Two weeks at home revived me. I didn't get much rest as Mary worked me hard and the kids filled my day, yet it relaxed me. My body was worn down, but my spirit recharged. Fishing in the Gulf of Alaska was a world of its own, one that overpowered everything and became the only reality. Back home my family centered me. Home renews me. It has always kept me sane and whole.

I should have been thinking about the sea when I returned to Homer. I collected Billy who had rounded up two crew members. We had ample fuel for Kodiak and I brought boxes of food, so we loaded the food and set out. Without checking the weather. We would need to add bait and ice to our holds before we could fish, but as we were going to fish Kodiak we would pickup those provisions there. Ice and bait were provided by the canneries, the bait at a price and the ice for free as long as you delivered your catch back to that cannery. For this reason we would go to Kodiak Village before we set gear and get our ice and bait there.

The seas between Homer to Kodiak were generally rough, but manageable for any boat expected to work the Gulf of Alaska. Manageable meant fifteen to twenty foot seas. When we cleared the protected waters of Kachemak Bay and entered the relatively protected English Bay it began to get nasty. When we turned east to take the Kennedy Entrance for the passage north of the Barren Islands we encountered thirty-five foot seas. I'd taken the North Wind through thirty-five foot seas numerous times, so wasn't worried about handling those seas. However, I would not have chosen to go through them. Had I known it was this bad we'd have stayed in Homer, which would have meant paying Billy's tab at the Salty Dog so he could continue drinking. Still, I'd rather pay Billy's bar bill than sail through these seas. It's one thing to be at sea and encounter thirty-five foot seas in a thirty-eight foot boat, then you have no choice, but no sane skipper would begin a trip knowing he'd immediately encounter such violent seas.

I should have checked the sea conditions before leaving Homer. Being on a personal high from contact with my family I had over looked the most basic tenet of piloting either a boat or airplane: check the weather. I really should have known better.

I polled my crew and we agreed to push on to Kodiak. The seas made the trip uncomfortable, but not overly dangerous as the North Wind had proven itself worthy to the challenge, as had her skipper. On a flat sea the 170 mile trip from Homer to Kodiak Village would have taken the North Wind twenty-four hours at its slow seven mph cruise speed. However, there was no such thing as a flat sea in this part of the world. Just like driving a mountain road, sailing heavy seas are mostly up and down. There's also the added delay of being blown off course by the heavy seas, current, and wind. Not only was the route made longer by going up and down the mountainous waves, but also by the curves thrown by the ever shifting elements.

It was a long and brutal trip across the straight. Forty hours after leaving the harbor on Homer Spit I sighted the lights of Kodiak Village. At that point we were still beaten by the steady drum of thirty-five foot waves and heavy cross winds, but I knew at any moment we would come into the lea of Kodiak's land mass and at that point most of the heavy southern seas would be blocked. At that point the big thirty-five footer's would change to a manageable ten foot sea. It was a pitch black night, so I could not see the land mass to judge when I would be protected from the southern seas. And I could only see the lights of Kodiak Village while at the very top of one of those thirty-five foot waves, but I could tell from the position of the lights that we would reach the protected lea point in an hour or so.

I had spent the last thirty-five hours standing the helm of my boat. Billy brought me coffee, food, and even emptied the Gatorade jar I urinated in. Other than that, even Billy stayed below deck in the nasty storm. After thirty-five hours of the same brutal beating sea I was running the boat in my sleep, or very close to it. The sea has a rhythm that every skipper learns to read. I've found that it is often the most dangerous seas that have the most consistent rhythm and this was one such sea. The waves were about sixty feet apart and thirty-five high and consistently both. This is a well placed sea condition for a thirty-eight foot boat, meaning not too tight together. Had my boat been seventy foot, the sixty foot separation would have been brutal as my stern would be high on the last wave, pushing my bow low into the next one. As it was I had room to clear one wave before climbing the next.

Climbing the wave is an apt description. After cresting the top of a wave I had to pull power back to one third so we didn't build too much speed down the steep back side of the wave. Once in the level "trough" between the waves I'd add two thirds power on the short level ground, then full power as I began to climb the next wave. The North Wind needed every one of it's eighty-five horsepower to climb those thirty-five foot waves. It was a tedious and repetitive job, one I could not afford to mess up, but it had been so consistent that I napped off and on. Just like the drown-proofing course the Coast Guard taught, the movement became so natural with repetition that there was no longer any stress, even though a wrong move could result in the death of my crew and I.

It was under these conditions that I'd been watching the lights of Kodiak Village at the crest of every wave. The north entrance to Kodiak is a bit dangerous with rocks and jutting land mass, but I knew the waters well. I'd never entered Kodiak in seas this big, but was aware of additional danger from submerged rocks that could strike a boat's hull deep in at the bottom of one of those big wave's trough, so I was careful to make a line with my compass heading and the lights of town to prevent being grounded on the rocks. For this reason I diligently noted the lights at the top of each wave. This is the reason I became alarmed when I couldn't see those lights at the top of a wave.

