At Sea - 17. AS Chapter 17

Amanda knocked on the door and entered, carrying two hot packs, wrapped in tea towels and she handed them to me and left, as she did I stood up and grabbed a bath towel from the bathroom, and placed it over the Princes mid-section, before carefully placing the hot packs on the cramped muscle area.

Once Prince Joachim had recovered enough, I exited the cabin, to allow Princess Marie to take over, and I headed down to my cabin to shower and change, before going up to the bridge to see the skipper. “I should have realised that the cold water would bring on muscle cramps, how stupid I am” I said to Jay.

“You are not stupid and it is not your fault, as skipper it is my responsibility, and I should have considered it, that was why I asked you what the water temperature was, I should had warned the guests to limit the amount of time in the water” Jay said to me, “ok so we are both to blame then” I said with a big grin, “Let’s forget it for now, and good work with the rescue and first aid” that shows good leadership” Jay said to me patting me on the shoulder.

Prince Joachim had recovered well, and joined the rest of his family for dinner in the dining room, with Mum, Amanda and Jacq doing the service, Mum looked a little nervous each time she returned to the galley, but she kept calm and did us proud.

Once she was finished with the main guests, she used the food elevator to transport the food for the security staff in the crew dining mess below, and the crew all ate last once all the guests had eaten. After dinner, the guests went to the formal lounge, where I entertained them on the piano, and after that the children were sent to bed, while I helped Amanda with cleaning up in the galley.

“Nav, I’m not sure where your uncle is, I wanted to ask if there is a place big enough for a helipad, or can we find a location where the helicopters can collect us from” Prince Frederik asked as he approached the galley doorway.

“I will consult with the skipper and let you know sir” I replied and he returned to the lounge rooms, while I headed down to the crews lounge below. I found Jay in the crew lounge relaxing, and I informed him of the Prince’s request and we headed up to the bridge to check the navigation charts.

Ten minutes later, we both entered the lounge room, and made our presence known, Prince Frederik stood up and approached us. “Sir, Nav has recommended this location, and I agree with him, it is a small island that is just south of here.

We passed it on the way yesterday, it is a small island with a long stretch of beach, well above the water line, here are the coordinates” Jay said handing over the piece of paper with latitude and longitude coordinates for the east side of the sandy island, at 43° 19' 06.2"S and 146° 09' 43.0"E.

“Very good, we will arrange to be collected from this location at 0800 hour’s tomorrow” prince Frederik said and he walked away, and we returned down stairs, to let the rest of the crew know what the plans were for tomorrow.

“I think, once our guests have left, we will start making the journey back home to Arthur River, we will stop overnight at the places where we stopped on the way down, so we should be home in just under four days” Jay said to us.

The departure of our guests went smoothly, transporting them all and their luggage to the island via dinghies, and we watched them being collected by the three helicopters, and be flown to Strahan, and as soon as they were gone, we set sail downstream towards Port Davey, and up the coast to our first overnight stop of Wanderer River, and I took the helm for the second half of the journey, to share the duties with Jay.

As we were nearing the Wanderer River, the boats sat phone rang, “MV Trident, Nav speaking” I said half expecting it to be the Prince, “Nav, its Marcus and Sam here, we are back at Launceston, and ready to return to the Trident” came a happy voice on the other end.

“Hey guys, it’s good to hear from you, both of you missed all the excitement, but I will tell you all about it when you arrive, we are way down the coast at the moment, on our way back north, currently we are at Wanderer River, we will be at Strahan tomorrow afternoon, so it’s probably best to join us there” I said to them.

“Sure, thing Nav, see you tomorrow” Marcus said, and he hung up. I picked up the PA Mic, “Skipper to the bridge please” I said into the mic, and I waited till Jay arrived. I told the skipper of the phone call from Marcus and Sam, and that I suggested they join us at Strahan. “That’s fine with me, oh and Jacq told me of the ideas for a multi- purpose rec room, and we will get the carpenter to work on that as well, once we get back” Jay said with a smile and he checked the navigation screen, then headed down stairs.

While Mum and Amanda were preparing dinner, Jay and Jacq moved all of their belongings back to their cabin on the bridge deck, and Mum said she would move into the other double cabin after dinner, and that she was considering an offer to remain on the boat as a permanent crew member, as she has enjoyed the journey so far, and this made me very happy.

The next morning after breakfast, with Jay at the helm, the rest of the crew including myself, got to work with cleaning all the used cabins, Jay and Jacq had already cleaned their cabin and bathroom, as had Mum with her cabin, so that just left the remaining single guest cabins used by the four security officers, plus all of the VIP and twin guest cabins, and together we managed to get it all done before lunch.

After lunch, I took over at the helm for the last three hours of the journey to Strahan, and the crew continued with cleaning the dining room, two lounge areas, washing down all balconies, and the front and back decks, till finally the catamaran was nice and freshly clean once more, just in time for our arrival at Strahan, where Marcus and Sam were at the jetty waiting for our arrival.

While the lads were settling into their cabins, Amanda, Mum and I went into town to do some fresh food shopping, returning about two hours later with boxes of food, plus an extra passenger, as arranged by Jay.

