Right to the Edge: Sydney to Tokyo By Any Means (29 page)

‘It has. Right now it’s heading for Hong Kong but it could turn left or right and it could just as easily come back. I want to make sure it’s well clear so we have the time we need to get to Taiwan.’

He showed us our position on the chart. ‘It’s four hundred and twenty miles,’ he said. ‘Two hundred along the coast here in the Philippines, the other two hundred on the open sea. Right now there’s a patch of low pressure developing in the southeast which I’m keeping an eye on. The monsoon is southwesterly, which means the winds and the current are along the port side all the way. If it were northeasterly we’d be sheltered until we left the tip of coast.’

‘How long does the crossing take?’

‘Two and a half days. We do about two hundred miles in a twenty-four-hour period, so if the weather is OK then it shouldn’t take any longer than that.’ Again he indicated the map. ‘What I might do is run up the coast for the first hundred miles to a place called Bolinao Bay; it’s sheltered there and we can sit out any weather if we have to.’

‘That sounds great.’ I liked Derek; clearly he knew his stuff and there was no way he was going to risk anything with the monsoon. I liked the idea of Bolinao Bay too; he told us it was really beautiful and with dive gear on board, if we did have to sit it out there would be plenty to do.

It was settled then. We’d keep our fingers crossed for the weather and all that was left to sort out now was which of us got Cabin No. 1.

Claudio came up with a way of drawing lots - a complicated method he called the Buddha system. Taking a piece of paper, he wrote down our names, mine at the top, then Robin’s and finally his own. On the right-hand side he wrote the numbers 1, 2 and 3, with 1 on the same line as my name, 2 next to Robin’s, and 3 next to his. Then he marked the space between the name and number with some vertical lines and told us to do the same. That done, the trick was to connect your name to a cabin number by drawing horizontal lines to join the vertical ones.

I was immediately suspicious, especially when he told us his dad had taught him the system. But it was that or drawing straws, so we gave it a go. Of course, my name came out at Cabin 3, Robin stayed at 2 and Claudio landed on 1. It was fixed, it had to be. Claudio was just too smug, but there was nothing we could do but accept it, and he settled down in the quietest, most comfortable cabin, just as he knew he would. I suppose that’s democracy for you.

Up on deck I went to the bow and gazed across the flat waters of the natural harbour to where it looked a little rougher out to sea. Coming alongside, Derek leaned on the rail.

‘That’s not good,’ he said, ‘water like that. If it looks lumpy from here you know it’s going to be serious when you get out there. What you want is a mill pond as far as the eye can see.’

Things didn’t get any better. In fact they got much, much worse. In the early morning all was still, but around eight o’clock it began to rain. The wind picked up, the harbour waters began to swell and it rained and rained and rained. Looking at the weather charts, we could see that the typhoon, which had been heading for Hong Kong, had turned its fury on Taiwan instead and was battering the coast. In the meantime we had the weather systems created by the southwest monsoon as well as another large depression working its way up the east coast. Derek said it would settle right over the northern tip of the island and another was beginning to take shape in its wake. Deep down I already knew we were going nowhere by boat.

I was gutted to the point of depression. It had struck again, the hex, the curse . . . whatever it was. I just could not seem to get it together with any kind of boat.

I refused to give up hope entirely, however, and we decided to wait one more night. To pass the time we crossed the harbour in a Rib to find Ocean Adventure, a sea-life centre. I pulled on a wetsuit and in stair-rod rain descended into the depths of the lagoon, where almost immediately a bottlenose dolphin swam up and peered into my eyes. I mean
right
in the eyes. In that moment the worry and the woes I’d been feeling just seemed to melt away.

The dolphin floated with its nose pressed to the palm of my hand and span around like a top, then I grabbed a handful of dorsal fin and it took me for a ride. On the surface I held on to its flippers and belly up it took me across the surface. It was amazing. I’d never swum with dolphins before but now I could see there is something about them, as if they can address issues you’re not even aware you have. No wonder you hear of people with serious depression swimming with these animals and feeling so much better. They are warm-blooded like a human and the contact you have with them is like that you have with another human; only they’re not human, they’re more . . . fundamental somehow. It’s hard to explain. But it was wonderful.

I also met a small, black whale with a bulbous nose and the same type of teeth you find in a killer whale. In fact, the species is named the false killer whale because they look like young orca. This one lifted its head out of the water and danced with me - with my hands on its flippers we whirled like a couple of waltzers.

It was incredibly therapeutic. Later, when we got back to the boat, Derek told us that two more typhoons were on the way, and I just kind of accepted it.

‘I’m sorry,’ he said. ‘But a crossing like this is one hundred per cent about safety and I’d be a fool if I tried to take you out in the kind of weather we’re having right now.’

He reckoned that we would be marooned here for at least five days and we could not wait that long. We would have to fly. I was desperate not to return to Manila so I called a guy we’d heard about who freighted large animals. His name was Joi and he told me he would happily fly us to Taiwan. He had a variety of planes but said that regardless of which one he used, it would take at least three days to obtain the correct landing permits. That was no good. If we were going to wait three days for a plane, we might as well wait five and sail as we had originally intended. Gutted now, I realised there was nothing for it. Like it or not, we were going back to Manila.

