If the sea is known as a harsh mistress, then sailing upwind on her for 1400 miles may be likened to S&M with a particularly perverse dominatrix.
I get images of hardship, bravery and adventure- romance even- when thinking of sailing the oceans. Days of seeing only blue sea and sky. And starlit nights spent gazing at the waves and the softly glowing instruments and reflecting on being the only person awake and aware for hundreds of miles around. It is all very inspiring and there's a bit of danger too.
A friend has been selected for a stint in Antarctica. I must ask him if the tentacles of Australian bureaucracy reach that far South when he is back, because I have discovered that there is no respite from them on the ocean.
Below is a true, but unfortunately very boring account of my dealings with the public services.
The Indonesian lumbering rule & regulation juggernaut is no laughing matter but at least I pay or bribe on the spot, and just once. In Oz, I foot the bill annually for the politicians and the lawyers that invent the rules that require the departments that need the planes and boats and human resource managers and CEOs and their accomodation that send the public servants to way beyond mainland Australia to do their job which involves hassling me over and over again when I'm doing nothing more suspicious than sailing in an ecologically blessed carbon-neutral manner across the human heritage that is the ocean back to the place where the boat & I live. This all takes place hundreds of miles away from land and the nearest other human being whom I could possibly choose to bother. I could do no harm if I wanted to!
' If you want a vision of the future, imagine a boot stamping on a human face-forever', wrote George Orwell.
If you fly to Australia, you buy a ticket and arrive hours later. If you choose to sail to Australia the customs have to be informed one week in advance. If you ask why, the answer is that it is a rule, a regulation or a law. It is felt that is an explanation. And Customs don't monitor HF or VHF radio so you need a phone.
I called from Kupang, announced my intentions and was asked to call back the next day so that the officer had access to the computers. I was quizzed on last port of call and intended time and place of arrival, the size of the boat and number of people aboard etc, etc.
While minding our own business on the high seas 12 hours later we were buzzed by a Coastguard plane- and I mean buzzed. They flew low and noisily circled the boat in a large aeroplane while I relayed the same information again by radio. We were read a 'pratique'- a paragraph of instructions of which the main one is that you cannot set foot on Oz soil until you've been processed by the Agencies.
We arrived at Ashmore Reef. An isolated coral atoll about 100 miles south of Indonesia and 3 or 400 miles west of Oz. And yes, it is delightfully scenic and it would have been a very Castaway and Robinson Crusoe experience if it wasn't for a large military-looking vessel called the 'Ashmore Guardian' moored in the otherwise deserted lagoon. Four officials soon came speeding towards us, of whom two boarded. Nice guys mind you, but I did have to fill in about three pages of details including boat registration number, call sign and tonnage and the last four ports of call. They said they didn't mind us going ashore on one of the tree tiny islands that sit on the coral. I told them that the coastguard had forbidden this (a bit odd- Indonesian fishermen can go ashore without a visa, if you are outbound from Oz you're welcome ashore, but it is very illegal if you're heading to Oz). The uniformed gentlemen promised to find out the letter of the law for us and indeed returned the next day confirming that landing was out of the question.
I pointed out that under the watchful eyes of the Ashmore Guardian AND the two huge Oz navy warships that had appeared overnight and which patrolled the lagoons' entrance, we were unlikely to do anything naughty on the island...
We did a bit of snorkelling and caught up on sleep, I even managed a brief kitesurf there hoping to have been the first to do so. The next day the Coastguard overflew the atoll and this time grilled the Ashmore Guardian for 10 minutes on channel 16 regarding our details again.
We set sail for Scott's Reef later in the arvo and once underway US warship 732 announced their position and 'live firing exercises' on the radio and warned all shipping to stay clear by 5 miles. I must be very conceited in thinking that the onus is on the gunners to aim their cannons at the empty ocean rather than at me, but politely kept my silence. Two hours later this warning was repeated from a different, closer position and I radioed to verify the information and got a reply in a very abrubt manner. I didn't dare ask about my right of way as a sailing vessel either.
A beautiful starlit night followed, complete with the gentle lapping of the waves on the bows and the soft hiss of the wake and all. I had almost developed a sense of solitude and beauty when we got strafed by the coastguard plane once more. Again the whole shopping list was dutifully relayed but -rebel that I am- I volunteered that I'd heard the 'pratique' two or three times before. At Scott's Reef ( a horseshoe-shaped reef in the middle of nowhere) we anchored for the day and did some mildly disappointing snorkelling. The official boat lurking there left us alone until we were about to leave again, but then called with a request for the whole shebang. I was getting quite irate by these repeated calls and enquired if they perhaps shared information with their colleagues, this being the sixth time in four days that I was called to account. The official apologised that he did not receive our details & I reciprocated apologies for being flippant and we went through the routine again.
The next day-just as I was considering meditating my way unto higher planes of consciousness so that I could mentally snowboard down again - we were divebombed by this infernal red/white coastguard plane once more. I was enjoying some harmless nudism on the foredeck and realised that they deliberately flew low and from downwind so as to catch us by surprise. This time ( I am an anarchist! A guerrilla fighter on the barricades in the battle for freedom and privacy!) I hinted at a sensation of déjà vu. The public servant aboard admitted that she had been on the plane on one of the preceding days but nonetheless served me the usual questionnaire once more.
We skipped the Rowley Shoals-just couldn't lay the course in the incessant Southerlies- but once near Australia I contacted Carnarvon customs with a more precise ETA and I requested permission to spend a night at anchor at Coral Bay in view of the 'inclement weather'. We went through the list again, and to ascertain that Australian Bureaucracy missed not a minute mote of vital information it was requested that I email the info too.. But I did get a call back with permission to anchor and a reiteration of the pratique.
I got some mild enjoyment from the thought that high-level meetings were held in the Oz War Room regarding an armada of boats from Indonesia all confusingly called Tribute and probably with sinister intentions converging on the hapless town of Carnarvon.
Another 24 hours of upwind sailing alongside the Ningaloo Reef under a stormjib and three reefs in the main but we made it to Coral Bay where I asked Sea Rescue for permission to use a mooring and I admitted we had not cleared in yet. She conferred with the Authorities, found CALM or DEC unhappy with us being in the marine park but at the end of the day permission was granted. She also said that Carnarvon Sea Rescue was looking for us and if it was OK that she gave them a call.
Thirtysomething knots on the nose the next day, followed by a miserable sleepless cold wet night, but eventually we sailed into Carnarvon. The Customs guy came aboard with the familiar 3 pages of questions (this time including the last six ports of call) and he then handed me his phone so that I could be quizzed by a lady from the Quarantine Department in Geraldton who also berated me for failing to inform her of our arrival. I apologised for our sneaky and stealthy entry into Oz and arranged to meet for an inspection next week. 'With a bill', she said.
Once ashore I discovered that I was expected back at work four days earlier and thus gossip had spread that we were missing, so Sea Rescue had put out an alert and the police had interviewed our next of kin regarding our whereabouts.
I don't think Big Brother is watching us. But thousands of Little Brothers do add up.
