It looked like the closest thing to heaven on the other side of the planet. Goway.com ("We Know the South Pacific') offered travel packages to remote locations in the Cook Islands via Island Escapes. After seventeen years of marriage, Linda and I were ready to get away from the routine and celebrate marital bliss--in style. We bought a travel package, booked a flight, and headed out over the 2003/04 Christmas break for the time of our lives.
We were not disappointed. Fresh tropical breezes blew away every thought of a nasty Ohio winter from our minds. Linda's high school math classes and my little flock of sheep easily gave way to snorkeling, surfing, and sunbathing. After eight days of fun in the sun, I decided to join a charter for some deep sea fishing. Linda opted to stay at the hotel and write the kids.
Five of us, two other tourists, the Captain and first mate, left Aitutaki at the break of dawn and headed west toward Palmerston. The goal was to get about 30 miles out and begin trolling. As the sun rose over our backs, I got to know my fishing buddies--both Americans. David, a self-taught intellectual, writer, and philosopher was waxing eloquent about Americanism and Puritanism as soon as he learned we were from his native country (he was later to write a blogpost with over 8700 words on this very topic). Jason, a resident of the Palmetto State, was a techno-wonder geek who obviously loved every gadget under the sun. While he chatted about the new electronic shopping cart he helped design, he couldn't take his eyes off the images on the captain's Doppler fish finder. Both of them were at the islands alone--David to do some heavy thinking, Jason to catch his breath before his wife had their next baby--more on that later.
At some point our conversation was interrupted by a stream of colorful cursing from the cabin. It wasn't in English, but there was no mistaking the meaning behind the tone and staccato-like syllables as they rattled and reverberated on deck. When the sound of the words died off over the waves, the sound of the engine died too. The three of us looked at each other as the captain burst out of the cabin and threw open the hatch over the engine compartment. Black smoke billowed out and an acrid stench burned our noses. The captain swore again and called for the first mate. They conferred for several minutes while the boat gently bobbed up and down in the ocean, and then the captain came over to us.
"You will wait on the boat. We are taking the dinghy back to Aitutaki to get help," he commanded.
"You can't just leave us here," Jason cried out.
"It's safer on the boat," was the captain's cool reply. The discussion was obviously over. They would be back in five to six hours. We dropped a sea anchor to wait.
As the dinghy faded on the horizon we took stock of our situation. Our friends were back at home freezing their tails off on the long commute to work. We were on a boat in the middle of the South Pacific with nothing to do for the rest of the day but fish. So fish we did.
During the middle of the afternoon, David noticed the gentle waves beginning to break harder. When he called our attention to this change, we all became aware of a difference in the color of the ocean, the sound of the waves crashing, and now that we thought ot it, the pattern of the clouds in the sky. We looked desperately toward the east, hoping for signs of another boat, but in vain. Messages on the radio garnered no response. Within a half hour, the water was crashing over the sides, rain was pelting down, and we were huddled in the cabin. That's when we discovered we were all Christians. There was a lot of praying as the boat was driven before the wind.
My ten year old son made a friendly wager with me on Saturday evening. He was willing to wager a month's worth of taking out the trash that the Steelers would beat the Seahawks...what was I willing to put up? How about a month long pass of unlimited PS2 games at BlockBuster (valued at $22 mind you)? Now I really didn't care at all about the outcome of the game, just wanting it to be a worthwhile contest that didn't end in the first quarter. "Sure, you're on."
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