Loco

“My cabin is on the forth poop deck” I exclaim in a letter to my family, laughing away to myself like a naughty child. They were probably relieved to see that my sense of humour and sanity were in tact after my initial panic about life at sea.

Little did they know that I had spent half the morning choreographing a jigsaw puzzle celebration dance, and the other half doing cartwheels in a boiler suit I found under my sofa. Boredom can drive you to some terrible things, but none were so bad as my decision to read a Danielle Steele novel.

My lovely sailor buddies, Viktor, Alex and Andrev, from Russia, Lithuania and Ukraine respectively, were bringing me great joy and I was slowing developing a social life on the boat. I had a phone in my cabin and I would let out a squeal of delight whenever it rang. Viktor called to say he’d found another Abba DVD; Andrev could see a whale from the bridge and wanted to know if I needed to borrow his binoculars, and Alex pretty much just phoned for a chat. However, this social life only occurred after they finished work and so I was forced to spend the rest of the day with myself.

On arrival I’d begun by exploring the boat. It was two hundred metres end to end, with cargo stowed above and below deck. There was a teeny tiny swimming pool, a dartboard without darts, a ping-pong table and a library with a wide selection of Polish literature.

Although the entertainment facilities left a little to be desired, my cabin was lovely, far better than I had expected and a pleasure to be in. Twin beds in one room, adjacent to an en-suite bathroom, complete with miniature soaps. Next to that was my own private day room with a desk, sofas, calendar (to count down the days) and plenty of space for important time-fillers like prancing around in my lifejacket.

I read my book during the day, taught myself some Spanish, attended the frequent meals (brunch, elevenses, afternoon tea) and slaved away over my 1000 piece jigsaw. I visited the TV room and enjoyed a private screening of Miss Congeniality, and part 4 of 5 in a VHS box set on the history of the Great British Railway. Why this video was there remains one of life’s great mysteries, and thinking about it kept me occupied for some hours. But even with this weighty issue on my mind, boredom started to creep in.

By day ten my jigsaw dance was second to none, my tan was coming along nicely and I was quite sure I could pinpoint our exact location on the map. I’d had a go at steering the boat, studied the weather reports, and begun to identify constellations from a celestial sailing poster on the bridge. All things considered I was having a jolly good time. But then something terrible happened.

As if possessed by some crazed housewife, I found myself in the library plucking the solitary English book from the shelf: a Danielle Steele romance. The name of the book escapes me. I think I’ve blocked it out. But the cover was pink, I should have known better.

But with time to kill and a lack of entertainment I was fooled into thinking it was a good idea. Boy meets girl, girl is secretly a princess, love ensues…what did I expect?! As I finished the novel a fit of insanity took over me. I abandoned my stance on littering and sent the book flying into the depths of the Atlantic. I felt I had done the world a great service.

As I watched the book float away, its pages already under attack from the corrosive salt water I felt my sanity return. Somehow by throwing that book to its watery death I had freed myself from the boredom. Suddenly the time was flying past. Time flies like an arrow, fruit flies like a banana. Day 14. Land was in site!