In Maui the Japanese community again took us to its heart but this time they had to compete with the hospitality of Al and Verity Collins, known throughout the cruising world as hosts to visiting yachtsmen. Did we want some laundry done? Bring it on up to the house and dump it in the machine. Hot baths? Come on over—any time! Shopping to do? Here’s Al, at the dockside with his car, ready to take you anywhere you want to go.
The climax of our stay on Maui was the two-day trip into Haleakala, the world’s largest extinct volcano crater. With us went our young guest, Alan, enjoying his last adventure before returning to the mainland, despite the minor inconvenience of a broken arm, obtained by falling down our forward hatch. (This was the first accident aboard and we sincerely hoped it would be the last.)
Our last memory of Lahaina is of the farewell party and hula show put on for us at dockside just before our departure. As we cast off the lines to the strains of “Little Brown Gal,” we suddenly noticed that Jessica was still sitting on the edge of the dock, her back to the Phoenix, so engrossed in the performance that she was quite unaware of our departure. Hastily I put the engine in reverse, Moto tossed a line to shore, and willing hands boosted her up over the stern sprit—together with three more cakes and another stalk of bananas in case we should get hungry on the overnight trip to the Big Island (Hawaii).
Sailing on down the Kona (leeward) coast of Big Island, we spent several days in Kealakekua Bay, where Captain Cook was killed. The bronze plaque which supposedly marks the place of his death was under a couple of feet of water, a short distance offshore. We could never have found it without the help of “Cap’n” Glass, a salty-looking old landlubber-turned-yachtsman. Even Cap’n Glass, however, could not tell us how the marker had managed to end up in such an unusual spot. Water risen? Land sunk? We’d still like to know the details.
At Napoopoo we decided to make a further test of our new equipment by beating around South Point and up to Hilo, against both wind and current. I had good reason to believe that the trip would be rugged and some instinct made me suggest that the women go across the island by bus, a trip of only a few hours, to wait for the rest of us in Hilo. Barbara acquiesced with mixed emotions. In her diary she noted: “Deserted the Phoenix. It was a queer, rootless feeling to watch her moving out of the harbor far below us while we were driven along the upper road on our way to the station wagon-cum-bus.”
Four days later in Hilo, she noted in her diary: “Our Phoenix was sighted this evening.... How wonderfully the Japanese grapevine works! Three members of the Hiroshima Ken Society were waiting at the dock when Earle and Ted rowed in to shore for the first time. Already we’re dated up for the Welcome Dinner plus a day of sightseeing around Hilo and another day touring the Volcano Area.”
We were exceptionally fortunate in visiting the Big Island during the 1955 volcanic eruptions, so that we had far more than the usual tourist excursion through Hawaii National Park. New cinder cones were being pushed up daily within easy driving distance of Hilo. In startling contrast to other countries, where volcanoes claim innumerable lives and force a mass exodus, Hawaii’s volcanic goddess, Pele, has a reputation for benevolence. One of the favorite expeditions, day or night, was to the scene of current activity. Tourists and locals alike, serenely confident, flock to watch and photograph her pyrotechnic displays or to scoop up—on a very long stick—souvenirs of molten lava.
I was absorbed, however, with preparations for our long hop to Tahiti, 2,200 miles to the south. The constant work and pressure took up so much time and energy that I almost resented the interruptions of volcanoes, hospitality, and the ubiquitous visitor with his often ludicrous questions. A couple of sailors from a naval ship wanted to know where we kept our gyrocompass—and they weren’t kidding. A Hawaiian housewife, too broad even to attempt getting down the main hatch, expressed incredulity and distress when she learned that Barbara had to get along without a washing machine. And a gang of modern teen-agers, far from envying Ted’s adventure, seemed rather to feel sorry for him because we didn’t have TV!
I was so preoccupied, in fact, that I was completely unaware of Barbara’s feelings or of the struggle she was having with herself as the date of our departure drew near. And not until several years later, after our trip had been successfully completed, did she allow me to read notations she had made in her diary at that time:
This whole period has been an emotionally confused one. Intellectually, I know that no trip to come will be as bad as the hop from Japan, but like the rat who’s been shocked too many times, I have a deep-rooted dread of starting off again. A thousand times I’ve wanted to cry out, “I can’t go on with it—I just can’t!” Yet I know I must. I can’t be the one to let Earle down—and after the trip around from Kona, when the men batched it, and have taken every occasion to tell me how important I am to their well-being and how morale suffered when I was not along.