On Passage

Lynne Gladstone-Millar

ON PASSAGE

Our Autumn migration stint of bird-ringing on the Isle of May had been good. A fog and an east wind had brought rushes of Bramblings, Redwings and Song Thrushes on passage and we even had a Bluethroat in the Bain trap. As usual we had been bunking down comfortably in the Low Light, the island's dis-used lighthouse, but by Monday Fred and Fritz, the resident mice, were eyeing our diminishing stores rather too keenly, and a warm bath at home beckoned. Thus - but always with mixed feelings - we closed up the Observatory and clambered down to the Altarstanes where Davie would pick us up in his boat on his way home from his lobster pots. It was late afternoon.

We had our customary greeting from Davie - a wave of his pipe - as he sailed in to the tiny creek and quickly we got everything stowed on board. We were off... .but were we? Davie - and that is not his real name - had fouled his anchor line. I don't know if you have ever been on a boat with a fouled anchor line, but quite simply it means that you are immobilised, as we were to discover. In our case this was on a sea which was getting choppier by the minute, and under a sky which was getting darker all the time. For at least an hour we were tossed about like flotsam and had to stave ourselves off the island's rocks with poles.

The two lighthouse keepers who had seen us off had disappeared up the hill and we had no means of telling whether they were aware of our plight. These were the pioneering days of the Isle of May - no wardens, no researching students, no helicopter pad, and no mobile phones, of course. Just us and the Keepers. The only way they could get in touch with the mainland was by radio telephone. In Davie's boat there were no life jackets and, a sin without pardon, no navigation lights.

We realised that things were bad for two reasons - the question of our survival and the compromise of Davie's reputation. (I like to think the first was the more important in Davie's mind.) No fisherman wants to call out the lifeboat because he has fouled his anchor line, and the lack of life jackets and navigation lights would not help his cause.

The sea took us farther away from the island. It was almost pitch dark by now. We were so low in the choppy water that we could not see the coast on either side. The River Forth had become the Atlantic Ocean.

Fear is indefinable. Yes, I did feel fear - I am sure we all did - but what I remember more than anything else was the loneliness, the searing, soul-piercing loneliness of it all. I learned that you could be lonely, when not alone. The three of us sat, silent. I know I did actually contemplate the possibility that we might all drown, and that this would be my last day on this earth, but it was with a curious detachment. Does nature close down reality for us humans in times of great danger?

It was cold. The silence was startled by the keening of a solitary Herring Gull. We lost all sense of time, but it must have been after over three hours when suddenly Davie's seaman's eyes spotted a small light bobbing up and down on the horizon. Were we hallucinating? Gradually, so very gradually, it came nearer and nearer. To Davie's huge relief it was not the lifeboat, but a chum of his from Anstruther who had come to our aid. The Keepers must have seen our predicament, and radio'd for help. With incredibly skilful seamanship, the crew got a line to us, and Davie tied it to a spar of wood that ran round the prow. We were on our way home.

I don't know if you have ever been towed by a boat, but the fact is that neither the rescuer nor the stricken vessel has brakes. We were both at the mercy of the sea. Sometimes we plunged frighteningly near each other, at other times we were flung far apart. The sea was getting rougher all the time.

I am blessed - or cursed - with a vivid imagination, and suddenly I thought when the rope between us was stretched as taut as could be: "If that rope breaks, we will be decapitated by the backlash." This seemed to be a far worse fate than being drowned.

As if on cue, there was then a loud noise like the very crack of doom itself. Our reactions were spontaneous. All three of us threw ourselves down into the bottom of the boat in among the lobster pots and general guddle. Of course if decapitation had been the fate lined up for us I don't think for a moment that this action would have been quick enough However, we were spared. What had happened was that the spar of wood on the prow of Davie's boat had snapped off with the strain, and it was now bobbing away in the water attached to our rope.

With yet another brilliant piece of seamanship our rescuer managed to manoeuvre near enough to throw the rope again. I don't know what Davie tied it to this time - I daren't look.

As if this drama were not enough, we saw bearing down on us what seemed like the largest aircraft carrier in the whole fleet. It was not, of course. It was a destroyer from Rosyth, but to us so far down below it seemed to be a leviathan. It had full lights on, floodlighting the Estuary. By this time all the shipping in the Forth had been alerted to the fact that there was a boat on tow with no lights.

By the time we had limped into Anstruther, word had got round. The harbour was ringed by fishermen puffing their pipes and looking down at us. They helped us up the ladder, with greetings that spoke volumes. It was simply, "Aye man". "Aye man".

Fish and chips washed down with brandy never tasted so good.