Four Homeless Millionaires by Rik Leaf

Author:Rik Leaf
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Promontory Press
Published: 2016-01-15T00:00:00+00:00

Viva Australia pays homage to some of the Aussie wildlife that kept scaring and startling us, as we journey from Melbourne to the Outback and end our trip on a sailboat.

Swarthy Swashbucklers and Nautical Hazing Rituals

Today I was a millionaire. Well, at least I lived the way I’d live if I were a millionaire.

It all began with a magnificent invitation to join Zara’s uncle, Peter, aboard his sailboat for a couple of days. That was how we found ourselves heading out of Pittman Bay under the beautiful, bright Sydney sun attempting to tackle the challenging world of sailing aboard “Sail La Vie”, Peter’s thirty-seven-foot Sea Odyssey.

Initially, the experience reminded me of my early days as a theatre stagehand trying to remember which was stage right and stage left, front, and back of house. We were not even out of the harbour before we were scrambling about the deck like a herd of landlubbers, stumbling over winches and cleats, and getting tangled up in ropes and rigging.

Peter tried valiantly to teach us some simple nautical terminology like port, starboard, coming about, and tacking. But honestly, my affirmative head-bobbing and grunts of understanding were really just reflexive “learned behaviour” I’d acquired growing up on a farm surrounded by burly, bearded men who wore tool belts and carried wrenches in their pockets. As usual, I had very little idea of what was going on around me.

Amid the chaos, I amused myself by muttering piratey phrases to Zion in a swarthy brogue every time we passed each other. “Why is the rum gone?” I’d say or “Do we have an accord?”

This was all the Pirates of the Caribbean dialogue I had time to channel between stubbing my toes and repeatedly drilling my head into the mast.

We headed out to Broken Bay where the Pittman and Cowan Rivers meet the Pacific Ocean.

“Hey, Zi and Riel,” I yelled over the sound of flapping sails and swelling waves slapping noisily against the hull, “you might want to wave … Just over there on the other side of the world is Canada.”

We headed down the Cowan River as a northerly came steaming toward us with her dark eyes and stormy skies intimating harsh intentions. Oblivious to the impending deluge, I stood slack-mouthed and gaping like a swashbuckling idiot savant until Peter nudged me to take the wheel. No sooner had he disappeared into the cabin than the heavens opened up and nature started screaming like a banshee. Wind and water stung my skin and blinded my eyes as I pointed the prow of the boat toward nothing, deciding that under my command I would prefer “Sail La Vie” to run into nothing rather than something.

Just when I was starting to suspect that Peter was engaging in some bizarre nautical hazing ritual, he was back on deck in his rain gear and more than happy to take the wheel from my incapable hands as he guided us expertly into Refuge Bay.

We arrived at low tide and moored as near to the little beach as we could, to make going ashore as convenient as possible.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.