Tough lessons taught by survival

I was telling readers of a very worrying time in a liferaft, the subject for my next book. (As publishing is about as uncertain as trying to survive in a liferaft, let me put it this way: I hope Drifting to Hell will be accepted as my next book.)

A yachtsman in Cowes asks me to list the lessons the disturbing experience taught me, lessons that could be of value to others who sail.

Many thanks, JW. Yes, let me pass on four important tips, three of which are known but are easy to overlook. First, though, this will be my new number one rule.

If you have the misfortune to have to take to a liferaft, you'll find that the time in there is boring, capital B. Yes, it can be very disturbing, and deeply worrying.

Dawdling time

But the dawdling passage of time is the near-killer. Your life is on the line, and yet liferafters will experience an emotion akin to acute boredom.

Pack in the emergency grab-bag a good and preferably funny book.

The humorous book we had with us was Mark Twain's Innocents Abroad. To read a few paragraphs from that story worked enormously well for us. As mentioned, I had never thought of the value of a book in that vital bag.

Now - just about - it will be the first thing I'll pack.

Here's a little taste of what we read, or listened to when it seemed all hope was lost.

Mr Twain's humour rescued us from the worst aspects of depression.

'She kept up her compliments, and I kept up my determination to deserve them or die.'  Continues on the blogs for my sailing adventure story, Sailing to Purgatory, at SailingToPurgatory.com