Frontier - 57. FR Chapter 57

However, today in the last lesson we had to form into groups of three for a class activity, and reluctantly he drifted over towards me since I was the only other student the same age. The third student for this activity was a middle-aged lady of Indian nationality, and she had a strong accent, which was a little hard to understand, but I managed to get her name, which was Miriam. The geek guy said his name was Mathew, in a very soft voice, and once introductions were done, we listened to the lecturer, about what the activity was about.

I tried to get Mathew to participate in the activity as much as possible, but it was hard work getting him to join in, while Miriam was very interested. I soon got used to her accent and was able to understand her better. Once the activity was over, Mathew drifted away from us, and back into the corner, where he usually sat on his own, while Miriam decided to sit next to me which I didn’t mind at all.

When the end of the school day arrived, I was given some more catch up work from the lecturer, which I accepted with a smile, and packed it into my backpack. When I had done this I noticed that Mathew had slipped out quickly, and Miriam was looking at me in a concerned way. “You look like you be spending all weekend doing school work,” she said to me.

“It is Ok. I am good at studies, so I will get it all done. I want to go to University, so I am hoping I can catch up with all the school work I have missed while I have been away,” I said to her with a smile.

“I have three children, all grown up now. My husband and I are very proud of them. All are in university - one to be a doctor, another to be a marine scientist, and the youngest one, she wants to be a teacher,” Miriam said to me.

“Marine Science is what I want to do. I spend a lot of time snorkelling around reefs, and they have some magnificent marine life in them,” I replied to Miriam.

“Well, don’t study too hard. See you on Monday,” Miriam said as she left the classroom. I followed her out, but went to the general carpark where my car was located.

As expected I spent the whole weekend at my dining table with my text books, note pads and laptop spread over it. I stopped every two hours for a fifteen-minute break, and every six hours I had a 45-minute break, which I spent going for a walk along the foreshore. I managed to cram as much information as I could into my overloaded brain. I made sure that I went to bed early, so as to not get too tired from lack of sleep. When my alarm went off at 7am on Monday morning, I felt fine and happily prepared for a full week of school.

When I sat down for my first class of the day, I had this feeling that one of my classmates behind me was staring at me, yet every time I turned to look, they were either talking to someone, or busy reading something. When it came to lunch time, I sat outside of the cafeteria, on the grass lawn, and enjoyed the unusually fine day. I was caught by surprise when Mathew sat down beside me.

“I know who you really are. You’re the guy who skippers a yacht, and you were caught up in some drug cartel thing,” Mathew said to me.

I looked around to see that there was no one in hearing range, before I replied. “Yes, I am Anton Hamilton, owner and skipper of the trimaran yacht – Last Frontier. The drug cartel are chasing after me because of something my step father had come across by mistake,” I responded.

“Oh, I see. Does that mean we are in danger too?” Mathew asked me cautiously, and I just smiled before taking out the newspaper that I had purchased on the way to college, and showed it to him.

“Drug cartel virtually demolished, after multiple police raids in five countries” the main headlines read, and Mathew continued to read out loud the rest of the story. “Thanks to information discovered by a truck driver in New Zealand, police agencies in Bolivia, the USA, Australia, New Zealand and the UK, raided homes and businesses of business associates of the cartel, and confiscated millions of dollars worth of drugs that were destined for streets around the world. It is believed that an earlier story, of the owners of an Australian Yacht Charter company, being involved in some way, have proven to be false, and this newspaper publicly apologises to that company for any harm that has been caused,” Mathew read.

“So, I am pleased to say, that my crew and I are no longer being hunted down by the cartel, which I am very pleased about, even after my stepfather and my mother have been killed, my yacht badly damaged twice, and my grandfather seriously injured,” I replied.

“Didn’t you get caught up in a bad storm and were marooned on an island for some time?” Mathew asked me.

“Yes, we were marooned, but we were very lucky that we beached on a remote island, and the damage caused was not catastrophic.

“We had plenty of food, a hydroponic garden, a solar and wind turbine power supply, and a desalination unit that gave us plenty of fresh water, so it wasn’t that bad really. We just had to spend a few weeks there, to try and solve the problem of buoyancy from the damaged bulkheads, and also to get the yacht back into the water, as the storms high seas and tide had us beached twenty metres away from the water,” I explained to Mathew, who seemed entranced about my true story. Suddenly I was aware that I had a small group that had gathered including Miriam.

“Wow, that is amazing. How many of you were there on the yacht, when you became marooned?” Miriam asked me.

“Just four of us - my two younger brothers, aged 8 and 6, as I was their temporary guardian at the time, my good friend and 1^st mate Simon and me” I replied.

“So how did you get the yacht back into the water?” another class mate asked me.

