2nd Leg Day 6: Cheese & Onion Loaf, Squalls and Fish Curry

Today is Monday, 6 August. We have been at sea for six days since leaving St Helena, and 22 days since leaving Cape Town. We have about 35 days of the voyage left, depending on the weather.

Dawn saw an overcast sky, gray and rainy. Renier got his the first dowsing from a squall on the voyage during his 00h00 to 03h00 watch slot, I mine on the 06h00 to 09h00 slot. Dawid was spared a dowsing for this round. The weather was cool enough to warrant a T-shirt and a rain jacket. Later in the morning the clouds cleared somewhat and blue sky was to be seen all over. But the squalls stole our wind and we had to motor along. Needless to say, in these conditions we did not catch any fish.

There was just enough clouds to prevent me from taking sun sights. No problem, as we motored and thus the dead reckoning is quite easy and accurate. I am still pondering the problem of the differences in position obtained from the sights taken of the moon and of Venus.


I was up early for my morning watch slot, at 05h30. Raring to finish the cheese and onion loaf that I kneaded yesterday late afternoon and left to rise overnight. The lively starter sponge gave me hope for a proper rising of the dough. The dough proof, that is. I was not disappointed. The dough had more than doubled in volume overnight. I had some difficulty in extracting the dough ball from the plastic bag that it was stored in. I did my best and did not really lose any of the dough.

Cheese and Onion Rye Loaf

Adapted from a recipe in Classic Sourdoughs Revised by Ed Wood and Jean Wood

Ingredients

1 cup sourdough culture proof

1 tablespoon butter, melted

½ cup milk

1 teaspoon salt

1 tablespoon sugar

1 cup grated cheddar cheese

1 cup finely chopped onions

3 cups unbleached all-purpose flour. I don't have access to this, so I used white bread flour.

Process

Combine all the non-flour ingredients, then add the the sourdough culture proof and mix. Now add the rest of the flour a little at a time and mix until the dough becomes too stiff to mix with a spoon.Turn the dough out onto a floured board and knead in more flour until the dough is smooth and satiny. This dough is quite wet from the onions, so it may take up more flour than anticipated.

The dough of my mix was a bit soft, so I kneaded in another half cup of flour. I then kneaded the dough for another five to eight minutes before cutting it into two sausages and shaping these into two long loaves. These were put in the oven to rest for another two hours before I lit the oven and baked them for 50 minutes at 190ºC/375ºF. I made a number of slashes diagonally across the loaves to assist expansion before the oven was lit. After ten minutes in the oven, I basted the tops with water to assist crust forming. I won't chance spritzing the oven with water, as we have to clean the oven back to factory mint condition before delivery. A mammoth task when there is some scale or other residue in the oven. After the allotted baking time the oven was switched off and the loaves left to cure for another twenty minutes. The loaves were then removed from the oven to cool.

They came out magnificent. All my fears allayed, I cut the first slice. An onion aroma filled the saloon and the first loaf was consumed within half an hour. We all sat there savouring the taste. The crust was nice and crisp, not too thick. The crumb was full of irregular sized holes and elastic but soft. The taste was exquisite. A firm favourite with all aboard.

The loaf constituted lunch. No two minute noodles for lunch today. Dinner was my affair, fish curry by popular request. I made fish curry, using the Dorado we caught, with lentils and coconut milk, served with saffron rice. There was a lively game of backgammon going on while I prepared dinner. Our curtain raiser for the main event, the Uno after dinner . League. Tonight we closed the card games with a round or two of Black Jack, until the bank went bust.

Fish Curry with Lentils and Saffron Rice

Ingredients

400 g fish fillets. I used some of the Dorado that we caught.

½ cup brown lentils

¾ to 1 cup of fresh garden peas. I use frozen peas, the canned ones do not taste as good.

1 envelope of dried coconut powder dissolved in a cup of water or a can of coconut cream or -milk.

