owlrigh

Three days off, and what do you do with them? Return to the islands you make your living in, naturally. It's either that or end up in the bar every evening, drinking it up, and so when Ben mentioned he was going out for an overnighter in his catamaran, I chose to go with him.

Being out there on a different boat made all the difference. Places I normally shrug my shoulders for because of their familiarity became new again -- and sailing in a little catamaran, slipping across the waves, was a novelty.

Coral Trekker needs gale force winds to make her go; under a comfortable wind speed she'll do the fastness of a knot, maybe, and it would take you half the trip to get to the islands.

We often get the complaint we don't sail enough in her.

Off we went in La Luna. She's a delightful little cat; phenomenally fast and responsive. We sailed almost straight off the beach he had her in, and weaved in and around anchored yachts at will. And there I'd thought my yacht was responsive; she makes mine own feel like a lump of lead.

That she's low in the water and open made me want to swim more. I spent half the time swimming or snoozing in the reflected sun, where normally I eschew the water and sit in the shade.

Two days of that and my skin is ever more so tanned. The difference between regularly exposed parts of me and the unexposed is striking now.

But really, those days were mostly spent canoodling, for Ben and I have become involved. I hesitate to use the word "boyfriend" as it seems so very strange, but ... yes, I suppose the word is not amiss, and my life has taken a turn for the strange I hadn't expected it to.

The skipper, Bob, laughed at me these past days.

"You're supposed to be cool and collected," he told me. "What's going on, Lilliput?"

"Shut up, Bob! I'm used to men making themselves a cake over me, not me over a man! Don't laugh at me." And I mused a bit more. "You don't think he'd be a bit scared away by, you know, my background?"

"Nah, I reckon that's what he likes most about you," said Bob, my confidant these days, who will probably keep his hands off me now. "Thinks he's struck gold, mate."

Only now he can make fun of me, and he does, and I don't blame him nor the other deckie. God, I'd be making fun of myself if only it wasn't me in the middle of it ... and such a turn around.

Being a yachtie is like being in the midst of a melodrama.

The chef off Reef Odyssey doesn't talk to me any longer; I guess the one evening when Ben and I were dancing up a drunken storm was a bit too in his face and ... off he chuffed. Never to speak to me again until he gets over it.

I, in the meantime, am trying to get used to not being single, where some random bloke asking me to go to a wine would get me nodding away and following -- free drink and perhaps conversation! -- now has me thinking, hmm, if I do that ... hmm. What is the etiquette on these things? And my brother has run off to New Zealand after his Brazilian girl, so he cannot be questioned.

So I met Ben through work, and met his father much earlier, another yachtie, through a mutual friend, and his father has since sold his catamaran to someone who is still around, who is going to take the family cat. It's a tangled web out of some midday soapie!

This past trip Bob laughed at me for days, accusing me of being quiet and reading because I was mopey for Ben -- who'd gone off to another boat for a few days.

"That's the first laugh out of you for days!" he said to me this afternoon, just before I left for my day off.

Just after telling me to get sleep and not spend it all ... doing other things ... so that I'm awake for work tomorrow morning. It's like being in high school, only this never happened to me in high school.

In an attempt to become more sociable -- Bob is not very understanding of not feeling sociable -- I downed some plonk the other night and went to join the passengers.

We were anchored just off Whitehaven Beach that night. We were side on to the swell, rolling, and there was a keen wind going on, voices ripped away so that any attempt at conversation was botched immediately.

"Tell Kris" the other deckie "to go aloft!"

Doing that, I stood back, three sheets to the wind, and watched him climb.

"You were meant to go up, too," he said.

"I've had a few!" I protested.

"So? You know how not to fall!"

Off I went, pitch black, and climbed all of the way to the t'gallant. Drunk as anything, these things occur to you as good ideas which would not nearly feel so in the bright of day.

Such as then climbing down the outer forestay to get back to the deck, a wire you have to hold onto with hands and feet or you'll definitely fall. While this didn't happen, the screaming of my arms and shoulders well up to today reminds me that my captain is a bit funny in the head about the rigging.

Hell, last time he tried to climb he froze and nearly fell! Now we have to go up and prove things for him where he cannot.

The Whitsundays have livened up a bit for me now. It was just needing to be off a veritable ship to see the islands for lovely ... okay, maybe with a bit of canoodling ... for me to want to be out there. Out here. Maybe I can see why people come here -- and stay for a long time.