Sharks, Dali and Waltzing Matilda: Explorer recalls epic raft journey
February 4, 2014 -- Updated 1601 GMT (0001 HKT)
The rafts were
built from balsa wood sourced in the Ecuadorian jungle because of its
durability and the fact it was used by tribes to construct rafts in the
centuries long before the Conquistadors came to South America.
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The Las Balsas voyage 1973
That was the year he
graduated from St. Joseph's University in Philadelphia, celebrated his
24th birthday and married his first wife.
It was also the year he set sail on a trip that would enter the record books as the world's longest known raft expedition.
Fitzgibbons was one of the "Las Balsas" explorers, a group of 12 hardy men led by the charismatic Spanish explorer, Vital Alsar, who set sail from Ecuador on three vessels fashioned from little more than tree logs.
Their aim? To reach
Australia, some 9,000 miles away across the South Pacific. In the
process, they hoped to prove that the Pacific Islands could have been
populated by migrations from South America in the centuries before the
Spanish Conquistadors arrived.
Alsar had made two attempts at the trip before. The first ended when his ship sank after its wooden frame became infested with teredo worms. The second -- known as "La Balsa" -- was successful, although many wrote it off as a fluke that could never be repeated.
The Las Balsas crew were
out to prove the doubters wrong in what they hoped would be the first
recorded multi-raft crossing of the Pacific.
"It was an adventure,"
says Fitzgibbons, wistfully recalling how his participation in the
voyage came to be. "Everyone thinks of these things from when they were a
kid and here it was in front of me."
He was introduced to
Alsar via a mutual acquaintance in Mexico City a year before the trip.
He recalled being impressed by the Spaniard's knowledge on an array of
subjects as well as his philosophical demeanor.
"He was like Santa Claus meets Jesus Christ," Fitzgibbons says of the heavily-bearded Alsar, "like electricity to be around."
Ten other suitable
candidates were soon carefully recruited from across the world.
Fitzgibbons was one of three Americans while the others hailed from
Mexico, Chile, Ecuador, Spain and Canada.
Each had to speak at
least three languages, be capable of navigating at sea and make a scale
model of the boats they would soon build together using instructions
provided by Alsar.
Mike Fitzgibbons (right) with a model vessel (Courtesy Mike Fitzgibbons).
While being an important
lesson to familiarize the crew with the ships they would sail on, it
was also a PR opportunity for the mission.
Alsar gave the models to
an array of public figures and politicians to promote the voyage,
including the surrealist artist Salvador Dali. In return, Dali donated
an original painting which would be placed atop the sails of the vessels
when weather permitted.
The balsa logs
The crew arrived in
Ecuador early March and immediately set out for the jungle. Once there
they sought out and cut down a number of balsa trees from which they would build the vessels.
Balsa wood was chosen
because of its strength, durability and the fact it was used by tribes
to construct rafts in the centuries before the Conquistadors came to
South America.
After a week, the group
gathered the wood they had collected and sailed down a nearby river to
the port city of Guayaquil, where they would construct the vessels.
"We built them right
there, shaped them, cut them," says Fitzgibbons. "Three rafts with their
cabins. They were very sturdy. They could take high winds, high waves.
They were just like planks on the water. There was no rocking, we would
just go up and down."
As the sailors set out
to sea, Fitzgibbons recalls there were few nerves. Each man had prepared
well and was focused on the upcoming mission.
"We were convinced
through Vital that, as hair-brained as everything may have seemed, it
was well planned, thought out and safe," he says.
"You knew you would have
your challenges but everything you would do, you knew you did it for
the day you would arrive in Australia."
On board, the men
divided tasks. Each would take two-hour shifts to sail in the morning
and once again later in the day. Chores such as keeping the logs clean
of seaweed and slime were also split, as was cooking.
The main pleasure of
life at sea quickly became food. The group brought with them small
rations of rice, beans and some preserves like marmalade and jams, while
rainwater was captured in buckets. Their main nutritional source,
though, came from the ocean -- spending much of their time catching
tuna, mahi-mahi and small pilot fish.
"Food became something
you obsessed over. You daydreamed about things you couldn't get. There
was no milk, there was no cheese," Fitzgibbons says. "There was not much
talk about sex because you didn't care, you were hungry. You didn't
think about it. Food became your big delight."
Sharks begin to circle
Attracting tasty morsels
to catch was never much of a problem. Barnacles soon started attaching
themselves to the boats once at sea. This attracted small ocean
creatures, which in turn lured larger marine life, which attracted fish.