1 dessert spoon dry masala powder

1 teaspoon coriander seeds

¼ teaspoon black mustard seeds

½ teaspoon fenugreek seeds

1 star aniseed

½ stick cinnamon bark. This is about a tea spoon's worth of bark.

1 cardamom pod

1 onion, chopped

1 dessert spoon green masala (Recipe here)

½ hot chili, chopped

½ tea spoon chopped garlic

1 tea spoon garum masala

Some salt

Dollop of vegetable oil. Not olive oil.


For the rice:

1 teaspoon saffron essence. Or three saffron strands, soaked in half a cup of hot water.

¼ tea spoon aniseed seeds

Some salt to taste

Process

Cut the fish into thumb size pieces and marinate them for 30 minutes in a dollop of oil with the green masala. Then start with a dry pan. Add all the whole spices except the whole aniseed seeds and saffron, to the pan and fry them until the flavour starts to come out. Peel the cardamom pod and discard the pod skin. Then add some oil and the chopped onion and chili. Fry the onion until it goes translucent or glassy, then add the chopped garlic, the marinated fish and the dry masala powder. Fry the fish until it is done, then remove it from the pan.If you don't the fish may cook to bits. Now add the lentils and two cups of water. Simmer this until the lentils are almost done, then add back the fish. Add the coconut milk. You need to watch the quantity of fluid in the pan, that it does not get too runny. The lentils will absorb water up to a point, but if the dish goes too dry, the lentils will burn. Then you start over. Lastly, add the peas and the garum masala and simmer for five minutes. Then switch off the heat and let the dish rest for ten minutes.

To prepare the rice, add a cup of rice to cold water with some salt and the dry aniseed seeds. You can use cumin instead of the aniseed. Bring to the boil and simmer until the water has reduced somewhat. Add the saffron to the pot and simmer until the water has boiled away completely. Add more water if necessary; the rice may still need cooking when the water has boiled away.

Then dish up!









This blog also linked to Yeastspotting!

Authored by Johan Zietsman
Last updated on 2012-12-12

St Maarten Stop & Go

Hi Folks,
Thanks for visiting. We are departing St Maarten within the hour on route to Fort Lauderdale.
I have not been able to upload the rest of the blog due to extremely poor local internet conections.
Please be patient, I shall have the full Monty in two weeks' time.
Sincerely,
Johan Zietsman

2nd Leg Day 5: Summer, Spit'n Polish and Sourdough

The days are getting more and more summery as we travel further north. The wind is holding up and we sailed 138 nautical miles over the last 24 hours. This in spite of a stoppage of over an hour for the fish yesterday after lunch. Good news indeed. We have now done 72 straight hours of sailing, barring four hours to charge the batteries. Good wind indeed.

I managed to get sextant sightings of both the moon and Venus early this morning. Then I had to dig deep in my mind (and the celestial navigation manual!) to perform the reduction calculations on these. I had two very good sets of sights, each set clustered close together, but disagreeing with each other. I still need to clarify the difference, but for now I had some proper revision of sightings other than the sun.

This is part of the exercise, to understand the sources of variation in the calculations and readings. And this is part of what you lose when working in electronic media only. The computer spews out numbers and one has to take them at face value. That is, unless you understand the quantities involved and are able to decide whether the results make sense or not. A big caveat indeed. Tomorrow, when I have some quiet time, I shall review today's readings and try to make sense of the differences.

The summer weather made for a leisurely Sunday. Towards the middle of the morning the wind started abating to a gentle breeze and we were able to do our first round of spit and polish. That means removing rust and salt crust from all the stainless steel fittings outside. Not every day is spent in lazing away leisurely! The weather had been kind to us so far and there was little salt and rust to contend with. The calm sea added to the comfort and I was able to do my part without too much discomfort: I pulled an intecostal muscle yesterday in the melee with the big fish. This lead to some very funny faces from me today as the muscle went into a spasm.

