EVIL frigate!

---

---

Sat. Dec.6th, 2010

Position: 18 07.78 N
103 09.50W
Location: Punta Lizardo
Time: 1130 (11:30 AM Central US time)
Heading: 299
Boat Speed: 8.3 knots
Wind Speed: 4.2 knots
Wind Direction :239 magnetic
Sea State:0-1 meters
Sail Status: Motor sailing: Mainsail & Genoa

We are Motoring through glassy seas. It is a very calm night with only one vessel contact. Winds picked up this morning for about 1 hour of nice sailing before they died again. We are heading for Mazatlan where we will be re-fueling and checking our weather window to cross the Gulf to La Paz. We show an arrival to Mazatlan on December 8th. On a different note, the night was calm as far as weather and seas; however...WAR was declared.

Let me describe our late night activities...
It was a dark dark night seemingly calm and peaceful but like a stealth fighter in the night, a large frigate bird decided to quietly swoop to our mast and take residence on our wind instruments. After I personally spent about 45 minutes yelling, slapping lines, banging rigging and all together trying to be a nuisance to this creature who I used to like, I only managed to get him to occasionally raise a wing or two, but he remained fastly perched on his free ride. Cyrus joined me on deck and I briefed him on the situation. "We are code orange", I explained, looking upward to direct his attention to the lit wind instruments approximately 100 feet above us on the top of our mast where a large jet black bird balanced gracefully. I was happy to have Cyrus join me to help on our second line of attack. He first attempted to hit the bird with a high powered spot light, thus confusing and blinding him. This was our grand plan. This did not work. The bird remained.

Cyrus then slipped below into the red lit cabin and returned with an orange and decided to throw it close to the bird so to startle him off the mast. This was the point at which I was to blind him with the high powered light... a one-two punch. We are now working in teams with multi-faceted plans...surely we can outsmart a simple bird. Did I mention it was a dark night? So much, that after he did his best Red Sox wind up and threw the orange, we both paused, hoping he would not hit the wind instruments and cause more damage than the bird; however, as we stood staring into the dark, wondering where the orange went, it slams to deck right next to him, blasting to smithereens. Yes, he almost hit HIMSELF. The wind shear apparently was not taken into account with his trajectory. The bird is still there.

At this point, I realized we must think outside of the box, and remembered we have a large fish wind-sock that we fly in ports for good luck. I would imagine a giant flapping fish in the night right under him, might scare him off his perch. Cyrus agrees to my plan and returns with the sock and swiftly clips it to a small flag line as I stand by with the flood-light. The bright rainbow nylon fish sneaks up from behind and flaps wildly about, the frigate did fly! Yahoo! We were so very proud and attempted to deter him from landing again by blinding him with the light, but he returns and happily perches once again.

War has now been declared as he poos on our deck. Various techniques were employed, including swearing at this now vile creature, changing lighting, flashing the light like a strobe in hopes he might have a seizure, steering wildly about so the mainsail flogs, and so on. Realize that this is around 3:30 am and two sleep-deprived humans are now obsessed with ousting this winged evil from its lair. Two hours pass and at the point I am lying on my back, strobing the light and Cyrus is driving wildly about while simultaneously shaking the fish sock wildly about... I hear a SPLAT. You cannot imagine the smell that accompanied this "splat", as our dark-winged Satan bird regurgitates his entire day of fishing down upon me... missing me only by inches. The half digested fish spill upon the deck in a pool of red fleshy stomach acid. Stink splatters and a smell that I can only compare to rotten fish, vomit and gum disease, has me gagging.

An HOUR later, after buckets of water, brushes and sponges... the free-loading, vomit-filled, evil satan-bird is still perched.

We are now humbled and grumbling silently at the satan-bird aloft. We are sure he is basking in his glory and he preens himself smugly. We attempt to ignore him. He has won.

4 hours later, after I have finished my watch, washed my hands about 20 times (I can still smell it) and took a rest... I return to my next watch. I stop at the logbook to see what has happened while I was below. Cyrus' remarks are as follows: "I don't like our free loading frigate" I can sense the defeat in his writing and go on deck. He is still there.




ADDED NOTE:

---