The Martins have Landed #5:

Getting Ready to Go

By Dave and Jaja

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In June we will leave Colorado behind and return to northern Norway, where DRIVER has been waiting patiently for us all winter. When we arrive, we'll paint DRIVER's bottom with anti-fouling. We'll also top off the diesel, propane, and water tanks before we hit the high seas. Our summer itinerary starts from Norway's Lofoten Islands, and continues to Iceland, Greenland, then Canada. With luck we will be back in the States by September. Roughly speaking, the total distance is about 3,000 miles.

If going on a long sea voyage were as easy as writing the above paragraph, the world's harbors would probably be very crowded. Dreaming is easy and planning is fun, however, executing the plans and dreams requires plenty of grunt work.

I was dragging my heels last week, thinking about all the work needed to get us ready to go. We've been living ashore for 10 months, and our rental house is crammed with stuff that needs to be boxed up and put into storage. Just the thought of finding boxes, buying tape, and going through closets one by one, is enough to make me sleepy.

The first closet I attacked was overflowing with charts of the North Atlantic. They were stacked like cord wood. I wanted to combine the eight rolled-up bundles into two bundles, so that I could send them ahead to Norway via air mail.

I yawned, and unrolled the first bundle of charts. The west coast of Iceland lay spread out before my eyes. There were pencil marks indicating our snail-like progress northward during our cruise in 1998. Like a sea breeze filling in on a calm sea, the fog in my head began to lift and the roaring wind began to fill my ears. I was no longer in our living room. I was back on DRIVER, experiencing sensations that were 4 years old.

I could smell the salt air and hear the pounding surf. I looked at the chart again; there was a stain on it from the time I spilled coffee and tried to wipe it off with my wet, woolen mitten. Careless. A small wave bumped into DRIVER. I reached out to hang on and felt the slick varnish covering her teak cabin trim.

I unrolled another bundle of charts. Spitsbergen. Hornsund Fjord was rimmed by white snow and calving glaciers. A gentle breeze filled the genoa. Flocks of eider ducks and auks swooshed by overhead, while small chunks of ice bumped DRIVER's hull. Although it was June, our latitude of 77 degrees north precluded any real warmth from the sun reaching us. My nose was cold.

Another roll of charts. These were the mid-Atlantic Islands: Madeira, the Canaries, the Cape Verdes, the Azores, and Bermuda. St. Georges Harbor, Bermuda, was a haven of blue water, rimmed by green trees, and warmed by a bold sun. A sharp gust of wind pushed against DRIVER and I heard the anchor chain "click" in the bow roller. Soon, we would be setting sail for Iceland. New adventures awaited us - just out of sight. We were so naive in Bermuda. We never dreamed we would sail to Spitsbergen, and flirt with glaciers and polar bears.

My mind focused on our upcoming voyage to Greenland. I looked at the virgin charts. Silence. I examined the jagged coastline, which is usually cloaked in ice. All I could feel was the living room carpet under my bare feet, and all I could see was our ugly living room furniture. What adventures were in store for us this summer? What unexpected thrills would give these clean and silent charts a voice?

I combined the eight rolls of charts into two, big rolls. They were ready to be mailed. As I looked around the house, at the stuff that needed to be packed, a new energy took control of my mind. I thought, "the sooner this material stuff is locked away inside cardboard boxes, the sooner the riches of nature will be unlocked before our eyes."

Jaja came into the room. When she saw my eyes she smiled knowingly. "Have a good journey?"

I nodded. "The best is yet to come."