“Then there is the ration basket. It weighs but fifty pounds full, but it carries enough provisions for three persons for five days. In it also are three pairs of thin blankets made of a very light but warm weave of material and a water-filter. It contains, too, some medicines and bandages and lotions in case we have a smash-up. So you see,” concluded Frank with a laugh, “we have a pretty complete sort of a craft.”
After good-byes had been said to the Aztec’s captain and a few of their fellow-passengers who still remained on board, and the last of the dozen cases containing the Golden Eagle had been lowered into the lighter, the little party descended the Jacob’s Ladder and took their places in the bonga. While they had been on board one of the brown-skinned fishermen who manned her had rigged up a sort of awning astern with a spare sail, and this gave the voyagers a welcome bit of shade. With a cheer from the boys her crew shoved off and the bonga heeling to the breeze headed for the palm-fringed shore.
“About time they put about and ran up to the wharf, isn’t it?” asked Harry as the bonga scudded along so close to the shore that the roar of the heavy surf as the big waves broke on the yellow beach could be distinctly heard.
“Here’s where you are going to get a new experience,” laughed Mr. Chester, “I want to see whether such bold air sailors as you boys can stand shooting the surf without being scared.”
“You don’t mean to say that we are going to land on the beach?” gasped Harry.
“That’s just what I do,” cheerfully replied his father. “In a few minutes you’ll see something that will show you that all the wonders of the world aren’t monopolized by New York.”
The men in the bonga were lowering the sails as he spoke and when they had them tied in gaskets each took an oar while the captain ran to the stern with a long sweep.
The men rowed slowly toward the shore till they were almost hurled bow on into the tumbling surf. Suddenly, at a cry from the man in the stern, they stopped work with their oars and the bonga tossed up and down on the racing crests of the big waves while they “backwatered.”
All at once the man with the steering oar, who had been watching for a large wave to come rolling along, gave a loud command. The rowers fell furiously to work. The boys felt the bonga lifted up and up on the crest of the big combers and a second later they were swept forward, it seemed at a rate of sixty miles an hour. The surf broke all about the bonga, but she hardly shipped a drop.
As the long narrow craft raced into the boiling smother of white foam her crew leaped out in water almost up to their necks and fairly rushed the craft up the beach before the next roller came crashing in.