Nehru Bal Pustakalaya

THE VOYAGE OF TRISHNA

T.P.S. Chowdhury

NATIONAL BOOK TRUST, INDIA

ISBN 81-237-1694-X First Edition 1996 First Reprint 1999 Second Reprint 2005 Third Reprint 2006 (Saka 1928) © Brigadier T P S Chowdhury, 1995

Published by the Director, National Book Trust, India A-5 Green Park, New Delhi-110 016

Dedicated to the entire crew who made the voyage possible

Acknowledgement

The author would like to extend thanks to the Ministries of Defence, External Affairs and Finance, Army, Naval and Air Headquarters, Corps of Engineers, Naval Dockyard Bombay, INS Venduruthy Cochin, Signals Directorate, Yachting Association of India, O N G C , Oil India, Bombay Dyeing, Bata, Bharat Electronics Ltd., Delhi Recorder, Kohinoor, Doordarshan, All India Radio, HAM operators.

On behalf of the entire crew of Trishna, the author wishes to thank all their superior officers who made this dream possible, to all their friends and relations who were with them all the while, and to their dear families, who gave them the moral support and strength to complete the first Indian sailing expedition around the world.

OCEAN CRUISING

Ten Indians sailed around the world in a yacht, covering 55,000 km in fifteen months and twelve days. The yacht was only 11m long and 3.25 m wide— Trishna. It was the first Indian sailing expedition around the world.

All ten, including myself, were army officers from the Corps of Engineers, which is often considered a small navy within the Army. We work in and on water, con-structing bridges and ferries and are familiar with cross-ing lakes, rivers and seas in crafts of different kinds.

All of us were experienced sailors, but four had been on several ocean voyages. In a very small seabird sailing boat of the type commonly seen in Bombay harbour, 5 m long and 2 m wide, we sailed from Bombay to Goa and back many times; from Bombay to Cochin; from Madras to Port Blair, and from Bombay to Bandar Abbas (Iran) and back. The class of yacht we had sailed in was normally used in sailing races in harbours, and not across oceans. These yachts did not have any cabins for sleeping, navigation table or cooking, and these had no toilets. We had to improvise everything. Big waves would surge into

the boat and wet our navigational charts, soak our food, and drench us when we were resting under an open sky. On many occasions the labels on the tinned food would peel off with the water, and we were not sure of the contents of the tin. It was trial and error, but fun! Can you imagine, we had to lean out of the boat and hold on to its steel wires with one hand to answer the call of nature?

During one of the journeys from Bombay to Goa our rudder broke, and we drifted for several miles into the sea. We did not have a spare rudder. What were we to do? We decided to use some plywood pieces and repair the rudder. We could not take out the rudder, so I jumped into the sea with a hammer and brass nails, and used my underwater carpentry skills. It took about two hours with breaks, but I managed to repair the rudder.

During another journey we were unable to sleep for two days because sharks kept us close company. We ulti-mately realized that the left-over meat and other tinned food that we were throwing overboard after meals had at-tracted them.

Crossing the ten-degree latitude channel to reach Port Blair was an interesting experience. Qur boat's speed was no match for the strong current of the channel, and at times we felt that we were being pushed backwards. Once, to our amazement, we awoke in the morning to find our-selves at almost the same place as we had been the previ-ous evening. It took us two days to cross the channel.

Such experiences had prepared us for our round the world trip in our yacht Trishna.

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t h e p a r t s o f t h e y a t c h

TRISHNA

The idea of sailing around the world first occurred to us in 1977. No Indian had done thir before. A project was prepared, Major K.S. Rao was nominated to skipper the yacht; and Captain A.K. Singh left for the United King-dom in 1980 to do a preliminary survey of yachts. In the meantime, the other members of the crew trained with the Navy on INS Venduruthy to learn about navigation, meteorology, medicine, food and emergencies at sea. All of us read extensively about famous ocean voyages so that we could learn from the experiences of others.

At the last minute, much to our dismay, the sailing expedition was called off, due to lack of funds.

Two years later I revived the project and fortunately received permission from the government to go ahead. A team of nine officers was selected with Major K.S. Rao as skipper, and I as team manager. Two administrative offic-ers were stationed at Pune and Delhi.

An advance party of two, Major A.K. Singh and my-self, flew to London on 15 July 1984 to select a yacht, arrange for some training and work out a plan for the

journey. On reaching London, we contacted Brigadier A.lsf. Carlier of the Royal Engineers who had taken part in an around-the-world race, and was a seasoned ocean sailor. He felt that we were rushing our project, but we were able to overcome his misgivings and, with his help, our search for the yacht began.

We inspected over 200 yachts and finally on 28 Au-gust 1984 bought the 11-m fibre glass yacht, Guenevere of Sussex which we renamed Trishna. ' Trishna means an urge to fulfil a deep-rooted desire, a 'thirst'. It was thirst for the sea, and our desire to sail around the world which was the reason for giving the yacht this name.

Trishna was built in 1970 by Nautors, the famous boat builders of Finland. She is a sloop rig which means that she has two sails and a mast. One sail, the 'jib' or 'foresail', is in front of the yacht, and the other, the main sail, is put on the 15-m aluminium mast. The main sail can be rolled up and made shorter. This is called 'reefing'. Besides these two, we carried a large number of other sails, of big and small sizes. The basic principle of putting sails on the yacht is governed by the strength of winds: the stronger the wind, the smaller the sail; the lighter the wind, the larger the sail.

Trishna had a cabin with eight bunks, but as the two in front were not comfortable to sleep on, we converted them into storage space for sails, food, charts and ropes. She was fitted with the basic cruising equipment, includ-ing a depth sounder, wind instruments, speed log, radio equipment, very high frequency (VHF) and high

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Crew of Trisbna being blessed for the journey by a priest just before leaving Gosport, U.K. Left to Right. Maj. C Bharti, Lt. Col. AP Singh, SM, Col. KS Rao, SM, (Skipper), Brig. TPS Chowdhury (Team Manager), Maj. S. Shekhar, Maj. AK Singh.

frequency (HF) radio sets and a simple 12-volt battery sat-ellite navigator. Her 2-m long keel under water made her stable in rough weather. The safety equipment on board included a six-man life raft, rubber dinghy, life-jackets, pis-tol flares, two horseshoe buoys, and a danbuoy to throw to a sailor who falls or has been knocked overboard. She had a 65-litre fuel tank and a 23 HP diesel engine, which was used for battery charging, entry and exit from ports, and in emergencies.

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*

After doing a puja, breaking a coconut, and a cham-pagne bottle, we sailed Trishna from Brighton Marina to Gosport in south England accompanied by our new in-structor, Major Ron Gravells of the Royal Engineers.

Training on Trishna began on 29 August 1984. She was very different from the yachts we had handled before. She had a wheel for steering, but we were accustomed to a tiller. Moreover, we had never before sailed using instru-ments. We also did a navigational and ocean cruising refresher course for ten days. I remember that during one of our training cruises I could not correctly assess the direction of the wind and in a strong wind the boat turned in the opposite direction.

Training was hard work and involved long hours— sometimes from eight in the morning to nine at night. During our training cruises we ran into several gales and had to cope with strong winds and tidal currents. The waters of the English Channel and the Atlantic Ocean were really icy. One of the first pieces of advice Major Gravells gave us was, "Never fall overboard, as you are unlikely to be recovered alive"—it only took three min-utes in those freezing waters for blood circulation to stop. We read about a well-known British sailor who had fallen into the English Channel, after being swept away by a big wave, and was dead on being retrieved after a few min-utes. In rough weather we therefore always had a steel wire rope which was attached to the boat, hooked on our bodies. To practise rescuing, we threw a horse-shoe buoy and tried to retrieve it in three to four minutes. We

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practised this several times. It was not easy to turn the boat around, chase the buoy and recover it, 2nd nearly im-possible, in choppy seas.

Major Gravells insisted on perfection and made us re-peat drills till we had mastered them. It was a difficult manoeuvre to come alongside a jetty. "We messed it up several times, once even in front of Brigadier Carlier, which so annoyed Major Gravells that he made us do it again and again till we did the task to his satisfaction.

We had planned to leave for India by 15 September 1984, but as we had not bought our yacht till late August, we postponed our departure to 12 October. Leaving late meant encountering bad weather on the Atlantic Ocean, especially across the Bay of Biscay which is well-known for its storms and gales, but we decided that this would be a good experience for us before the actual expedition around the world.

We sought God's blessings before we left. A pandit came from London, said prayers, broke a coconut, and offered half of it to the sea; the other half we ate as prasad. And, to the notes of a British Army piper, the breaking of a champagne bottle, and cheers from the gathered crowd, we sailed off at 15.40 hours on 12 October 1984.