“That took a while for us to work out. The island that we were marooned on, was a former USA - WW2 airbase, so it had a few buildings, a disused runway, and a fair amount of scrap metal and wood.

“We managed to find some large heavy-duty pipe and some smaller heavy-duty steel rods, plus a few wooden blocks, and we did what the Egyptians did, when they build their pyramids, using counterbalance,” I began to explain.

“How did you do that?” Mathew asked, who still didn’t quite understand what I meant, so I pulled out a note pad and pen from my backpack, to draw what I meant, explaining as I went.

“We were very lucky to have a few items already on the yacht, which we could use to assist us. We had a number of 200 litre barrels, and 25 litre containers, which we filled with sea water, which is heavier than fresh water.

“Using the blocks of wood, we placed them near the back of the yacht on each side, and we dug away the sand under each of the pontoon hulls, then using the long steel rods, we wrapped them in our jackets, to prevent damage and slipping. We placed them under the hull and resting on the block of wood. Using ropes, we attached the drums and containers on the top end of the steel rod, and with the extra weight of both Simon and I and my two brothers, we were able to lever and lift the back end of the yacht.

“We placed the large steel pipes under each of the pontoon hulls and main hull, before carefully lowering the yacht onto the pipes. When we had the whole yacht up on the pipes off the sand, which took us nearly a week as it took a lot of energy out of us in the tropical sun, we then began the task of pushing the yacht along the pipes towards the water, which took us another few days to complete,” I explained.

“That is so clever of you boys to think of that. So, what did you do next - just sail back to civilisation?” Miriam said to me, and I gave a short laugh.

“If only it was that easy. During the storm when we landed on the island, the front was badly damaged by the reefs that we crossed. The bulkhead, which is the space in front of the crew living quarters in the nose of the yacht, was severely damaged, but, lucky for us, it had not broken through to the rest of the yacht, so it was still water tight.

“It was my first mate who came up with the ingenious idea of us packing all the damaged compartments in the main bulkhead, as well as the pontoons, with all the plastic containers. We emptied them all and resealed them tight, and using the big barrels to cover the open gap at the front, we filled the rest of the area with the smaller containers. It would not stop the water from going into the area, but it would help keep the nose up due to the buoyancy of the containers,” I announced to the growing crowd.

“So now that you had the yacht back in the water, and the yacht was temporarily floating again, did you sail back to civilisation?” Miriam asked me.

“Not quite. We had one more slight problem. During the storm we were struck by lightning, which destroyed our satellite communications and navigations systems, and the yachts compass was going haywire, due to the electrical charge that it received,” I explained.

“So what did you do then?” another student asked.

“Well after some thought I remembered two things. First, that I had a hand compass in my cabin and second, that my brothers school atlas has a decent map of the Pacific Ocean.

“Unfortunately, I had neglected to obtain ocean charts of the north and central Pacific region, before starting the charter from New Zealand to Hawaii, and it was after the charter was over when we were leaving Hawaii that we were caught in the storm. So, I had to just rely on the hand compass and the atlas as a guide for the best direction to the Marshall Islands to get help to repair the yacht. Although Hawaii was closer in distance, it would take us two or three days longer, as we would be going against the currents and the winds.

“Unfortunately, we went off course by a fair margin, sailing further east that we expected, so we missed the Marshall Islands, passed between Nauru and Tuvalu Islands, and eventually arrived at Vanuatu, not far from the capital city, where we were greeted by the Vanuatu Customs Service. They gave us the directions to the main wharf, and information of a boat yard to help with repairs. In total, we were lost for about four weeks, of which three weeks was spent marooned on that Island, which we learnt was Johnston Atoll, 1300 kilometres West-South West of Honolulu,” I explained. Suddenly there was a round of applause from everyone gathered, which lasted less than a minute, when the bell sounded for the end of lunch break.

For the last two classes for the day, I concentrated on the lectures, trying not to think of the unexpected audience during lunch break, when telling Mathew my story. We were close to the end of the day, when I felt my phone vibrate. I took a quick glance at the messages, of which there were a few: one from Anita, one from the yacht phone, one from Vic and Rita and even one from George and Mimi. I stared at the list of names, of missed calls, then the phone vibrated again, with just a text message from Anita, which I opened. “Congratulations. You are famous now thanks to your little presentation. Check it out on U Tube – Skipper talks about being Marooned on Johnston Atoll”.

I let out a groan, which caught everyone’s attention. “Anything we should know about, Mr Hamilton?” the lecturer asked me.

“No, Ma’am. I apologise for the groan. It was not intended to disrupt your informative class,” I replied with a smile, as I put my phone away, which brought a wide smile from the lecturer, who continued with the lecture. Ten minutes later the bell sounded to announce the end of the day, and I stood up quickly. “Excuse me, Ma’am, may I address the class please?” I asked the lecturer, and she indicated that I could.