Today was also the first day that we could sit around bare-chested. Luckily there was no-one else around to see the pale spectacle! Furthermore we had an overnight encounter or two with flying fish. Luckily for me, this time not personal, as against my knee in the middle of the night. Like the last time! But still disconcerting. You hear a loud thud in the night, then a slapping sound as the hapless fish lies flapping on the deck. Not something for the faint-hearted in the middle of the night. Good thing I had this experience before, else I may have had an unsavoury accident! We picked up a dead one on the foredeck this morning, after some more bumps in the night.

Sourdough and a Rye Loaf

I started a sourdough sponge yesterday, planning to bake bread tomorrow. The sourdough was fed with some rye flour and water to make up the loss in volume. The starter sponge was made with half a cup of sourdough, one cup of rye flour and some water to make it into a paste. This was left overnight to activate fully and to multiply. The warm weather aided and the sourdough responded magnificently by foaming and bubbling. I promptly stored it in the refrigerator. The sponge also more than doubled and was bubbling away. This bode well for my loaf and this afternoon I completed my dough mix with two additional cups of white bread flour, one cup of grated cheese and one cup of chopped onions. The dough also received a dollop each of melted butter, sugar, some salt and half a cup of milk. This was kneaded until it became quite stiff, after which I wrapped the dough ball in a plastic bag and stored it in the oven to rise for 12 hours. Our oven on board is the only place where the dough can rest undisturbed and the oven is too small for any of our larger plastic containers.

The cheese and onion loaf is by request from our skipper, Renier. As I am sitting here and typing up the blog, the loaf has risen by quite a bit and seems to be quite happy in the plastic bag. I am happy too. There was a stage some days ago where I was very worried about the vitality of my sourdough. It appears that the ambient temperature could have been the major player in the lethargic performance of the sourdough. One needs to heed the environment on board, it is not the same as at home!

Our merry little band has a card league every evening after the evening meal. This is played in the game of Uno and is hotly contested. Renier is keeping score and this 'wailing wall' is a source of great merriment and rivalry. We are considering a poker league as well for when we have lots of time. Washing up turns would count as legal tender to stay in the game. Perhaps this will make participants think twice about reckless betting. However, looking at the Uno scores, I have my doubts. We also have a backgammon game board. This is getting popular as a curtain raiser for the Uno league, as one of us is washing up after dinner, leaving the other two idle. It works out quite nicely this way, setting the scene for the Uno games later. The washing up has to be done directly after dinner, as the boat has only little space in the galley and the dirty dishes clutter the sink. On bigger boats this is less of a problem and we do the washing up firdt thing in the morning. There is normally some additional dirty cutlery and crockery from the night watches.









This blog post also linked to Yeastspotting!

Authored by Johan Zietsman
Last updated on 2012-12-12

2nd Leg Day 4: The Day of the Big Dorado

Today must surely go down in the history of this voyage as the day of the big Dorado.

The day dawned slightly cloudy with the barometer at a steady 1018 hPa, promising steady winds. The promise was not empty and we had steady south east trade winds of around 20 knots all through the day. The clouds gave way to the sun and the sea turned a bright blue turquois colour, with white sea horses all over. The swell was in the region of two meters and we were sailing along merrily at between five and seven knots. Brilliant sailing weather.

I took my routine sun sights around 10h00 local time, which is 11h00 GMT or 13h00 South African time. This time I had a good view of the sun and the horizon and was able to zero my sextant properly. The resultant plot and fix, working from yesterday's fix, put us a tad under 10 nautical miles from the boat's GPS. I have now been doing a parallel navigation to the boat's GPS and Renier's backup PC. My backup is on paper. No electricity involved. It makes a good hobby and gives a skill in understanding the capability of the instruments and the human brain. Much to be said for the use of the brain, thank you very much.

I was still packing away my instruments when the reel on the fishing rod started screaming. I made the necessary noises to raise the alarm and the fight was on. This time the fish did not get away. We furled the sail, stopped the boat and started the engines. By this time Renier was prepared with his fish fighting bucket and gloves and the fight was on, going astern as required after the fish. It took us over 20 minutes to get the fish close to the boat. Only thren did we identify it as a Dorado.