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SAIL TO INDIA

On the first two days, 12 and 13 October 1984, the weather was clear and sunny. "We halted at Alderney in

, the Channel Islands to check the boat and fill water and fuel, before crossing the treacherous Bay of Biscay. The first half of the crossing went off well but on the night of 17-18 October, Trishna was hit by a severe storm. With blinding rain, strong winds of over 90 kph and waves 9-12 m high, it was a battle to keep Trishna on course. Storm sails were hoisted to reduce the speed but keep the boat moving. The skipper and two of the crew were al-ways on deck to steer the boat. The storm lasted fourteen to sixteen hours. We were flung against cupboards and bunks damaging them, and some equipment from the deck was lost to the sea.

This was the worst storm during the journey from Gosport to Bombay. It, however, gave the crew the con-fidence that both the yacht and they could take the beat-ing of a violent sea and storms. In the next three days we were hit by two more gales with windspeeds of 70 kph and more, lasting two to three hours each. With the winds

against us continuously, we entered the Spanish port of La Coruna on the evening of 20 October. Bright sunshine greeted us on 21 October and we were able to wash and dry our clothes, sun the sails and repair the damage caused to the boat. After filling up water and fuel and buying provisions, we left in the afternoon. The sunshine disap-peared and heavy fog reduced visibility, sometimes up to 30 m. We had a narrow escape on two occasions when we almost collided with a trawler and a high speed boat.

And there was another strange incident. We were en-circled by two boats in the thick fog. Their crew shouted on the megaphone that they wanted to come aboard. We stated our identity, and asked them to prove theirs. We were not sure who they were—pirates or the coastguard. We also fired flares in the air to draw the attention of nearby ships, and informed the Lisbon port authorities on radio about the two boats. Ultimately the boats disap-peared leaving us wondering if we had encountered pi-rates!

We reached Lisbon on 26 October and left two days later for Gibraltar. After an hour's sail, however, we were intercepted by the Portuguese Maritime Police, who in-sisted that we return to Lisbon for a final clearance from them. This caused a six-hour delay. Initially there was hardly any breeze, but by 29 October it had built upto 35 to 45 kph. The sea became choppy and sailing was uncomfortable. The next day we were hit by a gale of over 65 kph. Everyone was seasick and the journey was

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very uncomfortable. The seas calmed down on 1 Novem-ber, and we reached Gibraltar in the evening.

At Gibraltar, the Royal Engineers and the Royal Navy helped us with repairs of the yacht and checking of the radio and other instruments which were giving trouble after the storm. We lifted anchor on 4 November and again ran into bad weather, with agitated seas and winds over 65 kph. Rain came down heavily, and heavy fog restricted visibility. Although the breeze had changed direction, enabling us to go on a 'run' (that is, with the wind coming from the stern), controlling the yacht be-came difficult. Even with the main sail reefed thirteen

' turns, the boat was still sailing at 11 kph. Waves of more than 9 m blocked the sunshine and crashed on the deck, filling the cockpit with water. We reached the Spanish island of Ibiza on 7 November.

We delayed our departure but when there was no sign of let-up in the weather, set off on 10 November with the main sail reefed up. Three days later the weather cleared. With bright sunshine, luck smiled, and we caught two fish, weighing 2V2 and 2 kg. Soon our stomachs were filled with o. r favourite fish dishes—fried fish and fish curry. On 15 November to our delight a flying fish landed on our deck. But the good weather and good moments did not last. Strong winds built up, the sea turned turbulent. Again, high waves crashed onto the boat and filled our cockpit with water. The weather remained rough till we reached Malta on 17 November. After a brief rest, replen-ishment of water and provisions, we left Malta two days

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later for Kriti, Greece. We had a forced stop at Kriti as the water from Malta and Ibiza was brackish and had to be changed.

In the early hours of 20 November, before we could bring down the jib sail and reef up the main sail, a sud-den gale hit us. Fortunately it lasted only an hour, but thick dark clouds, rain, choppy seas and small squalls continued for the next two days. So did the rocking and pitching, making us all very seasick. The weather im-proved on 23 November, and we put out the fishing line and caught a lovely three-kilogram bluish silvery fish with blue dots. Unfortunately, while trying to unhook it, it suddenly sprang to life, jumped out of the bucket on to the deck and then vanished into the sea.

Spoons and baits for catching fish could not be the same in all types of water. From experience we found that we had to use a particular spoon with the right bait and fish line in a particular area of the ocean. We also found that fish bit the bait only in good weather, and when the sun was up. In rainy and squally weather, they did not bite.

As there were signs of a storm, we halted for the night of 24 November at Iraklion. The next morning we sailed to Ayios Nikolaos, on "he same Island of Kriti, to fill up water, fuel and get fresh provisions.

We left Ayios Nikolaos on 27 November in a hurry, as thick dirk clouds were forming. Once we crossed the Greek island of Rhodes, the weather improved 1 ,t not ior Rain clouds soon converged on us from both

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front and rear. We had to sail against the wind (on the beat) till we reached Port Said. The only diversion dur-ing our fight with the elements was on 29 November when a jet flew very low over us on two successive runs, tipping its wings and disappearing as suddenly as it had appeared, leaving us bemused.

Just before we entered Port Said harbour on 1 Decem-ber, a motor launch tried to come alongside our yacht. We had been warned of pirates in the Mediterranean, es-pecially near the entry of the Suez Canal. All six of us came on deck, asked the crew to identify themselves and shouted that we were from India. The launch turned away. Who were they? Pirates? Another unsolved mys-tery!

Trishna was escorted by a pilot vessel to the Port Said Yacht Club and was soon swarmed by officials from im-migration, customs, port police, police, army and navy. The number of forms to be filled up before the yacht was allowed to cross the Suez Canal was really amazing. Se-curity was tight. Every foreign yacht had a guard for the duration of its stay. Anything brought in or taken out from the yacht was checked three or four times.

Since our radio set was not working, we had asked that a new one be sent from India. We had also asked for tins of cooked dal, meat curry, sag, vegetables, etc. I had asked for a bottle of hair fixer for myself. The customs officials insisted that the radio set had been brought in to spy on their country and the hair fixer was a special con-centrated shampoo, on which I should pay 300 per cent

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duty. We managed to clear the radio set eventually, but I had to pay 300 per cent duty on my hair fixer despite my exasperated offer that the customs officer keep it for his hair.

Captain M.S. Pillai joined Trishna at Port Said and I flew back to India to get more foreign exchange from the Government and complete the preparations for our fur-ther cruise around the world.

Trishna sailed through Suez Canal on 7 December, reached Port Suez the following day, and left in the early hours of 10 December for Port Sudan.

The journey through Red Sea was very fast. We cov-ered 260 km per day, and reached Port Sudan on 15 December.

We set sail three days later and had to face bad weather for the next twelve days. Strong winds hit us throughout the 1,300 km journey causing us to beat (i.e. sail, against the wind in a zig zag fashion) and thus we actually covered 2,145 km. This portion had many dan-gerous reefs, and we had to deftly manoeuvre the craft. The dark moonless nights added to our worries. We fi-nally reached Aden on 30 December 1984.

After a brief rest, and New Year celebrations, we left on 2 January 1985. Although the winds 'were against us, they were lighter, and we reached Salalah on 10 January. We filled up water, and left the following day. The winds were favourable and light and we reached Muscat eight days later. After a brief rest we left on 23 January for Bombay. The Arabian Sea usually has good weather

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during winter and we enjoyed sailing in this stretch. Many dolphins played around the yacht, a few whales came dangerously close, and flying fish in the hundreds at-tracted by the night navigational lights on the boat came flying on board, and even hit the crew on watch- duty. There were so many that we had to throw them back

' into the sea, but still had enough fish for breakfast, lunch and dinner!

We reached Bombay on 1 February 1985, a month ahead of schedule. A tumultuous welcome awaited us at the Gateway of India. We had sailed over 14,000 km, the longest distance that any Indian had sailed in a yacht. We were also the first Indians to have sailed in a yacht from U.K. to India.

Skipper Rao taking sun sights with a sextant in the Pacific on 20 April 1986 while Capt. Shekhar takes an ocean bath.

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THE CREW

We were now confident that both Trishna and her crew could withstand storms and gales and take a lot of bash-ing at sea. Nevertheless the yacht required some modifi-cations and repairs in preparation for our journey around the world. The crew too had to be ready to face any crisis.

We lifted Trishna out of the water at the Naval Dock-yard, and all of us worked at overhauling her and getting to know each system of the boat. Each of us was to spe-cialize in one system, and know the details of another, in case of an emergency or the illness of a crew member.

The anti-fouling paint was scrubbed off, engine and winches overhauled, instruments serviced, sails repaired and washed, the life-raft overhauled and new contents put in, the rubber caulking on the deck redone, new water tanks installed to increase their capacity to 585 litres, and many other small jobs completed on Trishna.

Our team had also to be finalized. The organizing committee decided to have a team of ten officers. The old crew was asked if they would like to volunteer as we

Trishna taken out of water at the Naval Jetty at Bombay.

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only wanted willing people, devoted to the mission. Over 300 applications were received. Finally ten of-

ficers were chosen. Of these, Major K.S. Rao, Major A.P. Singh, Major A.K. Singh, Captain S. Shekhar, Captain C. Bharti and I, had sailed Trishna from the U.K. All the crew members were sailors of repute, and had taken part in national sailing meets, and some had participated in international meets. And, we were all sapper officers from the Corps of Engineers.