Lennard Timms had agreed to travel down to Strahan, and come on board for the last two days of the journey, so he could start work on the changes to one of the research labs. Lennard was allocated one of the spare crew cabins, and he took no time to get to work on the changes, only stopping when it was time for dinner.

The next morning, with Jay at the helm we set off north again, while Lennard, Sam and Marcus continued working on the remodelling, meanwhile Jacq and I moved all the computers, whiteboard, pictures, table and chairs from one of the research rooms, to make way for the multi-purpose recreation room. The computers were installed in the now only Research work room, while the white board was placed on the side wall to the stairs on the bridge.

After lunch I once again took over at the helm, with our last overnight destination being the Pieman River, and I expected to arrive there well before sunset, so we could go part of the way up the river for better protection from the foul weather that was approaching.

By mid-afternoon, the sound of work downstairs had stopped, as the weather was now rocking the boat quite badly from the approaching storm front, it had been raining foe over an hour, getting stronger as time passed. When we entered the Pieman river, the rocking almost completely stopped, and it was fairly calm the further upstream we went, eventually I decided to stop at the same place as before, just inside the Donaldson River.

Although the weather outside was horrendous, it was quite cosy indoors, as the boat rocked gently to the howling winds that we could hear outside. We had another wonderful dinner, and I could see that Mum was settling in as a crew member very nicely, which I was very pleased about, and I hoped that she would decide to remain with us.

The storm came to a sudden stop sometime in the night, but as I went up to the Bridge deck at first light, I was shocked to see a large tree had fallen over and now blocked our way back out to sea.

Picking up the PA mic, I turned it on, “Attention crew, Marcus, Sam and Skipper to the main deck for clean-up duties” I said, and I waited just two minutes before Jay appeared, from his cabin, and he looked out the window.

“Oh damn, this may take a while, good call Nav, you better get the carpenter out of his bunk too, he will be needed also” the skipper said returning to his cabin to get properly dressed. “Attention crew, prepare to lower both dinghies, Mr Timms to the main deck also please” I said into the PA mic, before heading to the balcony to start lowering the dinghies.

Within a few minutes, everyone was on the main deck to see what all the fuss was about, and they were not happy to see what the problem was, “You know if we do this right, we could get some nice pieces of Huon Pine wood out of this” Lennard Timms said and Jay looked out onto the river, and thought about it for a few moments.

“No sorry Mr Timms, not this time, we don’t have the right equipment to do this, even if we managed to get the back deck of the boat under the tree at low tide, I don’t think the one chain saw is going to handle too many cuts of a tree that size” Jay said, and when he saw my face of disappointment.

Jay turned to Lennard Timms, “We will give it a try but I can’t promise you anything” Jay said and that brought smiles all around. “Jacq can you please grab the camera, I want this all to be documented, in case we have any trouble with the Parks & Wildlife rangers” Jay said.

Jacq went to retrieve the camera, “When is low tide today Nav?” Jay asked me, and I went upstairs to check the Tide chart, coming back to inform him that it was in just under two-hour’s time.

Using one of the dinghy’s we took photos of the fallen tree from many angles upstream, and only just sliding underneath, we did the same from downstream, with the catamaran included in them, to show the reason for cutting the fallen tree, which was approximately 8 feet in diameter.

As we watched the gap between the tree and the water increase, I was glad that I had not reversed into the Donaldson River like I had before, as we were in the right direction to reverse downstream, and under the fallen tree, if the tide dropped down enough.

We were all very pleased when we saw that it may be low enough, as the skipper slowly reversed the cat towards the fallen tree, with me at the rear of the main deck checking for clearance, the remainder of the crew were ordered to remain indoors or on one of the balconies.

Once the log was halfway along the outside deck, the skipper stopped, and with the chainsaw retrieved from the workshop store, Lennard Timms got to work making the first cut in the tree, approximately 1 metre in from the side of the boat.

The 6-foot long blade of the chain saw was not long enough to make one straight cut, so after three separate cuts, the heavier end of the fallen tree landed heavily on the side railing, forcing the boat to lean towards it from all the weight.

Lennard quickly began to cut the tree again, this time on the opposite side, once again one metre in from the side of the boat, as he was doing that, Sam, Marcus and I began to tie ropes around the log, and secured them down to the deck, to prevent it from rolling, and possible causing us to capsize.

When the second cut was completed, with the log dropping a foot to the deck floor with a loud thud, the boat levelled off again, and we tightened the ropes on the log that now sat on the deck, the problem now was how to remove the remainder of the tree, with the bottom end and the top end, still sitting on the side of the boat.

“Skipper, do you think that the dinghy cranes would be strong enough to hold the tree in place, while Lennard cuts from on the tree?” I asked Jay, “Good idea, I am not sure, I guess it’s the best option, let’s try it” Jay replied.

Jay went over to the crane and started lowering the gable, while swinging the arm over the side. I jumped up onto the tree, and with the end of the cable on hand, I wrapped it around the trunk and secured it, before jumping back on deck.