Sunday morning we headed back from the beach to Carlitos to finish up our reading assignments for coastal survival and to begin ocean survival. The class began with watching a video which detailed the contents of an ocean survival raft and the procedures for operating it and how to survive in it for a long period of time. This video was followed by some survival anecdotes from our teacher Mike Lowe who was a former air force survival instructor who once spent two weeks at sea in a survival raft, apparently by choice. He stressed the importance of establishing duties and a routine since the monotony and boredom of just sitting in the raft can be very mentally taxing over time.
Since it was supposed to be so mentally challenging that people might even get angry at each other it was decided that we elect a captain whose word would be law out on the boat and that every one would have responsibilities. Since the regular IRR raft is stuck somewhere between here and Honduras we hired a local to let us use his boat over night for only 20 hours instead of the regular 24. Since this boat isn't a raft all the normal raft duties like bailing water and pumping the raft had to be simulated since there was no water to bail and no raft to pump.
Before they sent us out to high seas we were all given some sea rations which consisted of 400 calorie cubes that tasted slightly like lemon but were mainly just sickly sweet. Since I hadn't had any at all that day I was super hungry and I had two and a half cubes which seemed like a good idea at the time…little did I know how fateful this decision was.
So at the appointed time we loaded up the boat and the "captain" motored out about 300 yards from the beach and sunk the anchor. Our "captain" promptly donned snorkel gear, told us he'd see us in the morning, and jumped over board. Our first order of duty was to simulate abandoning ship so we all jumped over board and then climbed back in our "raft." We had had plenty of discussion with Mike Lowe about how uncomfortable and cramped we would be on our boat and how that would a constant source of stress, but as soon as we got on it became clear that there was probably at least 2 feet of space between each person.
We had decided to rotate positions every hour so it would be fair for people who happened to have a less comfortable spot than others. About two hours in I started to feel seasick and nauseous and began to rue the hour I ate those sea rations. Its hard to describe but what tasted good at the time still makes my stomach turn; every time I burped I would be rewarded with a sickly reminder of why I should have stuck with my empty stomach. The first person to feed the fish started only about an hour and half in but luckily I never had to. My strategy was to focus on the horizon and to constantly remind myself that any untoward sensations were completely artificial.
The sun set about 6 PM and the temperature started to drop and by 7:30 it had started to rain. At first it was only a sprinkle but soon it turned into a genuine downpour. I had brought a rain jacket which I thought would protect me but it turned out to be an expensive layer of wet clothing. For the rest of the night it went from raining, to not raining, then to raining again just as soon as you had dried out from the last rain.
By sunrise I was definitely ready to get off but I still had to wait till 11 AM when we thought we were gonna get off. We had thought that the "captain" would be back at 6 AM to do some fishing off the boat but when he never showed we started to worry that they might not show up till 3 PM for the regular 24. But at 11 we saw some small dots swimming toward us that could only mean one thing…it was over! When we reached land Jeff and Linda were waiting for us with candy bars and encouragement…it was probably the best welcome I've ever had. Even though we made landfall at 11 I definitely felt like I was still on a boat for the rest of the day.
All in all it was an excellent insight into what the physical and mental reactions would be to surviving on the open ocean but I have no desire whatsoever to repeat it.
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