Читать книгу Little Ship of Fools. Sixteen Rowers, One Improbable Boat, Seven Tumultuous Weeks on the Atlantic онлайн

77 страница из 92

At times I wondered what the Phoenicians or Vikings or, centuries later, the Spanish, French, and Dutch had eaten on their sea voyages. Certainly not foil packs of Bubba’s Kountry Kitchen Dehydrated Crab Gumbo (MSG-free). Or U.S. Challenger freeze-dried ice cream bars. The English, according to our British crew member Liam Flynn, ate hardtack and dried lard—and “probably lots of other really dodgy and awful stuff.”

Steve, more than I, was appalled as all of this provender, pack after pack of it—in garbage bags, in duffel bags, in dry bags, dozens upon dozens of them—was shoe-horned into the holds and hulls and onto the galley shelves of a vessel that was already weighed down with perhaps a ton and a half of hardware and appurtenances that were not aboard when we feathered so delicately down the channel off Shelter Island.

Since then, David had added four monstrously weighty solar panels that lay atop the cabin; and a pair of wind generators whose whirligigs, half as big as airplane propellers, sat twelve feet above the bridge on steel stanchions; and a thick and complex wiring harness that carried power to heavy storage batteries in one of the holds and from there to the GPS and autopilot systems, and to deck lights and running lights, and to a pair of bulky desalinators in the front holds, as well as to a half-a-dozen wall sockets where camera batteries and iPods and the boat’s two SAT phones could be recharged. He had added cooking equipment and first-aid supplies and tools; and a spare rudder; and four spare oars; and a porcelain toilet; and sump pumps; and extra bracing; and a pair of inflatable life rafts; and survival suits.