This fish gave us all a hard time. Firstly, it didn't jump as Doradoes normally do, making it a little more difficult to bring in. Secondly, it swam all around the rudders and propellers and got itself properly tangled. Renier was getting despondent about landing the fish and called for a knife to cut the line. By this time, however, the whole ship's company was on a high and wouldn't hear about this. We fetched the boat hook and soon the fish was secured to the stern rail, hanging by its tail. None of this catch and release stuff for us. Especially not after what it had done to us, tangling the line in the propellers and rudders. We want revenge. That is, apart from the fact that we are simply hungry for fresh food.

Then came the task of untangling the fishing line from the rudders and propellers. We resorted to a combination of moutaineering techniques and bushcraft, taping a steak knife to the boat hook to cut the line from the propeller. Much like Rambo. We had a line tied around first Dawid's waist and had him lean overboard using his diving mask, to see what he could do. The swell did not make it easier. Later Renier took a turn and had more success due to his extreme reach. There was no time for pictures then, as Dawid was holding on to Renier's safety line and his ankle, while Renier was hanging upside down over the bucking sugar scoop stern with his head and shoulders under water. He was cutting fishing line from the propeller. I was passing tools as required. Just as in a hospital theatre, I suppose. A sight to behold, I wonder!

All's well that ends well and soon we had all the fouled lines cleared and could continue our voyage. Then the papparazi started and lots of pictures had to be taken. The papparazi being Dawid and me. We guessed the weight of the fish to be around twenty kilos. Renier had difficulty in holding it up long enough to take a proper picture, with the boat bucking in the swell and the size of the fish. It lay the full length of the cockpit table, with the tail hanging off the table.

All of this cost us perhaps an hour, after which we were under way again, with the dressing of the fish lying ahead. The fish yielded eight meals' worth of fillets, which put us in good standing with our supplies. We may need fish for another meal or two for safety, so we shall fish some more.

Dawid and I had some offcuts for lunch snacks in the form of sashimi, complete with wasabi and soy sauce. I like this, so I was sorry to not have cut more morsels off the carcass before we discarded it overboard. Dawid had some and declared it edible, even good. But he added that this was an experiment and that he would not trade this for a good hamburger.

Tonight, for dinner, we had fresh fish fried in a batter. No surprises there! This was served with potatoes boiled in the skin and a coleslaw side dish. The batter was made with an egg and some cornflour (Maizena) to which we added one teaspoon of fish masala powder and one teaspoon of gound cumin. The fish was marinated in this for twenty minutes before it was fried in light oil.

The coleslaw was made from finely sliced cabbage (duh!), a grated carrot, our very own home grown mung bean sprouts and some dried fruit cake mix that we bought on St Helena. A dollop of mayonnaise completed the side salad.

The end result was very tasty dish, with the batter sealing the juices in the fish and providing a tangy flavour to an excellent fish. The overall impression of the meal was as good, being a nice summer style dinner. Pity we weren't ashore. Then we could have enjoyed a nice cold Chardonnay or Sauvignon Blanc with it.

Authored by Johan Zietsman
Last updated on 2012-12-12

2nd Leg Day 3: Rye Bread, Beef Curry and Whales

Actually, one needs to add dolphins to the title, but then it would be too long and uncomfortable. We had an interesting day. I baked another rye loaf, I cooked dinner and a large pod of whales came to visit, joined by four or five dolphins a while later. The rye loaf happened in the morning, the rest all in the late afternoon during a small squall.

A large pod of whales means more than fifteen humpbacks. About five meters from the boat. Quite scary, but we got the idea that they were just visiting us in the passing, not wanting to play. One has mixed emotions when seeing these large animals at such close quarters, but they are beautiful. They were followed by a small group of dolphins, also on their way in the same direction.

Nice to have visitors in this deserted part of the ocean, far away from the busy shipping lanes. I also caught our first dorado today, during the visit of the whales. It was only a baby fish, so we let it go safely back in the water. It started swimming the moment it had reoriented itself after getting back in the water.

