The Atlantic Leg of our Sail, 1970.
Kerrie, lying on a deck chair, watching the horizon, is not with us. Her face is the colour green. I turn to Diann, our newly acquired travel companion saying, ‘She is really crook!’. Diann has a nurse background. She turns to Kerrie, ‘You stay there. I'll get some blankets for you pet.’ Diann was the fix it, caring person in our group.
I follow her to the cabin while watching her hobble and shuffle along, just barely managing to hold onto the thick 2cm ropes slung along the corridors. The Atlantic storms were sending the ship sideways every half hour.
Something tells me she may not be sleeping in the cabin tonight either!
Our room is a 4 - two bunk bedroom without a port hole.
When we boarded the Australia in Sydney, there was the smell of stale cigarettes and beer decomposed in the damp shampooed carpet. The hit of acrid smell lingered.
Relatives arrived to say their good-bye's and give gifts, as a reminder of home.
An emotional time both with tears of laughter and sadness.
Streamers were thrown overboard so that our loved ones could hold the other end. As the ship took off from the wharf the streamers stretched for some time before falling into Sydney Harbour.
Diann was given a 5 pound bottle of Vegemite from her mother to take to England for a relative or friend. Kerrie received a huge teddy bear from her brother. And I… I was holding a red streamer from on the top deck. Below on Circular Quay wharf, was my dad at the other end, he had missed our goodbyes on the boat.
Dad and I were to meet in a month. He was flying home to the Netherlands, to see the relatives for the first time in 18 years. It had been hard to leave his own business with children to support!