Major K.S. Rao, 38 years, who was the skipper of Trishna during the journey from the U.K. to Bombay in 1984, was again selected skipper. He specialized in navigation

and homoeopathic medicine. Major A. P. Singh, 33 years, specialized in navigation

and photography. Major A.K. Singh, 31 years, had met with an accident

while hang gliding in Pune in February 1983, and lost his left leg above the knee. He never let this hamper him and volunteered for the journey to encourage the handicapped. He specialized in the electrical and mechanical systems and in photography.

Major A. Bhattacharya, 34 years, initially looked after administration at Pune. On board he specialized in me-chanical systems, the boat's rigging and in communica-tion.

Major S.N. Mathur, 35 years, specialized in medicine and in amateur radio communications (Ham).

Captain R. Bassi, aged 27, specialized in meteorology, rigging and the ship's business (documentation and clear-ance at ports).

Captain S. Shekhar, aged 23, specialized in medicine, food, and navigation.

Captain C. Bharti, aged 24, specialized in radio com-munications, meteorology and rigging.

Lieutenant Navin Ahuja, aged 21, specialized in the ship's business, rigging and cooking.

Colonel T.P.S. Chowdhury, aged 41. I was selected to be the team manager. I specialized in the ship's business, medicine, cooking and photography.

Trishna had a crew of six. Of these, f o u r -Major K.S.Rao, Major A.K. Singh, Captain S. Shekhar and

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Captain C. Bliarti — were permanently on board and the others changed one at a time, at Port of Spain, Panama, Auckland and Sydney, so that everyone had the chance to sail in the expedition. Besides these six, one officer at Bombay kept in touch with Trishna on radio, another at Pune was responsible for sending spares, equipment and food, and for general administration. A third at Army Headquarters kept in touch with the Ministries of De-fence and External Affairs and various embassies. He was also responsible for getting funds from the Ministries, in-cluding foreign exchange. A fourth officer had his hands full keeping relatives and friends of the crew informed of

The ten member team of Trishna.

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the progress of Trishna and the welfare of the crew. He also had to keep the newspapers, radio and television posted on Trishna s progress.

I had to return to the U.K. for some spares, equip-ment and a special antifouling paint. Meanwhile the others took advanced training in navigation, meteorology, com-munications, and survival at sea. We also learnt more about medicine and attended classes on cooking.

We made lists of what we required during the jour-ney and bought equipment, spares and food. Each tin of food was painted to prevent rusting, and marked with a waterproof marker, in case the label peeled off. Then the food, medicines and spares were carefully stacked and stored in the restricted space available in the boat.

We now had Trishna completely overhauled, and after victualling the yacht, bidding goodbye to friends and relatives, set sail from Bombay on 28 September 1985.

SAILING FROM BOMBAY TO PANAMA

We were too busy before our departure. All of us were aware of the dangers involved in such an expedition, all of us knew that we may never come back; our families knc "v that too. However, we had been preparing them for months, some of us for many years, and they now ac-cepted the fact and permitted us to set off on our adven-ture.

We experienced rough weather from the time we set sail. Prom 29 September to 14 October, we were hit sev-eral times by gales up to 100 kph, with waves 6 to 9 m high, which damaged our VHF and HF'aerials and elec-trical systems. We did not want to stop and decided to carry out the repairs while on the move. Captain Shekhar climbed the 15-m mast in this weather, and repaired the antennae and electrical system. He could easily have fallen off the mast and disappeared into the violent sea.

As a result of the gales, we had an uninvited visitor. A bird, the size of a sparrow, took shelter on top of our mast and travelled with us for a couple of days. We tried to tempt it to come down with offerings of food and

Major S. Shekhar climbs the mast to rectify the VHF antenna which came off its mounting in a storm. Photo on high seas.

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finally succeeded. But, it would not eat much. We looked after it by turns and fed it milk, bread, porridge and rice. It seemed to be unwell and would lie in a corner all day. Eventually it died.

Life on board was very busy. We did not have an auto-helm, and had to man Trishna at the wheel twenty-four hours of the day. We had a watch system, port and star-board, for two crew members, each of whom were on watch for four hours continuously. Of the two members on duty, one was watch leader, the other his mate. They alternated at the wheel every hour. While one officer was at the wheel (helm), the other was the look-out man, to sight ships, islands, whales, etc.

Major A.K. Singh feeds a bird which came onto our yacht during a storm.

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Those off watch changed their clothes, ate, read, lis-tened to the radio, and attended to their duties such as checking the radio, engine, and electrical problems and giving rations for the menu of the day.

The fifth member was on 'mother watch'. He had to cook all the meals, wash up afterwards clean the 'gallery' (kitchen) and toilet and keep the yacht clean. Mother watch was done in rotation. It was only while fulfilling this role that one got a full night's rest, once in five days, and that too if the weather was good.

The sixth member was the skipper, the captain of the boat. He was on call twenty-four hours of the day. He was not only responsible for navigation, but also had to decide about sail changes. He helped in changing the sail during rough weather as at least three people were needed on deck during a sail change—one at the wheel and two for the actual sail changing.

With such a rigorous routine, there was no time to play chess or cards, leave alone get bored.

Once a day we had 'Happy Hour' on board. All six crew members came on deck at 16.00 hours and were together for at least an hour. The officer on mother watch made tea or coffee or served soft drinks, whatever each member requested. He also made some snacks. If we wanted to be difficult we demanded potato chips, eggs on toast or pakoras. During Happy Hour we discussed the news and other matters of interest. The skipper gave instructions for the night, informing us if we were to cross an island or some dangerous stretch. On special

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Our 'cooking gallery' in the yacht. Major Bharti cooking 'baked cabbage' for the crew.

occasions, such as birthdays, wedding anniversaries or the birth of a child of a crew member, we shifted Happy Hour to 19.00 hours and had a drink to celebrate. Oth-erwise drinking on board was forbidden.

Our first halt was Male, capital of the Maldives, where we arrived on 7 October 1985. We had been sailing for ten days and needed to stock up with water, fresh veg-etables and fruit. Since there was no jetty we had to anchor Trishna at sea, and row in our rubber dinghy to the shore. It was tough ferrying water and food to the yacht. To our surprise we had to buy fresh water in jerricans at Male, as fresh water was very scarce.

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We had worked out that for each member, we could spare 2 litres of water per day for sixty days. With this amount, we had to manage everything—cleaning ourselves, tea, coffee, drinking and cooking. The sixty-day period was based on the assumption that the longest stretch at sea would be forty-five to sixty days. Two litres of water was very inadequate, and we scrupulously rationed water.

We left Male on 9 October and headed towards Mauritius, a non-stop journey of 3,700 km. Strong winds and the sea current helped us. At high speed we covered the distance in sixteen days, averaging 231 km a day, good going for our small sailing boat. Everyone was very friendly and hospitable at Port Louis and we got to know something about local customs and saw some dances. We also had repairs done and checked Trishna thoroughly in preparation for the longest stretch of the journey that now lay ahead of us.

We set sail from Port Louis on 30 October 1985. Near Madagascar, a gale blew up with winds of 100 kph. and waves 12-m high which broke on top of the yacht, flood-ing her with water. The crew on duty were thrown off the boat several times but luckily were able to scramble back, as a rope from the boat was fastened to their belts. We bailed out the water in the boat with the help of two battery, and two hand-operated pumps.

As our experience grew, we were able to hold the yacht on course. Major A.K. Singh tried to photograph this stormy sea. A big wave came and A.K. disappeared into the sea together with the camera. This drenching

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ruined the camera, but A.K. managed to capture the ex-citing moment and salvage the roll; today we have an excellent photograph to remind us of the ferocious sea.

On the night of 18-19 November, while rounding the Cape of Good Hope, we were again hit by a severe storm with winds over 120 kph and waves 12 to 15 m high. Every moment could have spelt death. We drifted to within five km of the Cape and thought our boat would crash on the rocks. Though we did not lose any lives, we lost our safety equipment, the radio set was damaged, aerials were broken, we had trouble with the electrical system and lost radio contact with the rest of the world for fifteen days. The Indian newspapers flashed news, that Trishna was miss. thus causing our families and friends to panic. A search party was sent to find us but was unsuccess-ful.

The only pleasant memory of the storm was a 18-m whale we sighted—also probably battling for its life! It was the biggest whale we saw during our entire cruise.

Communication is vital for any expedition. We had two radio sets on board, one VHF and the other a HF. The VHF radio was a 25 watts Sealine radio with a range of about 75 km. This was used to contact the port au-thorities to let them know our estimated time of arrival and to get permission to enter the harbour. Channel 16 on this radio was the international distress and emergency channel, which is manned by all vessels at sea twenty-four hours a day. When heading for a collision we hailed ships crossing us several times on Channel 16, and asked them

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Having a meal inside the boat at the kitchen (gallery) the crew is in a serious mood due to rough weather.

to alter their route. The second radio set was a 100- watts HF-HC with a special inverted V antenna, manufactured in India by BEL on which we got a range of 7,400 km on voice, which was a record, much beyond the manu-facturer's range of the set. Weather reports, radio tele-phone calls and medical consultations were obtained over this radio.

