The Devil's Teeth: A True Story of Obsession and Survival Among America's Great White Sharks by Casey Susan

Author:Casey, Susan [Casey, Susan]
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub
Publisher: Henry Holt and Co.
Published: 2006-05-29T21:00:00+00:00

AN HOUR LATER, PETER, KEVIN, AND I BOARDED JUST IMAGINE, TYING the whaler alongside. I realized immediately that it was even harder to climb between pitching boats of wildly varying sizes when they were tied together. Fingers mashed between the railings would fare about as well as a caterpillar clapped between two blocks of cement. Poor timing on the swells could easily result in hang time from Just Imagine’s railing or, worse, falling between the boats as they smacked against each other.

The sailboat was roomy but hard-used, with fore and aft bunks, a pocket kitchen, a semicircular dining banquette, and, surprisingly, a bathroom with a full-size shower. Overall, it looked nothing like the pictures of yachts you see in travel magazines, the ones where assorted Italian magnates and an accompanying herd of fashion models are lounging around on deck drinking Cristal and wearing Pucci sarongs. Just Imagine was to glamour yachts what cargo planes were to Lear jets, what Clydesdales were to Arabians. Its decor listed heavily toward seventies-era rec room—acres of shellacked knotty pine, dusty bottles of no-name brandy, a stained glass porthole, and, in the center of the floor, a groovy bas-relief carving of a woman wearing nothing but long hair.

Unfortunately, Tom explained, on the trip down from Seattle they had encountered some bad weather and they had jibed and, well, part of the starboard side had been ripped off. We looked: yellow twine and duct tape crisscrossed an area once occupied by a railing. “Best not to walk on that side,” he said. Also, Tom mentioned offhandedly, the refrigerator had gone down, and the plumbing did not quite seem to be working either. I stared at him. “What do you mean the plumbing doesn’t work?” I felt panic. “Well, just now I tried to flush the toilet, but there was this backwash…” He opened a cabinet and pumped a long lever hopefully. “See, there’s no vacuum—hey! What do you know! It’s working!” Something gurgled ominously in the head, followed by a vicious blurping noise. “So there is plumbing?” I confirmed. “I guess there is! That’s cool!” he said, with surprise in his voice. I glanced at Peter and Kevin. I supposed I could drink warm beer and I’d have to donate most of my groceries to the island crew, but plumbing seemed non-negotiable.

I stood off to the side while everyone else attempted to create a mooring setup that would stay secured for the duration. The process was anything but simple: Should the bow face north or south? How far should the sailboat be from the buoy in the middle of the bay? What about the anchor? How many ropes? It went on. Peter and Kevin climbed into the whaler, untied it, and idled beside us so they could ferry the ropes to the buoy, while Tom and Bob argued about where Just Imagine should lie. The spot they chose was quite far offshore, straddling the mouth of the bay. It was obvious that whatever shelter the cove

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.