SO IT WAS on the evening of 14 July that we finally landed in Kaohsiung, Taiwan. There was a bit of drama with our booking in Manila but eventually we made it. In the airport we met some Bulgarian gymnasts who were competing in the World Games, due to begin in Taiwan in a couple of days’ time. These games showcase sports that are not at the Olympics. Never having been to that kind of event before, I had a go at blagging a couple of tickets to the opening ceremony, and succeeded. Outside we met up with Sunny, a lovely Chinese woman who was going to translate for us.

Over the last few days my energy levels seemed to have dropped a little. When we set out on this adventure I was full of beans and could keep going all day, but now I was finding that I was just bushwhacked come about three in the afternoon. The constant moving takes it out of you and the different beds - indeed the lack of beds some nights - all takes a toll. I’m not saying it’s hard work - it’s too much fun to call it that - but a couple of months on the road can wear you down in the end.

I really didn’t know much about Taiwan. None of us did - not even Claudio, who knows most things about most places. But I had done a bit of research before we left and discovered that Malay people had settled on the island centuries earlier. The first European settlers were the Portuguese in 1544. They named it Formosa, which means ‘beautiful island’.

Kaohsiung is the second-largest city and it was something of a culture shock after Indonesia and the Philippines. It was so modern, the roads not bunged up with jeepneys or motorbike taxis; everything felt clean and new. When I looked around it was hard to find any vehicle more than ten years old.

The plan was to be back in Kaohsiung for the opening of the World Games, but we would spend our first day at a place called Kenting on the southern coast of the island. This was where we had planned to arrive if the boat trip had gone ahead. The typhoon had put paid to that, but for every negative there is a positive, and for Taiwan’s burgeoning surf industry the outgoing storm had left plenty of huge waves.

We met up with a surf dude called Afei, who said he would be delighted to teach me to ride a board. I’d been planning to try it with Dare Jennings when we were in Australia, but the weather had put paid to that too. It was about time we had a little payback from the weather, and perhaps this was it.

I was excited. I reckoned we deserved a day or two just kicking back and having fun after all our travels. We caught the bus to Kenting. It was due to leave at 9.50 a.m., but it set off about five minutes before with just us and a couple of other passengers on board. That would never have happened in the Philippines; there the buses don’t go anywhere until they’re full. Again, the roads were amazingly clear, though the city limits seemed to go on for ever. The driver was quite chatty, telling me how he and his wife liked to travel; they had been to Japan, which he liked, and they were about to go off to the Philippines.

When finally we did leave the city behind, we were into familiar landscape, similar to what we’d seen in the Philippines. The countryside was verdant with palm groves and rice paddies - the only difference here was that the farmers harvested the rice with great box-shaped machines instead of by hand.

Afei met us at the bus stop. He was a typical surf dude, tall and slim with long hair, baggy shorts and the obligatory flip-flops. He greeted us with a big smile and warm handshake and loaded us into his VW van to drive to his surf shack.

‘So how long has surfing been big in Taiwan, Afei?’

‘Only for the last two or three years. Ten years ago there were just a few people surfing, though we’ve always had the waves for it, especially in typhoon season. A couple of years ago, though, it just took off.’

His shack was a really cool V-shaped bungalow, made of wood and painted purple. It straddled a patch of ground between two concrete buildings, directly across the road from the beach. Inside it was humming with people and a black Labrador was sniffing around. Surfboards were stacked in vertical rows and there was a rack of wetsuits, T-shirts and the little rings that attach the board to your ankle. Out front on the patio some people were waxing a couple of boards ready for the water.

‘Have you ever surfed before, Charley?’ Afei asked me.

‘Once, in Cornwall, years ago. I had to wear a really thick wetsuit because it was so cold.’

‘Not here,’ he said. ‘We sell them, but you don’t need a wetsuit here.’

A blonde girl called Erica was hovering around. Afei had painted a mural of Bob Marley on her board and she told me proudly that she would turn professional within a year.

‘Really? Has Afei been teaching you?’

She nodded. ‘He’s teaching me now.’

‘So how many lessons have you had?’

‘Three,’ she said, proudly.

Afei decided that the waves were too big here and suggested another spot twenty minutes up the road. Back in the van we made our way to a small cove where the waves were smaller and a bunch of people had gathered with their boards.

We laid our boards on the sand, and Afei taught me how to push myself from prostrate to my feet in one smooth movement. He showed me the correct place to stand, where to put my feet and the right arm position. After performing a few exercises, I was ready to hit the waves.

Paddling out, I waited for a wave. Afei was chest-deep in the water and when the right one came along he gave my board a shove and yelled at me to stand up.

Up I got. And immediately peeled off to the side.

The next time I got my balance and stayed upright until the wave broke. And then I fell off. Very quickly I worked out that the longer you were on your feet, the more you learned. That might sound a bit obvious, but when you’re upright you quickly get the feel of the board.

Trying again and again, I eventually managed to ride a few breakers all the way to the beach.