Trishna was in radio communication with Bombay and to some extent with Pune and Delhi. Progress reports were given twice a day. Till the Cape of Good Hope communication was good. Thereafter we were out of touch with India for almost 318 days till we rounded

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Thursday Island in north Australia, We used the HAM (Amateur) radio network extensively both on and off the boat. HAM operators in India and abroad accepted and passed on messages.

When we reached Jamestown in Saint Helena and informed Army Headquarters of our arrival, there was joy and relief. Thanks to the driving force of the storm we were twelve days ahead of schedule, having covered 7,400 km in thirty-three days.

Saint Helena is the island where Napoleon Bonaparte was imprisoned, died and was originally buried. It was i steep 679-step climb to his cemetry, which left us gasping for breath, but the splendid view of the harbour made it worthwhile.

There was no jetty at Jamestown so we had to anchor Trisbna at sea and row in our rubber dinghy to fetch water and provisions. Huge waves broke on the shore, and getting ashore was quite an art—we had to jump off at the precise moment when our dinghy was on the crest of a wave.

We left Saint Helena on 9 December for Ascension Island. The weather had improved and the seven-day journey was pleasant.

As Ascension Island was a military base we had to anchor at sea, but the port authorities sent us water and provisions. We learnt that the U.S.A had carried out moon-landing trials on this island before sending men to the moon because the ground and soil conditions were similar to the surface of the moon.

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We left Ascension Island on 17 December for the last leg of our trans-Atlantic journey to Natal in Brazil. The weather and currents being favourable, we covered 2,300 km in ten days. Having little to occupy us as we were sailing smoothly, the maxim 'an idle mind is a devil's workshop' proved true. We had been sailing for eighty days, rubbing elbows continuously and had begun to get on each other's nerves. Small incidents would lead to angry words. Music played too loudly, being late for watch duty, badly cooked food or delayed meals, anything would cause tempers to flare. The skipper had to inter-vene to prevent fist fights. Human behaviour changes under stress, specially when people are cooped up in a small space. Army discipline did help!

With few distractions, food was the focal point of the day. When we started our journey, our knowledge of cooking was fairly elementary, and our staple diet was plain khichri, but soon we could produce the choicest dishes. Our diet varied greatly—it depended on sea con-ditions, the weather and* the tastes of the crew. We kept food stocks for up to sixty days. We did not have a refrig-erator, so fresh vegetables and bread lasted five to six days, sometimes even less.

For breakfast we had cereal, eggs, bread, cheese and juice. When the bread got fungus, we had to be satisfied with boiled eggs and juice. Lunch was generally noodles mixed with vegetables (tinned or fresh) and onions. For tea, we had biscuits or salted snacks. Dinner, our main meal, consisted of soup, rice, dal, potatoes, vegetables and

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fresh or tinned fruit. Fresh fish was a welcome change. Thanks to Major Bhattacharya who joined us later in the voyage, and Major A.K. Singh, the fish delicacies were nu-merous. We had fried fish, fish curry, baked fish, steamed fish, besides other fish preparations.

Tinned food was not liked much, especially meat, as the preservative smelt, and left a funny taste in the mouth.

Later in the journey, most of us developed a prefer-ence for vegetarian food. In fact three crew members became vegetarians during the journey. Our cooking range was gimballed, and kept almost horizontal when the boat rolled and pitched. Even so, boiling water and hot food often fell on the one doing mother watch duty.

We were received warmly at Natal, but what we appre-ciated most was the chance to have a hot bath with fresh water. The Brazilians are a festive people and seem to enjoy life. People dance on the streets and beaches. Young boys carry a football, and dribble wherever they find space. We decided to spend New Year's day at Natal, and never regretted it!

Brazil has a long coastline, so we halted at another port, Belem. The journey to Belem was not very comfort-able. We had to sail 130 km against the current, dodging the many tree logs floating down the river Para. Bumping into a log could have ruptured Trishna's fibre-glass hull.

We left Port Belem on 13 January 1986 for Port Paramaribo in Surinam, and had a comfortable journey. Many people of Indian origin have settled in Surinam, and as comparatively few Indians visited Surinam, the local

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community was delighted to see us. When we showed them slides and video films on India (we always carried these and showed them at every port) they were amazed. They were surprised to know that India manufactured aircraft, ships, arms, earth-moving plants, etc.

We also decided to touch the ports of Georgetown, Port of Spain, Bridgetown and Port Royal because of the large Indian population settled in Guyana, Trinidad, Bar-bados and Jamaica. It was good to taste Indian food and listen to Indian music again. Sailing was very pleasant in the Carribean Sea, except for the stretch from Barbados to Jamaica, when we had some rough weather. At Port of Spain we made our first crew change. Lieutenant N. Ahuja replaced Captain R. Bassi who returned to India because his family were anxious about him, and wanted him home.

As a cyclone was building up in the Gulf of Mexico, weather forecasters advised us to move on quickly and we sailed directly towards Cristobal in Panama on 21 Febru-ary, instead of going to Miami in the U.S.A as previously planned. With good winds we made it in excellent time, covering 1,055 km in four days. The crossing of the Panama Canal from Port Cristobal on the Atlantic Ocean to Port Balboa on the Pacific Ocean was an interesting experience. The difference of 26-m in height between the two ports are negotiated in three stages with the help of locks. At each lock 4,500,000 litres of fresh water from the adjoining lakes are pumped till the level becomes the same on both sides of the canal. The gates are then

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Trishna entering the Last Lock of the Panama Canal—one of the smallest yacht to cross the Panama Canal.

opened for the boats and ships crossing the canal. There are many Indian settlers in Panama, some of

them rich businessmen with a major say in the Panama-nian economy. We met a number of them.

With help from the Panamanian port authorities, we lifted Trishna out of the water for refitting and repaint-ing. Despite having sailed almost .half-way around the world, Trishna was in reaspnably good shape. She had some cracks on the keel and rudder, the anti-fouling paint had peeled off at a number of places and barnacles had fastened themselves below the water level. The engine for battery charging required servicing, and so did the electri-cal and water-supply systems. Sails had to be repaired and

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the mast taken off and checked thoroughly. We also dis-covered many insects and cockroaches in our boat. They had probably got in with the vegetables and other pur-chases made at ports, and multiplied at sea. We thus had to fumigate Trishna for a few days. While the boat was being dried and fumigated, we decided to take two weeks off from sailing, to rest and recuperate in the U.S.A.

Major Navin Ahuja cleaning 'Barnacles' ffom Trishna at Panama with a knite,

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SAIL FROM PANAMA TO TAHITI

We sailed from Port Balboa at 14.30 hours on 5 April 1986. It was a cloudy day and drizzling lightly. Thunderstorms were forecast. But the weather pundits were wrong again. The rain clouds blew over. Not having been at sea for a few weeks, some of us were seasick the first few days.

While on duty at night, I noticed that the water around the boat had a bluish phosphorescent glow which was particularly noticeable where the bow (front) of the yacht cut through the water. The darker the night, the brighter the glow. But, when I took out a mugful of water on to the boat from the sea the glow disappeared. I was told that these were micro-organisms called 'plankton' found in abundance in the Pacific Ocean. During daylight I could see them suspended just below the surface of the water. They provided food for the fish, even whales.

On 7 April we ran into the doldrums. By 16.00 hours there was no breeze. We were not able to catch any meteorological forecasts on our radio. We decided to hoist our largest sail, the genoa, but were only able to make a speed of about 4 km per hour.

It was my turn to be on mother watch on 9 April 1986. The sea being calm I decided we should have spe-cial food that day. I served cereal with milk, scrambled eggs, bacon, cheese, juice and tea for breakfast; chicken soup, sausages, salad, baked beans and bread for lunch; coffee and tea, namkin, nuts and biscuits for tea; and tomato soup, rice, rajma, sardines and fruit for dinner. If the sea was choppy, we usually ate only chocolates and biscuits with tea, coffee or juice.

On 10 April, I saw many flying fish. They would skim half a metre above the water surface for 25 to 30 m, before dropping back into the sea. Sometimes there would be one, sometimes ten,.sometimes even a hundred of them. They varied in length from 15 cm to 30 cm. The wings of the fish were much longer than the body—some-times up to 45 cm. They were delicious to eat. They tasted just like sardines and we could chew their bones. Sometimes when we picked up a flying fish it would come alive suddenly, slip out of our hands and jump back into the water, much to our sorrow.

The winds picked up on 10 April, and we made good progress towards the Galapagos Islands. At 08.00 hours on 14 April we crossed the equator and went into the South-ern Hemisphere. As was the custom in the Navy, we performed the equator-crossing ceremony. Major A.K. Singh was popularly elected Lord Varuna and Lieutenant Ahuja the Queen. We improvised crowns for them. The rest of the crew knelt before them in turn and confessed their sins, including those committed at the last port. Lord

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Varuna pronounced punishments, such as running around the deck three times, jumping into the sea and climbing back, and blackening one's face.

