Stories from a friend

Recently I have had the pleasure of making a new friend. Jens arrived at our dock less than a year ago after some amazing sailing adventures. I asked him how, after sailing much of the world how he found our place in Brentwood Bay? I believe he met some other cruisers in Mexico that recommended Brentwood as a good place to rest up and keep the boat. Jens sails a Bristol Channel Cutter built in 1994 and has sailed it as far as Northern Europe and back.
I have always enjoyed talking to Jens and listening to his stories. He has a rhythm to his storytelling that grabs you and puts you right in the situation.
I asked him to let me read some of his stories and I'd like to share them with you.
Enjoy

Story by Jens Bagh


Traffic Light of the Fairies.

I am not averse to physical fitness but regard the current craze for jogging with some detachment and cannot help wondering whether something is not being lost in the headlong rush towards that elusive goal, physical fitness.

Everyday I meet people jogging along the local pathways puffing, panting and the glazed look in their eyes precluding any recognition of their fellow creatures or intelligent observation of their surroundings.

A poet wrote: “What is this life if full of care, we have no time to stand and stare”, and it certainly is true that we deprive ourselves of some wonderful experiences if we do not occasionally withdraw from the daily rush and the noisy crowds to reflect a little in a quiet spot.

Once it was my good fortune to spend some time on a very isolated coast where signs of human habitation, past or present, were scarce indeed. Wildlife there, though never abundant, was remarkably tame and after a little while one felt in complete harmony with nature. Water was clear and unpolluted and fresh water was readily available from many small streams running down the hillside being fed from higher laying melting snow. In short, the whole place breathed peace and tranquility and had someone suggested that this was the last refuge of the fairies or the wee folk, I would not have been surprised. Little did I realize that the place was so overrun by fairies that they had to have traffic control and even had a traffic light installed on the island.

I do not suppose I was meant to see it and apart from my wife, who saw it at the same time as I did, I never heard anyone else mentioning it. Not that people on that part of the coast were averse to telling tall tales when they did meet - far from it – but possibly the fear of ridicule held them back, because after all, who has ever heard of the traffic light of the fairies!

We first saw the cave entrance as a dark spot on the coastline as we sailed through the narrow inlet to the natural harbour formed by the island, but as the entrance was a difficult one with several reefs blocking direct access, I was preoccupied with steering the boat and did not pay much attention to the shoreline as such. The day was a beautiful one, a clear blue sky overhead and just enough wind to set the waves astir and turn the sea into a pool of shimmering silver. When we had the cave entrance just about abeam and approximately half a cable length away, my wife suddenly exclaimed, “Look, there is a light in there”! With reefs all around us I wasn’t much disposed to do anything but to try to get us into some relatively open water but as soon as I could I turned my head and said “Where”? My wife pointed in the direction of the cave and I saw a diffuse green light coming from the inside of the cave. Then my wife said in a voice which clearly indicated her distress “But a moment ago the light was red”! I could hardly believe my ears, the hair rose on my head and shivers went all up and down my spine. I imagine I sounded more than a little testy when I said, “You mean to tell me that when you first saw that light it was red and that it now has turned to green”? That is right she said! Here we were – more than a thousand miles away from the nearest place known to possess a traffic light and my wife was seeing one changing in front of her very eyes! This obviously was something requiring further investigation. I reduced the speed of the boat, brought it about and we returned the way we had come. Sure enough, the light changed again from green to red and even going through yellow on the way. By this time my hair was standing straight on end but I was determined to see this thing at close quarters. I reduced speed to dead slow and gingerly steered the boat towards the cave mouth keeping a sharp lookout for underwater obstacles on the way. Next time I looked into the cave mouth, the light that greeted me was shimmering silver and it suddenly dawned on me what we had been privileged to see. Water leaking through the cave ceiling had set up a fine spray a little inside the cave. With the exact elevation and direction relative to the cave entrance and our distance from the shoreline we had only been able to observe one of the spectral colours of the rainbow at a time as we sailed by.

In terms of probabilities, the chances of seeing a sight like this is small indeed and I shall feel forever fortunate in having been allowed to see the traffic light of the fairies.

JOB, (East Greenland. 1969-1971.)