Live Wire

It's Four or Five in the morning. Jean-Pierre and I are on shift. There's still not a sniff of wind. We're in swimming distance of land, but we've no engine, so no steering. We're each laid out flat on either side of cockpit staring at the stars as Valentina listlessly twirls through slow circles.

Come Nine-Thirty, given just a little wind, we've finally made way close to a workable marina, Puerto Del Carmen. Jean-Pierre kick starts the engine. We don't know how long she'll hold, but we don't need her for long.

I make the leap onto a sturdy floating pontoon and we're finally tied to dry land. I should be very pleased, but I'm more concerned with making a quick walk-come-canter down the long concrete pier to find the toilets. I can't speak for the continentals, but I'm English, and I don't shit in a bucket.

Having tested our time limit, I've got messages both from Dug and Vidal who are considering sending for the coastguard or Liam Neeson, but I'm pleased to confirm it's not necessary.

By evening, Manu, David and I are settled in a bar. Manu tells me that I missed one the conversations of the engine's state a day or two ago. He's reluctant to even pass it on, but I assure him I want to know. He tells me that whilst in the engine cave, Jean-Pierre had found a detached and loose wire resting on a pipe near the floor. He goes on to explain that it was a live wire from the alternator that recharged the battery from the natural motion of the turning the prop. He says that had the wire touched the floor of the engine room, it would, most likely, have ignited the various flammables that have been constantly leaking from various crooked engine parts. For lack of the automatic fire extinguisher fitted to most new boats, unabated, that fire might soon have burned hot enough to ignite both the feeder diesel tank and the contents of the rusty three-hundred litre main tank. Then the boat would have exploded quite magnificently and we'd all have died.

You can only laugh.