We reached San Cristobal in the Galapagos on 15 April 1986. The Commandant of the Ecuadorian Naval Base, helped us get accommodation, but could not give us any-drinking water. He challenged us to a basketball match but our sea legs could not move fast and we lost the match.

We left the following day for the island of Santa Cruz. The Galapagos volcanic islands have a rich and varied flora and fauna. We saw hundreds of sea lions playing on

Our crew members playing with seas-lions at Galapagos Islands in the Pacific Ocean.

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Marine iguana at Galapagos Island

the beaches. The males were quite ferocious. One male jumped at our boat, probably thinking we had come to steal a female sea-lion. We saw hundreds of colourful crabs and lobsters, and surprisingly small penguins, 30 to 60 cm in length. We were told that penguins from Antarctica had travelled in the cold 'Peru current' running along the western coast of South America, which ultimately hit the southern parts of the Galapagos islands. The smaller pen-guins stayed in this cold Peru current. Thus in the Galapagos, which aj-e almost on the equator, we did not feel the heat because of the cold current.

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A pair of Dolphins playing around the yacht in the Pacific waters.

There were multi-coloured fish, several species of birds, the most colourful being the male frigate bird, which inflates an orange air sac in front of its chest to attract the female during the mating season. Sea birds included blue and red footed boobies, seagulls, and swal-low tail gulls, herons, petrels, pelicans, and pink flamingoes. One of our most memorable sights was a group of thirty pink flamingoes in rows of six, chirping and dancing in perfect unison, bathed in the early morning rays of the sun. They looked like an army squad doing morning drill.

We also saw giant sting rays gliding over the water and landing on the beach, unconcerned by the crowds of people. The creatures I found most hideous were the land and sea iguanas. Iguanas are giant lizards a metre to a

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metre and a half long. Sea iguanas are the only existing water lizards in the world and are jet black. Darwin called them the 'ugliest creatures on earth'. One of the strangest sights we saw was at the house of a German who had lived on the islands since World War II. Every day at 16.00 hours, hundreds of sea iguanas came crawling from the sea to his house. They were everywhere—in his drawing-room, bedroom, verandah, and rooftop. He fed them with vegetables, milk, and plants. He had even given some of them names, which they responded to. He picked up a few, patted and talked to them. He warned us to be careful, because when frightened, iguanas spit out a poisonous fluid, which could make a person blind if it went into the eyes.

We also saw three huge whales 15 to 20 m in length, spouting water, through their blowholes high in the air. They were only 30 m from our boat.

One of the most beautiful places on these islands was the Bartholomew Bay and rock. The rock jutted upwards about 150 m from the ground, and we had a wonderful view from the top. At Bartholomew Bay, we learnt snorkelling. The under water world was wonderful-multi-coloured fish and plants, live coral, beautiful rocks, small penguins and crabs. I would recommend snorkelling to everyone. You do not need to go to the Galapagos for this: th*3 Andamans and Nicobar Islands, and Laksha-dweep Islands are just as pretty, and have wonderful snorkelling sites.

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We also climbed up to the crest of a recent volcanic eruption. The lava had set hard, and some of the edges were razor sharp. We could feel them through our can-vas shoes. One slip and we could have been badly cut. In the lava we saw life germinating in the form of algae and fungus, small green plants and insects of various types.

We left Santa Cruz on 23 April after an eight-days' stay at the Galapagos. For me this was the best halt of the cruise.

From the Galapagos, we sailed the second longest non-stop leg of our journey—5,550 km. It took us only twenty-two days, thanks to excellent winds and helpful currents. This was one of the fastest journeys of our entire trip.

Between Galapagos and French Polynesia, crew on watch during pleasant sail. Col. T.P.S. Chowdhury writing his personal diary.

4 7

On 26 April we crossed the 108° W longitude. We had sailed half-way around the world, and were now on our homeward leg. We celebrated with a glass of beer, jokes and a singing session. I was on mother watch duty and made a special dinner.

It had become very hot near the equator and we sweated profusely. On deck it was hot from 08.00 hrs in the morning to 17.00 hrs in the evening. Inside the cabin, it was hot, humid, and miserably stuffy. We were always looking for a bit of shade on deck—be it under the jib sail, near the mast, under the main sail or under the awning (a canvas cover over the helmsman). I had a painful bout of sunburn.

We looked forward to the rain. And when it rained, there was a scramble to bathe. We also collected rain water with the help of the sag formed by the main sail, for baths and to refill our water jerricans.

During the journey we came across hundreds of dol-phins, moving in pairs, or in fours, and in perfect uni-son—a wonderful sight. They accompanied our boat for hours. We again saw a lot of flying fish and had a few for breakfast. Surprisingly, we did not see many birds—only a few black stormy petrels, some black gulls, white footed and masked boobies.

Throughout the entire 5,550 km-journey we saw only two ships. We tried to call them on the VHF radio, but they did not respond.

We had a few showers and rejoiced at the thought of a bath. Occasionally, however, we were caught on the

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wrong foot. Once, as soon as it started to rain, I rushed out, wet myself and soaped my head and body thor-oughly. The sky was laden with clouds and I was sure that it would rain for some time. Suddenly, the rain stopped. I waited for five minutes, then ten, but there was no sign of rain. Sticky with soap and beginning to feel cold, I decided to use sea-water to wash myself. It was the wrong thing to do. The combination of dirt, soap and sea-water formed a thick, sticky, itchy layer on the body, which would not come off. As it hardened, the hair on my body turned into wiry oily wringlets, and even after rubbing vigorously with a towel, the mixture would not come off. I had ultimately to brush and comb the hair on my chest, arms and legs to get rid of the stuff. The moral of the story—when soaping yourself on board have plenty of fresh water handy, or use a special sea-water soap: do not use ordinary soap with sea-water.

But we were forced to use sea-water several times as it was very hot, we sweated profusely, and had a limited stock of clothes. I was the first to decide on a sea-water bath (without soap) and poured buckets of it on myself. I felt definitely better. Soon Shekhar, Navin and A.K. joined me. After that, we had a sea-water bath every sec-' ond or third day, if not every day. Sea-water left the body salty and rather sticky and uncomfortable, but it was better than being smelly and sweaty! Given the limitations of storage space, each of us had only five sets of clothes-two for wearing on board, two for wearing at ports and a polyester lounge suit to make us appear presentable on

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land. All of us had similar suits, blue in colour with a Corps of Engineers tie. The tradition among yachtsmen, at least in the United Kingdom where we were trained, is that at ports all crew members should be smartly dressed.

With only two sets of clothes on board, 'we had to wash them frequently. Underlinen was changed every second day and clothes every third or fourth day depend-ing on the weather. Clothes were washed on deck with sea-water. We used detergent or a special soap to get the dirt off. Soap had to be applied twice or thrice, but even then the clothes remained rather sticky. Naturally the first thing we did on reaching a port, was to have a bath with fresh water (we found it necessary to soap ourselves twice), and also wash all our clothes twice over.

On board we dried our clothes on a steel wire railing which went around the boat, and held them securely with clothes pegs. In strong winds and waves, however, or when changing 'tacks', our clothes sometimes disappeared. I lost a pair of socks, underlinen and shorts; the others had similar experience.

We had kept fairly fit till our journey to the Marquesas Islands. There were some upset stomachs, headaches, stomach aches, a cold or two, pulled muscles, loss of appetite, cuts and bruises, but nothing very major.

We reached the Bay of Taiohae, in Nuku Hiva, one of the Marquesas group of islands at 19.00 hours on 13 May 1986. We called the port authorities on the radio, but they did not respond. Finally, on the emergency channel we were able to contact a yacht, Cameo, which was

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berthed in the bay and with the help of her lights, homed in, and anchored that night in the bay, as there was no jetty to come alongside. The next morning, I went to the port and immigration authorities to complete the clear-ance formalities. They were aware of our arrival, but were expecting us around 25 May. We were told that we were the first Indians to have ever come to Nuku Hiva, or the Marquesas Islands. Everyone was curious about us and stared at us, especially at me, with my turban. . At the market place some youngsters wanted to feel my turban and know how it was tied.

The French Administrator was keen that we meet the lady mayor of the islands and have lunch with her. After a four-hour drive, visiting a vanilla plantation, and picking up some guavas, bananas, coconuts and oranges which were growing in the countryside, we arrived at the beau-tiful Bay of Hati Heu.

At the mayor's house we were met by a short, stout, middle-aged lady with a beaming smile. She was the Lady Lord Mayor's. We were garlanded and floral crowns were placed on our heads by her smiling daughter. After a while, we sat down for lunch—a sumptuous five-course meal of local dishes. We then went around the village, saw the beach and visited the local school, where I was once again the centre of attraction with my turban and beard. We were given fresh coconut water: a man climbed the tree in front of us and dropped the coconuts. We were also shown how to cut a coconut. Then K.S., A.K. and I were each presented with a piece of local cloth for our

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wives which had been hand-painted with local vegetable dyes by the Lady Lord Mayor's daughter.