Rye Loaf

The rye loaf was done on a fast track. I used instant yeast this time. The flour was a mix of one cup rye, one and a half cup brown bread flour and one cup white bread flour. The kneading board was floured with rye, which added another half cup of rye flour to the mix. I mixed this lot, adding some salt and the dry instant yeast, followed by 1 cup of lukewarm water. After kneading this on a well floured board, I let it rise in ambient conditions, which is around 25ºC /77ºF at the moment. We are nearing the equator and winter is basically over for us. The instant yeast performs well and the dough took an hour to rise to double its original volume. The dough was then kneaded down, shaped and put to rest for 30 minutes, then baked for 40 minutes, starting with a cold oven. I baked it at 190ºC/375ºF for 30 minutes, then at 210ºC/ 410ºF for another ten minutes. The oven was switched off and the loaf left in the oven to rest for ten minutes before being taken out to cool. It came out quite nice and brown, not overbaked, with a medium thick crust and with a very spongy crumb. The brown and rye flour made it quite heavy.

I was lucky to get a picture or two before it was devoured.

On the navigation front I managed to get some sextant readings early this morning, before the sun and the moon went into the clouds. The clouds were quite low, but had a gap to the horizon, where the sun on one side and the moon on the other peeeked through. As it is still close to full moon, one has the opportunity to take sun and moon sights at the same time. Not that it is of major help, since the two bodies sit at almost 180 degrees apart and therefore are not of much use for navigation. You want them spaced closer to 90 degrees to be useful. But the sighting practice is more important. I eagerly went to the reduction tables, only to find that both sets of sightings re of no use, as the heavenly bodies need to be more than 9 degrees above the horizon. The tables only start at 9.5 degrees. This is because there is too much distortion through the earth's atmosphere at the lower angles. Drat.

Luckily the clouds cleared at about 09h00 local time and I could get decent sun sights. These, along with my dead reckoning calculations since departing St Helena, put us within 6 nautical miles from the GPS fix. Not too shabby for three days' worth of dead reckoning, I should venture. It pays to keep fit in the ancient methods.

Today was also my turn at the galley. I made beef curry with lentils, served with brown and wild rice mix.

Beef Cube Curry with Lentils

Ingredients

400 g beef cubes

1 onion, chopped

1 hot chili, chopped

1 dessert spoon green masala (Recipe here)

1/2 teaspoon coriander seeds

1/2 teaspoon cumin seeds

1/4 teaspoon fenugreek seeds

1 star aniseed

Small piece of cinnamon bark

1 dessert spoon dry masala powder

1 teaspoon turmeric powder

1-2 teaspoons garum masala

3/4 cup brown rice

2 small potatoes, peeld and cut into thumb size pieces

3/4 cup lentils. I used black lentils, but you may use any.

1 can peeled and chopped tomatoes. We don't have fresh tomatoes, in which case you should use two or three. Don't worry about peeling them, just cut them into thumb size pieces.

Some salt

Some vegetable oil, peferebly not olive oil. The flavour clashes with the other spices.

Process

Cut the beef cubes into thumb size pieces. Marinate this in the green masala and a dollop of vegetable oil. I marinated the beef for 30 minutes.

Start cooking using a dry pan. Fry the cumin, cinnamon, aniseed, fenugreek and coriander seeds in a medium hot pan until the flavour comes out, then add the onion and a dollop of oil. Fry the onion until it goes glassy, then add the chopped chili. Fry these for another minute, then add the dry powder spices and the meat. Fry these until the meat is brown. Add some oil if the pan is too dry. The dry spices soak up a lot of moisture and they must not burn, else you start over. When the meat is brown, add the tomatoes, potatoes and lentils and some additional water. Simmer until the lentils are done. Thicken the sauce by mashing a couple of the potato cubes. Then add the garum masala, stir the dish, switch off the heat and let the dish rest for ten minutes to develop flavour before serving on a bed of brown rice.

This blog also linked to Yeastspotting!

