Now I had to gain a bit of extra knowledge, so I decided to enrol myself in classes on offshore boat handling so that I had a better margin of safety, as I was travelling on my own. Also I had spent a considerable amount of money on radar equipment and charts for my boat, having also bought one of the latest devices called a GPS, which would tell me where exactly in the world I was. This could come in very useful!
As the journey was a very long one from the my home in the Channel Islands I decided to pay a company to take my boat to the Mediterranean for me and leave it in a specific harbour that I decided I would visit first. I intended to fill up the tanks full of fuel and fill the cupboards to the brim when I arrived there as the food and fuel is was cheaper in that part of the world, or so I had learnt from the Internet. After I had sorted the arrangements with the boat travel company and had said all of my good byes to all of my family, I left the security of home on a journey that could be the best or the worst of my life!
When I eventually got to the port of Palmero, I paid the boat travel company and then went to raid the shops to fill my boat full of provisions. After all, this had got to last me a long time, because I didn’t think that many of these small islands accepted credit cards! Now I could finally leave on my journey around the Mediterranean. I started by going to a nearby island that I had heard was very good with visitors so this would be an ideal place to stop off. When I got there, I found that the locals were very friendly and helped me a lot and give me a lot of local knowledge, which would help me on my voyage. They also recommended an island due west of there, which apparently had the best tasting bananas in the world, so I decided to check it out.
As this part of my journey was a very long one I set the Autopilot to take me there while I had a lie down in the front cabin. But at about 5 o’clock in the afternoon my radar alarm started to sound and was telling me that there was an obstruction ahead. I thought to my self that this was a bit odd as I had checked and there were no islands or rocks on the charts. I thought that I must have drifted with the tides, so I got up and slowed down the boat to see what was in front of me. I saw an island, not a big one, but it did have a small volcano in the middle.
Looking on my GPS and then look at the chart and there is no island marked where I am. This was very strange because the charts that I had bought were very expensive so they should have been of good quality. I decided to have a careful look around the island and I discovered that it was a triangular shape with a mountain in the middle. There was lot of greenery everywhere and there were palm trees on the beach. It looked like paradise, but I was taking no chances I would have to be careful, as this island was not on the charts, maybe for a reason?
After much thought, I decided to go on one of the eastern beaches to stop overnight and rest. After I had had my dinner I looked at the island for signs for human life. Looking around I saw no trace of human life. Surprisingly I thought that I could see signs of smoke, maybe from a house. I made my boat secure and I got in my dingy and started to motor ashore. As I was heading to the beach I saw someone in the trees at the top of the beach, I shouted but they obviously didn’t hear me because of the noise of the motor. When I got to the beach I went to the trees to find some footprints. I follow them into the trees. I saw them again but as the trees were so dense, I lost sight of them, but kept on going in the general direction of them. I stayed on the same course and eventually came to a clearing in the trees. There was a house with smoke coming out of the chimney, but there was no one to be seen. I look in the house, it was barren and looked like someone has been “roughing” it there. I then suddenly heard a gun shot and fell to the floor………