When we were about to leave, our guide mentioned that we had forgotten to pay our 'bill'. I was taken aback. I thought he meant that we had to pay for the coconut water or the cloth; but I was informed that the Lady Lord Mayor entertained visitors at her house-cum-restaurant, and it was the lunch we had to pay for. The real shock came with the bill—14000 CFP (French Pacific Francs, or equivalent to Rs 1500)—twice our daily allowance! We paid, and beat a hasty retreat lest we be presented with another bill for the coconut water and the local cloth.

We bought fresh vegetables, picked up plenty of fruit from the countryside, filled water and diesel, and set sail for Tahiti at 17.30 hours on 17 May 1986. The first three days were pleasant. We had winds over 30 kph with only a slight swell. Then suddenly we ran into a calm—the worst so far. There was no breeze for two days, and Trishna lolled about inertly on the water. Only our solar panels did well, keeping the batteries of the boat fully charged. A small leak developed in the engine exhaust pipe and the cabin was filled with thick smoke.

On 26 and 27 May 1986, we ran into strong winds of 35 kph followed by a gale which lasted eighteen hours, with winds up to 55 kph. Waves 4.5 to 5 m high and pelting rain made the last leg of our journey to Tahiti very uncomfortable.

On 27 May we were escorted into Tahiti (Papeete) harbour by a ship of the French Navy. Trishna needed

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several repairs. Our engine exhaust was not functioning, two of the sails were torn, the awning supports had be-come loose and needed to be modified, winches had to be opened and greased; toilet pumps were not working well; Major A.K. Singh's artificial leg had broken and had to be welded. We completed all this in six days. We also met Rear-Admiral Thorieaut, who was the Joint Commander of the French Combined Forces in the Pacific, and also of conducting the testing of nuclear bombs on the unin-habited islands in the Pacific Ocean. We gave him our schedule, so that we were not caught in the middle of a nuclear test.

Seeing that their lone Sikh crewman Brig. T.P.S. Chowdhury was popular, Maj. Navin Ahuja also dressed as a Sikh at Tahiti (Papeette) to draw crowds.

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There is a mix of the local culture and French influ-ence in Papeete. We enjoyed watching the local dances, especially the 'Tamure' which we picked up quite easily.

We attracted attention here too, specially I with my turban. Many men and women boldly touched the tur-ban, which was sometimes rather annoying. What in-trigued them most was that I needed five metres of cloth just to cover my head, whereas their one-and-a-half metre, 'paro' covered their entire body. The Polynesian girls, who served us meals, asked me to show them how I tied my turban. They were amazed that it took only a few minutes.

So great was the curiosity aroused by my turban that Lieutenant Navin Ahuja decided to put on my spare turban and go out to the market so that he could be the centre of attraction.

We left Papeete on 3 June 1986.

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SAIL FROM TAHITI TO SYDNEY

We had hardly gone a few kilometres when the weather started deteriorating; soon it began raining with winds up to 45 kph. The sea was rough and we felt queasy. After a few hours, however, we found our sea legs.

As we were keen to see one of the most beautiful islands of the world, Bora Bora, we sailed fast and covered the distance of 260 km in a day and a half. We reached Bora Bora in the early morning on 5 June. It had a beau-tiful lagoon dotted with palms and huts and with crystal clear water of different shades of blue and green. We did a lot of swimming, snorkelling, wind surfing (which, incidentally, I learnt within an hour),- watched sharks being fed and thoroughly enjoyed ourselves.

We went around the island, were entertained to a local feast, 'Tamaraa', and saw the local dances. The people were very friendly, specially because the colour of our skins matched theirs. In fact, many of them would hold our hands, put them next to theirs, and laugh. We went to a discotheque too. On Friday most people on the is-land went dancing. They had never seen Indians before,

few*

The crew attending a Tahitian feast on the island of Moorea on 29 May 1986.

and when I asked a girl for a dance I could see the amaze-ment on her face! When we started dancing the floor almost came to a standstill. We conversed through sign language. Thereafter I danced with several others.

We got to know some of the customs in Tahiti and Bora Bora, one being that unmarried and divorced women wear a flower'Tiaire' on the left side, whereas married women wear it on the right. So, one had to be observant when approaching a girl. An unusual and delicious dish we had, was 'marinated fish'—filleted raw fish marinated in fresh lime for two hours, and served with coconut milk, pepper, salt and chillies. But, when we discovered that it was plain raw fish some of the crew found it dif-ficult to stomach.

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We picked up some words and sentences in French Polynesian. On Sunday morning, 8 June 1986,-many newly-made friends came to see us off. There is a saying in Bora Bora that nothing can make the locals bestir themselves on a Sunday morning. Except for a few staunch Christians who went to church in the morning, the majority attended evening mass. Yet they came loaded with gifts of fresh fruit—pineapples, bananas, oranges, kinos, custard apples, coconut and lime, to bid us goodbye!

No sooner did we leave the waters of Bora Bora, than we ran into bad weather. The boat pitched and rolled furiously. There were winds up to 45 kph and waves 4 to 6 m high. We felt sick and, to add to our misery, it poured with rain. The coconuts and fruit tied in a net on the deck, became loose and rolled off one by one. Our progress however was good. But four days later we ran into a calm which lasted two days. We also almost ran into two whales. Even when our boat came near them, they did not move and we had to steer clear of them. We were barely thirty metres away when we passed them and could make out clearly that they were about 15 m in length. To register their presence, they spouted water.

During this stretch I developed a sore throat, fever and a splitting headache. Major K.S. Rao offered to take over my watch duty but I did not accept. All of us had our share of work. Fortunately the fever subsided and my throat got better after a few days.

As we still had a lot of fruit, we made fruit our staple

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diet. Twelve to fifteen bananas, two to three pine-apples, five to six custard apples, six to eight oranges and two to three coconuts daily was each one's normal food intake.

We reached Rarotonga on Cook's Island on the after-noon of 13 June 1986.

Besides working on the boat, we also/went around the island, and saw the local dances. In the evening we at-tended a concert by a western music band from Western Samoa. A.K. and Navin insisted that I sing a few English songs. When I sang some Elvis Presley numbers, there was loud applause and cries for encores. An Indian, and a Sikh at that, singing English songs!

We had good Indian food at the Indian families we visited. We were also invited to a Sunday Church service in a village, which was followed by a lavish feast. All entertainment officially ended at midnight on Saturdays, so that everyone could attend church on Sunday morn-ing. As the guests of honour, we were introduced to the gathering by Justice Apshort in the presence of the Deputy Prime Minister, Teraipai Mhote.

As we were about to leave on 16 June, A.K.'s leg again broke at the joint. Our Indian friends helped us get it welded, even though it was a holiday. We finally left at 17.30 hours on 17 June.

The weather forecast predicted easterly winds up to 28 kph with rain and a rough sea but we had to move on. It poured continuously for the next three days, making everything on the boat soggy and chilly. However, we made good progress, covering 220 to 240 km per day. We

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had originally planned to head straight for Auckland in New Zealand from Rarotonga, but the Indians settled in Fiji asked us to come there. This meant a diversion of 2,800 km and an extra journey of thirty to forty-five days. We were ahead of schedule, so time was not a problem. What was worrying was that we would run into the coldest winter months of the Southern Hemisphere on our way to Auckland and Sydney. We decided to put it to the vote: three wanted to go and three did riot. Ulti-mately I persuaded the crew to go to Fiji.

The swells in the Pacific Ocean were getting more violent and none of us felt well. I had a permanent head-ache and felt queasy and for comfort had to lie down in the cabin.

We saw a lot of dolphins on this leg of the journey; some would float lazily, alongside our boat. We were lucky to also see many whales, some of which came dan-gerously close. I remember that on 20 June, when Navin and I were on duty, there were two whales 9 to 12 m long, going round and round our yacht for almost half an hour, frightening us out of our wits. Sometimes, one dived underneath the boat, while the other came to within five metres of Trishna. Maybe whales mistake small yachts (like ours) for other whales, and'come close to make friends and rub their bodies against the supposed whale. That was the last thing we wanted! A sudden turn or swish of the tail could crack our fibre-glass boat and make it sink immediately. We asked the crew to come on deck with their life-jackets and kept the emergency

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rubber life-raft ready. We shouted, dropped anti-shark re-pellant in the water, started our engine and did our best to scare away the whales. But to no avail. To add to our problems the engine stalled. It took an hour's effort be-fore it came to life again and we were able to move away from tne whales.

On 23 June A.K. and Bharti sighted two whales, and Navin and I saw another pair a few hours later. Yachtsmen at Tahiti told us that they ran into a whale at night which lifted their boat out of the water, tossed them about, and damaged their rudder. With great difficulty they limped on to Tahiti. On 25 June 1986, we crossed the International Date Line and gained a day, skipping 25 June.