Authored by Johan Zietsman
Last updated on 2012-12-12

2nd Leg Day 2: Blue-grey Clouds and a Red Sunset

Today dawned as another gray and morning. It actually rained in a fine spray. I had to don a rain jacket as well as a light sweater. Interesting experience in an environment that should tend to subtropical, if not tropical.

The sunset was beautiful, with all shades of dark blue and gray, setting off the red sun through the clouds.

As of today, it has been more than a week of cloudy weather, preventing any sextant sightings. I have resorted to navigation by dead reckoning, the same techniques used for hundreds of years before more modern methods were invented. And I have perused all my texts on basic navigation. This adverse weather actually provides a good opportunity to hone navigation skills, especially those intuitive skills to judge average speed, direction and leeway over a certain period. The inaccuracies in the navigation are vested in the inaccuracies in the judgments. I now make several judgments, recording each in my journal. Then I compare the end result position to where the boat's GPS tells me I am. This method provides a means of checking sensitivity of the various judgments and their influence on the overall calculations. I like to think it helps me to hone my navigation skills, but thus far I am not really impressed. Perhaps I am overly sensitive. Twenty nautical miles difference from the GPS on a vast ocean is perhaps not bad. Especially if one considers that the closest dry land is more than 168 nautical miles from us and increasing. We are not going to hit anything hard for a while, I should imagine.

But I am yearning for some sextant work again. I think I have the instrument under control this time. At the last check it appeared that it keeps its zero calibration now. At last.

We are again battling with the routine on board, the stopover at St Helena being just enough to upset the on board rhythm and body clocks. Both Renier and Dawid were a bit out of it yesterday after their scuba dive outing, while I was just stiff from the previous day's hard physical exertion.

I am now reading my third book, but still reading snippets of The Seven Pillars of Wisdom by TE Lawrence. The one from Arabia, not DH, the lover. Dawid is wading through a copy of “Sailing Around the World Alone” by Joshua Slocum, while Renier has completed reading his fifth book. A change from our normal lifestyles, where reading does not normally come high on the priority list due to more active lifestyles.

Our menu onboard is a marvel of inventiveness. The guys are using raw masala (curry paste) in their two-minute noodles as garnish. Also some raw chilis. I harvested some fresh ones from a bush in the back of the Consulate Hotel on St Helena. I don't think anybody will mind, as the little fruits are going to waste on the bush, being there just for show. These ones are actually quite strong and flavourful, being a bright orange colour and looking like short Thai chilies. They are perhaps just a little bit less strong than a habanero chili. But good to eat. I had some in my noodles too. It adds a nice piquant flavour to the dish. And some welcome vitamin C, I suppose.

Authored by Johan Zietsman
Last updated on 2012-12-12

St Helena Stopover and Pasta Carbonara alla Ziets

We reached St Helena island on Monday morning around 12h00 local time. Which is, of course, the same as GMT or UT.

This time our arrival went with less heartache than on the previous occasion, as it was during the working week and during normal office hours. The customs ladies were friendly and efficient and we all went ashore together in the ferry. We spent the afternoon doing all the rest of the paperwork, then had a hamburger and a beer or two. We were also able to contact our loved ones via the internet and share some yearnings.

Tuesday was very interesting. Dawid and I went on a tour of the island, while Renier enjoyed his solitude and surfed the internet, contacting his friends and family. In the afternoon it was my turn for solitude and chatting to my beloved, while Renier and Dawid went scuba diving. Imagine, scuba diving in practically the most remote corner of the world. At present only reachable by sea.

The island itself is quite interesting, as it has a history as old as South Africa, perhaps older. The Portuguese discovered the island in the early 1500's (around 1531?) and apparently kept it a secret for over 90 years, when the Dutch came to know about its whereabouts, then the other European nations. It was annexed by the British in 17xx and has been under British control ever since.

Perhaps it is known best by its most famous inhabitant, Napoleon Bonaparte, who spent his last years there in exile. The island has special significance for us South Africans, as some of our great grandfathers were interned there during the Anglo Boer War from 1898 to 1902. Dawid and I visited the little cemetery where those who died during their internment are buried. The cemetery is kept quite neat and is situated in a most beautiful glade on the mountainside near to a little Baptist chapel.