Before long, sharks were
following in the wake of this mini ecosystem, while curious whales were
a frequent sight alongside the rafts.
An sailor catches a mahi-mahi fish (Courtesy Mike Fitzgibbons).
"The sharks were pretty
obvious. You'd see them coming around for the other fish," Fitzgibbons
explains. "We didn't mess with them too much. Only twice did we kill the
sharks that were keeping the food away.
"There was one time we
had hammerhead sharks that one man didn't realize were there. He threw a
big tuna head out into the water on a line. This was picked up by the
hammerhead. It literally started to turn the raft around until the line
broke. That's how strong it was. It was an ugly-looking thing. Huge, but
ugly."
Hungry sharks weren't
the only danger out on the open water. The weather was also a force to
be reckoned with. On one occasion, when the ships were passing Tonga, a
particularly violent storm struck, lasting for eight days.
"It was pretty severe.
We had six days of just rain and then the last two days it was just huge
waves that had built up over the time of the storm. You couldn't even
see the other vessels as they disappeared into the trough of the wave,"
Fitzgibbons remembers.
"It was frightening just
listening to the noise of the wind. It was so strong that the lines
holding up the sail would vibrate like the string of a guitar because
they were that taut."
Amid the chaos, one of the three vessels became damaged and separated from the others.
"We didn't realize until the morning that they were gone," says Fitzgibbons. "It was worrisome as we didn't have radio contact.
"We just kept sailing
and kept to the routine as we had agreed to before. Everyone was silent
at that point. Then, after seven or eight days, there they were on the
horizon. It was great. Their radio had failed. They could hear us but we
couldn't hear them. It was remarkable."
Such experiences,
although terrifying at the time, have come to define the trip for
Fitzgibbons. Alongside the moments of great laughter and comradeship,
which he says were frequent, he learned most from them.
"When you're trying to
be reflective about these things, it would have felt like you weren't on
this expedition if you didn't come through that," he says.
"It made me see how
people could function together and get through things. Sure, we were
tired and wet and cold, but we got through it."
The final stretch
Eventually, after 179 days at sea and a distance of 9,000 miles, the Las Balsas crew had made it to Australia.
Bearded, bedraggled and
exhausted, they landed on the shores of Ballina in New South Wales,
where they were greeted by an excited local community.
The sailors had learned how to sing and play "Waltzing Matilda,"
a folk song often referred to as the country's unofficial national
anthem, during their spare moments at sea and they performed the ditty
for their delighted hosts.
Adapting to life on land once again, however, took some getting used to.
Some of the explorers
have since spoken about how they didn't get on with others in the group
when they got back to land, but Fitzgibbons talks highly of everyone he
sailed with.
He reserves the highest praise for Alsar, though, whose vision and strength of character made the journey possible.
It wasn't until they
were almost ashore he realized the pressure the captain was under,
ensuring all of the men he had persuaded to take part in his crazy
adventure had got there safe.
"I watched the worry
just drain out of him. I thought, 'My God, he did this,' " Fitzgibbons
says, his voice breaking with tears. "It still makes me emotional just
thinking of it.
"He made this happen and
he got us there. I'll never get over that. Everything else you can make
in a movie. You can't make that up."
The 40th anniversary of
the Las Balsas voyage came to pass last November, and a reunion
celebration was held in Ballina with several of the sailors attending.
A small memorial displaying one of the rafts used during the journey remains in the town's maritime museum to this day.
This exhibit aside,
however, Las Balsas hasn't stuck in the popular consciousness in the
same way that other famous Pacific ocean raft adventures have.
The Kon-Tiki raft voyage in 1947 (Courtesy Getty Images).
The Kon-Tiki voyage undertaken by Norwegian explorer Thor Heyerdahl and five others in 1947, for example, has its own museum in Oslo. A 2011 feature film on the journey meanwhile was nominated for the award of best foreign language film at the Oscars.
Although a mightily impressive feat in itself, the Kon-tiki only sailed from Peru to the Polynesian island of Raroia, where it struck a reef. This meant it traveled roughly 5,000 miles less than the Las Balsas vessels.
For Fitzgibbons,
however, recognition was not what the journey was all about. In fact, he
kept his mementos of the journey hidden away for a long time.
"When Vital visited me
once, he didn't see anything in the house and he asked me, 'Where are
some of your souvenirs from the trip?' I said I didn't want to share the
story. He said, 'It's your story, you should.'
"So now," he pauses, before composing himself one final time. "Now, I do."
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