On 30 June winds and sea were equally agitated, the sky was overcast and it poured. This bad spell continued for seven days. I regretted the decision to come to Fiji. Ultimately, we reached Suva in the evening on 2 July. Suva is surrounded by reefs, and its harbour has a narrow entrance. We asked for a pilot vessel to show us the way and anchored at the jetty for the night.

We were given a warm reception at Walu Bay. The police band was at the jetty to welcome us with huge ban-ners with 'TRISHNA-Welcome to FIJI' inscribed on them.

Suva is a modern city with high-rise buildings and large departmental stores with a wide range of Indian products. There are many Indian hotels and restaurants, and we made the most of them, sampling every Indian dish. We also went to see the large sugar-cane farms

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owned by Indians. The Fiji'Indians were generally well-to-do and held a major share of the business.

We met the Governor-General of Fiji, Mr Ganilau. He seldom received visitors but made an exception in our case, as he was impressed by the idea of a journey from India in a yacht. We were shown around by Brigadier Sitiveni Rabuka, a senior officer in the armed forces, who had been trained in India at the Defence Services Staff College, Wellington. He was extremely friendly and we were surprised to read a few years later that he had staged a coup, taken over the country, and passed anti-Indian laws.

Trishna being checked at low tide, after the 'bashing' she received enroute to Fiji.

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A large Indian crowd came to see us off on 8 July 1986 and loaded us with packets of Indian food.

We ran into strong winds of 35 to 45 kph on 9 July, but made good progress. Two large flying fish 15 to 20 cm long hit me at night, startling me. Winds built up to 65 kph and waves broke on the boat, deluging it with water. We had to pump out sea-water continuously. It wasn't comfortable sailing in those conditions. Most of us hardly ate, but we forced ourselves to consume liquids lest we got dehydrated. It was turning cold and the winds were icy. Despite wearing warm socks, waterproof boots, trousers, warm vest, poloneck pullover, woollen scarf and a wet suit trouser and jacket we were chilled to the bone. Wet suits had been specially designed with a thermal lining to keep us warm and dry but the surging waves splashed over us and drenched us to our vests.

Major A.K. Singh found the strain on his leg very great. Buffeted on all sides by strong waves, we were hurled around inside the cabin. Once, when I was in the toilet, a huge wave hit us; I was thrown out of the toilet door (which broke) and on to the cupboard opposite, which also broke with my weight.

On 16 July the main sail ripped apart. Now both our main sails were torn. We hoisted the storm tri-sail and moved forward. We decided to capture these violent moments on the video and still cameras, and have some memorable shots of them.

As our progress was slow with the storm sail, Maior Rao and I decided to stitch the main sail with needle and thread,

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During a storm in the Tasman Sea.

though such repairs are normally done by a special machine. It took us six hours and a great deal of force to push the needle through the sail cloth, and our fingers bled. With the repaired sail, we made a speed of 7 to 9 kph, but the boat was still tilting at an angle of 60 degrees with the starboard gun-wale and railing constantly under water. The temperature at night was 1°C to 2°C, but howling, chill winds made it colder. Rain added to our discomfiture. I again regretted the decision to go to Fiji. We would have been in Australia by now.

On 21 July the main sail again ripped open, and we changed to a smaller sail. At night, during my watch duty, we saw a ship approaching. We tried calling it on the radio,

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but there was no reply. The ship kept heading straight at us, and it seemed that we were going to collide. We called it re-peatedly on the-radio but there was no response. Finally, when the ship was 500 metres away, we changed direction to avoid a collision, and missed the bow of the ship narrowly.

As we were sailing against the wind and current, our progress was slow and we were late in reaching Auckland. When we arrived on 22 July, most of the crowd who had been waiting to receive us had dispersed, but Major A. Bhattacharya was there. 'Bhatta' was to replace Navin Ahuja at Auckland.

We had to do a lot of work on the boat. We also saw

Crew of Trishna leaving the Port of Auckland, New Zealand.

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the launching of KZ 7, a marvellous New Zealand yacht, which was to compete in the 1987 America Cup Race in Australia. Naomi James, the first woman to have sailed alone around the world in a yacht came from Britain to launch KZ 7., The world's top yachtsmen were invited to the function, and a special song composed about KZ 7 was sung, as she was taken out in procession through the streets.

Auckland is called the city of sails because almost every second family owns a yacht, and one can see yacht masts everywhere. Sailing in Auckland had already stopped because of winter; sailors did not make long voyages at this time of year when the weather was bad, and they marvelled at our determination to cross the Tasman Sea to Sydney.

We left Auckland on 3 August 1986 and were seen off by the Indian High Commissioner, New Zealand Navy, members of the Indian community and other friends. The weather forecast was not favourable and it soon started to drizzle but we were busy asking Major Bhattacharya about our families and friends. There were also presents from home, some eats and pickles and many letters and photographs.

We were in the belt of the 'roaring forties' (30° to 40° latitude in the Southern Hemisphere), which has strong winds throughout the year. Rough weather greeted us on 4 August, with winds building up to 70 kph and waves 9 m high. Anything in the cabin that was not fastened was thrown about, including us. Major Bhattacharya was very

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seasick. In spite of anti-seasickness tablets, he threw up continuously. He was given mother watch duty so that he could rest, but while making dinner, he threw up and the boat stank. Since we suspected that some vomit had fallen into the food, most of the crew refused to eat.

As we rounded the northern tip of New Zealand to enter the Tasman Sea, waves not only hit us from the beam but also from the direction of the wind, making Trishna rock violently. Water flooded the yacht and to add to our woes it was bitterly cold. We were soaked to the skin; trousers, shirts, pullovers, scarfs and woollen caps were drenched. After our watch we wriggled out of our clothes and hung them inside to dry. But, four hours wasn't enough for them to dry and when we went back on duty, we had to wear damp clothes. We were certain we would catch pneumonia; somehow we survived.

On 6 August both the New Zealand and Australian weather forecasts predicted that we were heading for trouble. On 8 August we were again hit by a gale. Biting winds and a violently restless sea greeted us. We reefed (rolled up) our main sail to reduce the area of the sail, and consequently the boat's speed. Bhattacharya again threw up and the rest of us were also seasick.

On 9 August we were in the thick of the storm. We heard on the radio that two ships had run aground and hit the reefs near the Great Barrier Reef; near Sydney three yachts had capsized and rescue was not immediately possible, as helicopters could not fly in such weather. We feared it was our turn next. Trishna was heeling more

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than 70 degrees, and it was difficult to hold her on course. We sighted a ship. Immediately we fired flares and sent SOS messages on the VHF radio. But there was no re-sponse. We were exhausted. Our bodies ached and we felt very unwell. We decided to change duties every hour instead of every four hours. I again regretted that we had gone to Fiji. Oh, why had I volunteered for this cruise? I could have been sitting comfortably at home with my family. I prayed to God to take us out of this, storm. I prepared myself for a sea-burial! But our military disci-pline was such that no one panicked, no one shouted, no one yelled.

On 9 August, for the first time during the cruise we did the 'hove-to' drill and stopped sailing ('Hove-to' is to turn the steering completely to one side and tie it up; and cross the main sail and jib sail in different directions, so that the yacht does not move forward, but just bounces up and down with the waves, and drifts). One officer remained on watch duty at the wheel to look out for ships, boats, whales, etc, and the rest rested, utterly spent. In these conditions, we celebrated A.K. Singh's birthday on 11 August. I made an appetizing dish of biscuits and chocolate topped with cherries, lit a matchstick, sang 'Happy Birthday to You', and took some photographs. This cheered us up.

On 13 August the winds were less fierce and the sea calmer. For the first time since the storm broke, we had hot food. I was on mother watch and made potato chips for tea; pullao, moong ki dal, peas with mushroom

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vegetable for dinner, and served cherries and chocolate cream as dessert. But Sydney was still 740 km away.

The weather improved on the morning of 15 August, a good Independence Day omen. That evening there was a beautiful sunset. But alas, the next morning we heard a thunderstorm and gale warning on Sydney radio; winds blew more and more fiercely, huge swells started in the sea and the sky became heavily overcast. Morale plum-meted again.

Just as we were despairing of ever seeing land we sighted the famous Sydney Bridge and Opera House on 17 August. We shouted with joy! Later we admitted that during the storm we had all said our last prayers. We were very impatient to get off the yacht, have a bath, wash our clothes and sleep on firm land but it took two hours for the customs and immigration authorities to clear us.

Trishna had received such a bashing that she needed to be taken out of water, her hull and other parts in-spected, damage repaired and sails stitched. The Australian Navy helped us greatly. Major S.N. Mathur had come from India to join Trishna on her last leg. I was return-ing to New Delhi to get foreign exchange and brief the Prime Minister, Rajiv Gandhi, who was to come to Dar-win and meet the crew.

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SAIL FROM SYDNEY TO BOMBAY

We set sail from Sydney on 27 August. It seemed that the low pressure in the area had not died down because we ran into strong winds on the second day and further ahead into another storm which lasted over twenty hours with strong winds and towering waves. By now we were fairly seasoned and took storms in our stride, except for Major Mathur, who was seasick, and refused to eat anything but fruit.

