Sailor Woman: Becalmed
Baguettes, hibiscus and Joyce — goal achieved. Photo: Jill Knight
This feature article originally appeared in AFLOAT Magazine and forms part of our latest edition of boating features from Sailor Woman Jill Knight exploring life onboard and the joy of ocean passage-making.
Jill Knight had never understood the hatred many sailors have of little or no wind. Calms had never bothered her. And initially, she’d made the most of this one.
Cooee had sailed out of Balboa Harbour on April 3 with a deadline: 46 days to cover the 4,500nm across the Pacific to Papeete. It was rare for me to commit to an arrival date but this one was special: my long-time friend Joyce had arranged to fly out from Australia to spend her annual leave with me in Tahiti. At 4°N we found the SE Trades and at 2°N began to scoot west on the Equatorial Current. On one day, under main, topsail, staysail and jib, I found 117nm on the log and 170 marked off on the chart; 116 the next day and 185 on the chart. Our deadline was safe.
The current petered out but we still made good time after crossing the Equator, passing the 3,000nm mark with a good breeze on the port quarter. The motion had become a little rolly and our Admiralty chart must have slipped onto the sole. When I retrieved it, I discovered that my feline companion, Fletcher, had found it to her taste. She’d already chewed out all of the Australs plus the NE islands of the Marquesas. I’d spent a lot of time with that chart and had come to love its thick paper, lines and numbers — the sum of patience and curiosity of centuries of sailors. Our course ran between the two chewed patches, so I tried not to fret. On Day 27, less than a week north of the Tuamotos, the wind evaporated. Progress came to a halt and I welcomed the break. Instead of fuming while the sails slatted, I dropped them all and got on with enjoying the tranquillity. I took the opportunity to cook and clean; slid to the end of the bowsprit to check bits and pieces there; climbed the ratlines to inspect the rigging; greased the Aries lines and moved possible chafe spots along. A brilliant, soundless night followed and a soundless dawn took its place.
A sort of Nirvana
Neuroscience suggests that overwhelming awe calms parts of the brain, inducing euphoria along with an acute awareness of one’s insignificance in the grandeur. With nothing pressing to do and confident wind would soon return, I went into a kind of trance, a state of perfect liberation from the world. On deck everything was still, all 360° of the horizon empty. Immediate details became wondrous. The only movement was Cooee‘s response to my shifting weight on her narrow decks. If I leant over the side I could see her hull clearly outlined above depth-less blue.
Gooseneck barnacles made a crazy artwork of her rudder, and after all our miles on the same tack, many others cling to life on her starboard side above the antifouling. A small patch of oil sheened the sea where I’d rinsed breakfast dishes, the peacock colours expanding prettily but in no hurry to leave. My solitude felt immense and privileged.
Below decks the big skylight over the saloon was open and while I applied myself to my French lessons, Fletcher stretched herself out in a patch of sunlight. She lay between my leg and the settee back and began to bathe. A foreleg was stretched out long and thoroughly licked. Then, one hind leg was thrust upwards, licked, twisted and licked some more. After a few companionable licks to my knee, there was a rearrangement and a start on new territory — belly, more legs, shoulder. It seemed perfectly natural to see my cat going about her everyday rituals unperturbed by our great distance from land; both of us unperturbed by the degree of our trust in Cooee‘s timbers and copper nails. A third and fourth day passed while the state of transcendence remained a cloak insulating our tiny, detached world.
If wind never returns
A fifth day of stillness brought me back to reality. It was unthinkable not to be in Papeete in time to greet Joyce. The tattered chart became my focus, where I searched vainly for some magical solution. Then, I took to staring at the horizon. I examined every cloud for a sign of movement, interrogated small ripples as to their origins. The sixth day brought sameness. Hope, boosted by a peaceful sleep, had gradually deflated and seeped away by the time the breathless starry night arrived. On the seventh day I sailed for four melancholy miles in a whisper of breeze. Then I motored for eight, using diesel I was saving for the final approach to Papeete. Pointless.
Feeling depressed, accepting that we were not going to be there for Joyce, I returned to my old friend, the chart. And saw possible salvation!
Fatu Hiva gold
Fatu Hiva, the southernmost island of the Marquesas, lay to the NE and away from Tahiti. However, I’d sailed there before and knew the small population just had to have diesel. Cooee‘s tank didn’t have enough to motor all the way but if I brought the feeble breeze onto the beam we had a chance. If not, we would be 750 miles from Papeete with nothing in the tank. We set sail and the farther north the stronger the breeze blew. Next day, just before midnight, we reached the island in wild black squalls. It was a mere pinprick on my ocean chart but had escaped Fletcher’s teeth by a lucky margin. Once in the lee, I motored east into the blackness until I could hear the sea against the cliffs and stopped.
Dawn finally backlit the spikes and spires of the land and began to touch the towering vertical ramparts and chasms that reached from the clouds into the sea. Baie des Vierges became visible as a tiny crevice in the majestic tableau.
Sailors on the huddle of anchored yachts thought prospects for acquiring diesel extremely poor, but when I told our story in my best rehearsed French to the island Chief he conceded that the yellow ditch digger nearby could spare 120 litres of the precious fluid. What joy! I’d used little since escaping the doldrums the previous day, so set sail again full of gratitude and optimism. Cooee was tied stern to Papeete’s dock, cleared in and provisioned before Joyce landed less than 24 hours later.
This feature article originally appeared in July 2026 AFLOAT Magazine. To explore more stories like this, browse the AFLOAT Magazine archive or view the latest edition of AFLOAT Magazine.
