are any indication, I’m going to like the food.

This is breakfast, lunch, and dinner. Every day. They toss in a lot of rice and fish and Spam.

I have pretty much unlimited email access, but no internet. You can reach me at majestic@dreamport.to. Put Capt. Douglas somewhere in the subject line and the Radio Officer will get it to me. No attachments over 1mb please. It’s kind of clunky, he brings me email on a USB stick, and I put replies and new ones on the stick and give it back to him. Then he plugs it into the computer that is hooked up to the Inmarsat system and sends ‘em out.

The Pointy End. WDE 4888. Call me.

This boat was built in 1972, and is showing its age. But it is a hard working fishing boat, and despite her age and her rust she’s seaworthy and so far the ride is quite comfortable. It’s Captain Mark’s opinion that she has a hard-working and safe crew. I liked hearing that. As for me, my cabin is tiny, but I have it to myself, after refusing to share it. They tried to put the fishing observer who joined us today in with me but I brought that to a quick resolution. I’m the Master; I get my own cabin, and no he cannot stay in here. Test #1, passed with flying colors. There will be many, many more…

My "cabin" is quite small. It's getting bigger though. These are the "before" pics. Stay tuned for the "after" pics!

I have my own head and shower, which is an interesting place. Imagine a shower stall that includes a sink and a head. That’s what I’ve got. A straight pipe comes out of the bulkhead, no shower head for us he-man types. The sink and shower spill to a floor drain. And the water is hot, very hot. The fidley is just aft of my cabin, and the water pipes run through there on their way to my head. After we’ve been steaming along for a few hours, the water that initially comes out is literally boiling. Gives new meaning to the term "steaming". Believe it or not, this is from the cold water line. There is actually no hot water line to any of the heads or the galley on board! That’s going to change. I thank Capt. Mark for sharing this information with me rather than letting me learn it the hard way. He saved me a trip to the hospital by doing that. I have to let the water run for about five minutes until it cools enough for me to use it. Stay tuned for more Installments! Thanks for reading! –Doug

One night, out of the 34 I was at sea in July and August, stood out amongst the rest. I took something like 60 pictures of the sunset that evening!