Sailing in the area was quite dangerous because of the number of reefs, and moving sand-bars. The beautiful Great Barrier Reef was treacherous for yachts-grounding could mean extensive damage. Navigating •Trishna was difficult. We continuously took depth readings, kept ascer-taining our position and read the navigational charts very carefully. Yet, short of Brisbane, as we were turning into the harbour, we ran into a moving sand-bar which was not marked on the map, and were stranded on it. This was the first time during the cruise that we were grounded.

We jumped into the water, and pushed Trishna, but without success. We had to stay on the yacht, wait for the next high tide and then try again. Our entry into Brisbane Port was delayed. Some officials and press photographers came in a motor-boat to see what was holding us up. The next day, much to our embarrassment, photographs of our grounded boat were splashed on the front pages.

At Brisbane we again had to haul Trishna out of the water to inspect the hull and keel for damage during the grounding. Luckily the boat had suffered no harm.

Trishna sailed for Cairns on 19 September 1986. Be-cause of the proximity of the Great Barrier Reef we had to be continuously alert.

We reached Cairns on 17 September and were able to see the Great Barrier Reef in more detail. From an under-water glass enclosure we looked at multi-coloured fish, big and small, live coral, colourful plants, sharks and the marvels of the underwater world.

We left Cairns on 22 September en route to the tip of Australia at Thursday Island. We were warned of the dangerous Torres Strait crossing, which was only 1 to 2 km wide at places. The current was very strong, and it was tough negotiating that stretch. The moment we crossed the Torres Strait, we were able to communicate on radio with India.

While sailing from Thursday Island to Port Darwin, Major Bhattacharya caught a 10-kg tuna fish, his first catch. We had caught a fish after a very long time since fish would not bite in the cold waters of the southern

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Pacific. Now that we were in warm waters, fishing be-came our favourite pastime. In good weather we threw a fishing line with a spoon and bait from the stern of the boat. The crew on watch duty kept tugging at the line to see if any fish had been caught. We usually pulled up the line at night and put it back the next morning. If we were not fast enough in pulling in the line, when the fish bit the hook, the fish-line would sometimes snap and the fish would swim away.

Trishna berthed at Port Darwin from 6 October to 13 October 1986 waiting for the Prime Minister, Rajiv Gandhi, but much to our disappointment, due to security reasons, the Australian Government advised him against coming.

On 18 October we reached Kupang in Timor (Indo-nesia) after a 920 km sail. The weather had improved and sailing was fun. From Kupang, we proceeded to Waingapu in Sumba with good winds, and then on to Bali. We felt very much at home in Bali with its beautiful Hindu temples, and moreover, many people spoke Hindi. We celebrated Diwali with the Balinese and were seized with homesickness. This was our third Diwali away from India. We left Bali on 2 November and reached Jakarta on 9 November, covering 1,450 km. It was fairly good going, although it was overcast and we had intermittent rain. One day there was no wind, and we drifted quite a distance.

On 14 November we set sail from Jakarta for Singapore. On the way we encountered heavy rains

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accompanied by thunderstorms. The families of some of the crew had. come to Singapore and they were really thrilled to see them.

Leaving Singapore on 27 November, we headed for Penang. We were very vigilant when going through the narrow Malacca Straits as we had been warned about pirates attacking ships and boats but the sail was unevent-ful. We had two days of calm, and reached a day later than scheduled.

We left for Great Nicobar on 5 December and reached Campbell Bay on 8 December. It was wonderful to be on Indian territory! We were setting foot on Indian soil af-

• ter fourteen and a half months. All the crew members in India came to Campbell Bay to receive Trishna. We were very happy to see the large crowd at the jetty.

Aj^aerial view of the jetty at Campbell Bay, Nicobar.

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There were giant-sized mosquitoes at Nicobar, and after a few days we learnt that they were malarial. Before we could get mosquito nets we had been badly bitten. Two of us got cerebral malaria later in the journey.

After unloading non-essential stores like extra maps, books, and equipment which was not working, we left Campbell Bay on 15 December escorted by the naval and coast guard ships.

The voyage from Nicobar to Colombo went very fast, one of the fastest of the journey. We had very favourable winds and currents, and averaged 300 km a day. Near Sri Lanka, we were visited by three playful whales spouting water. Our fear of whales had vanished and we came to within fifteen metres to photograph them. The largest fish of the entire journey was caught here — a 20-kg tuna fish. We had a tough time pulling it on board and cleaning it.f For the next two days, it was fish curry, fried fish, baked fish, fish pakoras and steamed fish for breakfast, lunch, tea and dinner. Major Bhattacharya was all smiles. We also saw many dolphins, and a number of sharks. Communication with India was very clear, and every two hours we were in touch with Bombay and Delhi on radio.

Several times during the sea journey the water pump stopped working, and crockery and cutlery had to be washed on deck with a bucket of sea-water. Filling a bucket while the boat was moving, required a special technique. One had to swing the bucket with the same speed and in the same direction as the boat, and only

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immerse the bucket 15 cm deep. Three or four times I was almost dragged into the sea with the bucket and only the railing saved me. I could not let the bucket go because it was a precious commodity. One day when Mathur was on mother watch he washed the plates and left the cut-lery in the bucket to rinse. Sometime later, forgetting that there was cutlery there, he decided to fill the bucket. With the bucket went our cutlery, never to be seen again. The loss was discovered when we looked for spoons and forks for dinner. Fortunately, we had a few spare ones, and managed with them till we reached the next port. The same thing happened when Navin Ahuja was on mother watch in the Pacific Ocean. That time we did not even have a fork or spoon left.

We arrived at Colombo on 21 December. We had an audience with the President Shri J.R. Jayewardene, who applauded our adventurous spirit. After working on the boat and getting her into proper shape, we left Colombo on 29 December for the last leg of our journey home— 2,200 km-to complete our cruise around the world.

Trishna was moving very fast, perhaps she was as eager to get to Bombay as we were! We caught a lot of fish on the way. Somewhere near Mangalore, Captain Bharti, who had earlier developed fever, became very sick. His fever rose to 40°C, and in spite of medicines it would not come down. He was taken off watch duty. We con-sulted naval doctors in Bombay on the radio, but even after following their instructions, the fever persisted. Finally, we had to request the Indian Navy to evacuate

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Trishna being received by a committee boat by the Bombay sailors on return from around the world.

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Bharti to a hospital. The Navy diverted a naval ship to pick him up and take him to Bombay. In Bombay it was discovered that he had cerebral malaria—picked up at Nicobar! I also fell ill with 40°C fever, which too was diagnosed as cerebral malaria.

We received a message that the Prime Minister would be coming to the Gateway of India to receive us and 10 January 1987 was fixed as the date of our arrival. We arrived a day earlier and had to wait at Mandwa Island off Bombay for the official reception. Senior officers, our families, and all the crew members met us there. On 10 January 1987 all the ten members got into Trishna and sailed to the Gateway of India.

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RETURN TO BOMBAY

The first Indian sailing expedition around the world en-tered Bombay harbour after a journey of 470 days, at 16.00 hours on 10 January 1987 completing a historic voyage of 54,000 km. The crowd cheered, flares were fired, gun shots rent the air, sirens hooted a welcome as we, the ten mem-bers of Trishna, stepped on to the steps of the Gateway of India. Many of us had been away from our families for fifteen and a half months. To be greeted by placards with 'Welcome home! Welcome Papa', 'We missed you', by our children brought tears to our eyes. But, it was not only our families who celebrated our return; the entire Gate-way of India was thronged with friends and well-wishers.

A First Day Cover and a special commemorative stau p on Trishna were released on 10 January 1987. We then took Trishna to the Naval Dockyard, where she was hauled ashore, and loaded on to two railway wagons to be transported to New Delhi to participate in the Repub-lic Day Parade.

Trishna reached Delhi in six days, but our problems were not yet over. A crane with a long boom was needed

Trishna, tableaux at the Republic Day Parade 1987.

to unload her. Moving the yacht through the crowded Delhi roads meant cutting the obstructing tree branches and raising overhead telephone and electricity wires. Working the entire night, we just managed to get the tableaux ready to take part in the dress rehearsal on 23 January. The Trishna tableaux was one of the largest ever made for the Republic Day Parade.

It was the first time that any of us had participated in the Republic Day Parade. We were part of the Army contingent and were loudly cheered as we went down Rajpath on 26 January.

Many of the spectators thought the boat on the tableaux was a model of Trishna, and were very surprised

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to learn from the commentator that it was the 'actual Trishna' which had sailed around the world.

We are often asked how the expedition changed us. Contact with different people and varied ways of life has broadened our minds. Adapting to constant changes of weather has produced resilience and given us a more philosophical outlook: after the storm, there is bound to be sunshine and calm—you have only to stick it out. However fair the weather, you know that bad weather must sooner or later be faced. Most important of all, we have learnt to be tolerant—with a six-member crew life would have been intolerable otherwise.

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