Continued from yesterday”¦ We neared a couple low, flat islands at 1700 (5:00 pm) on Wednesday. We changed course to get closer to them so we could be in more protected waters. Unfortunately, they were not a suitable place to stop, but at least in the lee of the island it was a little bit calmer. Christi’s nausea instantly went away and she ate a big meal. Eric felt less nauseous and managed to eat some crackers and drink some Pedialyte. We looked on the charts and found a suitable place to anchor off an island called Bawean that was 24 hours away. After an hour of idling, we pressed on, heading for the anchorage. Moving on was hard for Eric. He struggled with going out knowing the sickness would return. But he managed to do it.

Literally, the minute we were out in the big waves, Eric’s sea sickness returned. As the night wore on the wind and seas again got bigger. By Thursday morning the wind was at 34 with gusts up to 40 and the waves were 12 14 feet right on our nose (head seas). Surprisingly, Christi physically felt OK, but emotionally she was starting to fall apart. She was worried about Eric, who hadn’t held down more than a couple mouthfuls of liquid in over 24 hours. She was exhausted from lack of sleep and long watches. She was back to only eating crackers and grouchy from lack of food. She couldn’t take the stuffiness and she was sick of being tossed around by the waves. But most of all, she couldn’t bear staring at the clock and odometer and seeing how painfully slow the miles ticked by. We were doing half our normal speed, and knowing we were in such miserable conditions and not going anywhere was killing her.

It was time for Eric to take tablets of compazine, which is a strong prescription drug for Motion Sickness. It worked amazingly well. He should have taken it sooner. At around 1700 (5:00 pm) on Thursday, Eric drank a liter of water and actually kept it down. This was a huge relief, since he was now up to 36 hours with virtually no liquids. He was still feeling absolutely miserable. Christi had a nervous breakdown around 22:00 (10:00 pm), complete with hysterical screaming and crying. She fell asleep after, and when she woke up four hours later, she was feeling better. We reached our island destination at 03:00 on Friday morning, but as has been the case several times here in Indonesia, the charts were off, and without accurate charts it was too dangerous to enter the bay in the dark. We did circles in the calmer water of the lee of the island until daybreak.

At 06:15, we entered the bay, chose a spot and began to drop the anchor. But the windlass (machine that lifts anchor and chain up and down) wouldn’t move. We peered into the anchor locker (area under the windlass where all the chain is stored) and saw the anchor chain had managed to knot itself up into a ball. While out there dealing with the chain, Eric noticed that part of our anchor support had fallen off. It is a little gadget that keeps the anchor from banging around when we are out at sea. He was able to save most of it, so in a way it is good the chain got stuck. Had we dropped anchor, the whole support would have been lost for good. Fortunately, with a little finessing of the windlass, we managed to get chain unraveled and successfully anchored.

The anchorage is very rolly and uncomfortable, even with the paravanes out. The current is swift and there are whitecaps everywhere. It also provides very little shelter from the wind. Being here is certainly better than the alternative, so we are not complaining.

After we anchored and got Kosmos settled, Eric began assessing the damage. Our kayaks came loose, and had they been small enough to fit through the railing, would have gone overboard. The dinghy was loose and the cover is chaffing. The VHF antenna holder is bent. The clevis pin for a boom line fell out, and caused the boom to swing. There is a small area on the boom where the paint is gone, chaffed off by the paravane chain rubbing against it as a result of the pin. The back locker that has our propane tanks had come open, and water got inside. Now the propane system sensor is not working. There was a small gash in the gel coat from where the locker door had smashed into it. The forward hatch leaked, but since it is over the bathroom, it was easy to clean up with no damage. All in all, not too bad. The damage certainly could have been much worse. We are thankful Kosmos is like an armored tank. Waves were hitting us quite hard. It was a torrent of water on our front windows pretty much the whole time.

We were both feeling like total zombies and simply were not up to dealing with all these issues. Since we couldn’t go to shore, we spent the day watching movies and trying to recuperate. We were both very sad about not being able to get off the rocking boat and enjoy terra firma for a while. We were also sad about not being able to get a big meal in a restaurant, especially since neither of us was up for cooking anything. And boy, could we have used a big meal!