“Ok, who is the wise arse who video recorded my lunchtime talk, and uploaded it to U Tube?” I said as I looked around the classroom. I knew that it wasn’t Miriam or Mathew, as they were up close to me during the whole thing, and I didn’t see them holding a phone camera.

“What are you referring to, Mr Hamilton, and does it have to do with that groan earlier?” the lecturer asked me as she was about to leave the room.

“Yes, it is to do with the groan, as I was unaware that I was being recorded at lunch time, when I was recalling an event that happened to me and friends not that long ago,” I replied.

Since no one owned up to the recording, I sat back down and packed my books into my backpack, before retrieving my phone to find the recording, which didn’t take long. I saw that it started just after Mathew asked me if I was the one caught in a storm and being chased by the cartel.

The whole video clip was 7½ minutes long, and I sat and watched it. Whoever had filmed this, had even done a close-up of my drawing, and it was a clear and good quality video. Once I had seen it, with Mathew looking over my shoulder the whole time, I put my phone away, and stood up.

“Well, I guess I will see you tomorrow. Bye for now,” I said to Mathew, who gave a slight wave and a slight hint of a smile, as I left the classroom.

Once in my car, I checked my voicemail on my phone. “Hi, Anton. I saw the newspaper article in today’s paper, and received an update from the AFP when I arrived at work. I spoke to Jasper and they are coming back to the mainland this afternoon, and we will start to move our belongings over to your house straight away, although I can’t help till my shift ends. Thanks again for letting us use your house. It is such a great place. Oh, and I have seen the video clip of you as well. I am presuming you were not aware that you were being recorded, so do you want me to try and hunt down who it was that posted it? Anyway, let me know. Hope college is going well for you. Talk to you soon. Bye for now”.

“Hi, Anton. We just got word from Anita that it is safe to return to the mainland. I will chat to you this evening once I have helped them to move into your house. I will be staying on board the catamaran until the trimaran returns, but I will be going back to school to catch up on school work too. It will be great to see the boys again. Talk to you later. Bye”. I smiled after hearing Simon’s voice. He was sounding happy, which was good to know.

I decided to wait till I arrived home before listening to the last two messages, so I pocketed my phone and started up my car, and drove to my city home, arriving about twenty minutes later, as I was caught up in the usual late afternoon peak traffic.

The voice messages from George and from Vic told me that they too had read in the newspapers about the large amount of police arrests regarding the Bolivian Drug cartel, and that they wished happiness and good luck with my future endeavours. I went online and checked the U Tube site, to have a look at the video clip of me at the college. I was shocked to see that there were over 172,000 views so far.

I was glad that I did not have a personal email account, Facebook or Instagram account, as I am sure they would be full of messages from people all over the world. I was about to shut down the computer, when an email arrived on the company email address. It was from Anita, so I opened it.

“Hi, Anton. I have done some investigating regards that video clip. It was published by a Daniel Kenneth. I have spoken to my Sergeant about it, and there isn’t that much we can do officially. You may be able to go through the civil courts to put a stop to it. Sorry we can’t help you any more. Regards, Anita”.

I didn’t know the name, so I presumed that he was in a different course than the one I was doing. I planned to speak to the College principal first thing in the morning. After doing some homework, I made some dinner, and afterwards went for a walk along the foreshore. Once I had returned I called the yachts sat phone to speak to Simon.

“Hey, Boss. How is college life treating you?” Simon asked me cheerfully.

“Doing well thanks, mate. I spent the whole weekend catching up on what I had missed from the start of the semester, and I am on track to finish the year as a year 12 graduate,” I replied.

“That’s good to hear. My teachers have slugged me with plenty of homework too. I have just finished dinner, then it’s back to the books. Jasper and family have settled into your house, and are loving it.” Simon said to me.

“That’s good to hear. So, I was wondering, would you be interested in being a permanent skipper for me? I will pay for any courses you want to do,” I said to my good friend.

“Actually, I have been thinking about marine engineering, since you told me about you buying a research vessel. If I had that degree, I would be able to maintain the engines of the research vessel and the two yachts,” Simon said to me.

“You have got a deal. You just decide where you want to study and I will pay for it,” I said to Simon.

“Awesome. You are a great boss to work for, even if you do over work us some times,” Simon said to me.

“Oh, Simon, sometimes you can be a real a…” I suddenly remembered what happened last time I said the word ass, and I hoped that he hadn’t caught on to what I was saying.

“Hee haw,” Simon said, and I groaned knowing that I had made a huge mistake, as I heard Simon laughing loudly. “Hee haw” I heard him say again, and so I ended the call.