We also had a look at Napoleon's home, Longwood House, as well as the governor's official residence which goes by the name of Plantation House. At Plantation House the grounds are home to a number of huge tortoises, the oldest of which is 170 years old and answers to the name of Jonathan. Well, in a manner of speaking.



We then had a look at Jacob's Ladder from the top. Another famous landmark on St Helena, this is a set of steps, 699 of them, leading up the mountainside from the town to the fort on top. It started as a funicular railway to supply the fort and was then converted to a set of steps. They are quite steep at 11” average per step. That's about 27cm odd. Quite steep, even for going down.

After the tour I was hungry as the day was quite cold, so I had a hamburger and chips before settling down to load my blog. It took more than two hours, as one sucks individual electrons through a drinking straw for internet access. Or so it feels. The internet connection is actually fast enough to Skype, but not all access is fast. I managed to chat to Carol for a while before the connection was promptly severed by the meter after my airtime ran out. The chat made only a little dent in my longings...

On Tuesday night we had a beer in a different place. Then, by mutual agreement, we went back to the boat and made dinner. The mutual agreement was that the food on board is better than the food ashore. Anywhere on the island. Period. So I cooked, as it was my turn anyway.

We had Pasta Carbonara alla Ziets.

Ingredients

250 g bacon, chopped

1 onion, chopped

½ sweet pepper, chopped

1 teaspoon garlic, chopped

½ hot chili, chopped

1 ½ cup pasta. We used macaroni.

1 envelope pasta sauce. We used chicken and mushroom, as this was the nearest flavour.

Some salt

Some cooking oil

Process

Cook the pasta in fast boiling water. Add some salt and a dollop of oil to the water before adding the pasta. This will keep the pasta separated. When the pasta is done, pour off the water into a cup to make the sauce. No use in wasting perfectly good starch water.

Fry the onion and sweet pepper in medium hot oil. When the onion goes glassy, add the hot chili and garlic. Stir fry this until the onion goes brown, then add the chopped bacon. Stir fry until the bacon is done to your taste, then add all the pasta and mix through. Pour the sauce over this and stir fry for another minute or two, then dish up.

A simple dish, quite delicious, using only two pots. And better than the food in town.





This morning we serviced the engines, topped up the diesel and water tanks, then went to town for our weather checks and last shopping. We actually found some tomato paste for 10p a tin, as the tins were just out of date. What a bit of luck! On the other hand, there were literally no fresh tomatoes to be found in any shop in town.

The last thing we did on the island was to take a shower in the ablution facilities on the foreshore. We were hoping for some hot water, but alas, there was none. So we took a cold shower using shampoo to wash our bodies as all our bathroom kits were on board. Dawid had taken shampoo along to rid him of the salt on his body after taking a swim before we went ashore. This came in very handy, as all of us had last taken a proper bath or shower some days earlier.

We all felt a sense of relief when the anchors were weighed, the sail unfurled and course set for the Brazilian coast. I guess the last shower ashore may have been symbolical, washing away the effects of the land on us. Perhaps a bit like the immortal words of John Masefield in his poem Sea Fever, quoted here:

I must go down to the seas again, to the lonely sea and the sky,

And all I ask is a tall ship and a star to steer her by,

And the wheel's kick and the wind's song and the white sail's shaking,

And a grey mist on the sea's face, and a grey dawn breaking.

I must go down to the seas again, for the call of the running tide

Is a wild call and a clear call that may not be denied;

And all I ask is a windy day with the white clouds flying,

And the flung spray and the blown spume, and the sea-gulls crying.

I must go down to the seas again, to the vagrant gypsy life,

To the gull's way and the whale's way, where the wind's like a whetted knife;

And all I ask is a merry yarn from a laughing fellow-rover,

And quiet sleep and a sweet dream when the long trick's over.


Authored by Johan Zietsman
Last updated on 2012-12-12