Had the lights of town suddenly went out I'd have to make a decision about continuing on or turning about. Knowing that any minute I would enter the lea and much calmer seas caused me to immediately opt to continue on if the lights had went out. Thinking that a cloud might have blocked the lights I looked up at the sky through my windshield. As they had been the sky was clear. As I looked at the stars they disappeared. The sky above me was black. At this point we were in the low trough between waves and cruising at two-thirds power. Seconds passed since the stars disappeared before something clicked in my brain. It wasn't even close to a conscious thought of what had happened when my subconscious brain kicked in causing me to ram the throttle to full power. I didn't know why I added full power in the low trough between the waves, but I knew it was the right thing to do.

Before this moment I'd never seen a rouge wave. Though they were things of legend among sailors everywhere, rogue waves were real enough. Rare, but not so rare as we would like. A rogue wave occurs when one wave joins another and combine their strength and size. So a sea of twenty foot waves would produce a single rogue wave of forty feet. I later learned the sea conditions that night were ideal to produce a rogue wave. Though this is not always the case, generally a rogue wave occurs in a steady sea condition as I was experiencing. Though it took my conscious brain half a minute to catch up with my intuitive reaction, my reaction was perfect, though nothing I could have done would have been enough to climb the seventy foot wall of water.

As the North Wind began its long climb up the monster wave I was completely in the dark. Literally. To protect my night vision I'd extinguished every light in the pilot house and the boat's exterior. (Its illegal to run without navigation lights, but I was more concerned about survival.) All night I'd used starlight to see the sea ahead of me, but now, all I could see was pitch black sea. Knowing the wave was high enough to block out stars was a bit unnerving.

With the bow pointed up at a forty-five degree angle we climbed half the seventy foot high mountain of a wave before the North Wind's four cylinder Perkins diesel engine was overwhelmed. The angle of our climb alone was enough to wake the crew. As the first guy stumbled out the crew quarters the North Wind broached. Lacking power to climb the wave the boat turned sideways, tipped heavily to starboard, then slid down the wave. A bad thing. A boat that broaches on a wave twice its size rolls over and sinks. It happens fast and is one of the most deadly ways for a boat to sink.

As the boat broached I lost all pretense of control. Acting on instinct I did two things. I pulled the throttle back to neutral and opened the exterior door, then pulled myself towards it. I grabbed the hand of the first crew guy with intentions of pulling him out with me. The only reason I didn't dive out the door and into the thirty degree sea was that the centrifugal force caused by riding the massive wave sideways to starboard pinned me to the wrong bulkhead since the exit was on the port side. To the crew I shouted, "Get out!"

We were could see the lights of Kodiak Village, yet our odds of survival in the cold and turbulent water were near zero. Yet we had to try. As soon as the boat made its expected roll I was prepared to dive through the open door and into the water. I let go of the guy's hand and again screamed for everyone to get off the boat. The other guy was closer to the door than I and better rested, so he managed to make it to the exterior door. He looked back at me and I shouted "Go!" That's how sure I was that the North Wind was going to roll over. He understood too because he crawled through the door. I don't mean to make this a cliff-hanger, but this is how it happened. At that exact moment I felt the subtle difference in movement as the boat neared the wave's crest. We were still side ways, but had reached the top of the wave.

Acting with the strong survival instincts I've always possessed, I lunged for the departing guy, caught his ankle and pulled him back into the cabin. He didn't need a lot of convincing to stay on the boat. We had fully crested the top of the wave and had started down the big wave side ways. I added half power for steerage then turned my rudder toward the base of the wave. In my mind I equated it to recovering from an airplane stall.

All the crew were now crammed in the pilot house. I screamed, "Survival Suits." We drilled this before leaving Homer so everyone knew where their suit was and how to put it on fast. While the two new crew guys were climbing into their suits Billy passed one to me. Billy calmly held his survival suit in one hand and a thermos of coffee in the other.

We were half way down the monster wave when I spotted another seventy foot wave behind it. Back to back rogue waves. I didn't think that was possible. It was like the sea, wind and moon were all conspiring to kill me.

I have yet to read Moby Dick, but I understand I responded much like Captain Ahab. I went to full power and started cussing the wave. One of our crew, an educated fellow, later said my tirade was a fine example of the sailor's full vernacular and a tribute to Captain Ahab in Moby Dick.

When we started up the second rogue wave we were going so fast that I thought we might actually climb the thing. The crew saw it too and began to chant "Go, go, go," as we climbed. About ten feet shy of the top we broached again. This time it felt like we slid sideways down the wave forever until the wave had passed. When it passed I pointed into the sea again and hit the next wave with full power, still cursing. The next wave was a normal thirty-five footer, so I had to back off the power to keep from burying us into the sea at the trough. After the second rogue wave we rode exactly ten normal thirty-five foot waves before we reached the lea of Kodiak Island, where the seas settled to lake like ten footers. We laughed all the way to the dock.

I bought a round and joined the crew. As we told our story to fisherman they gathered and cheered the North Wind, and bought drinks for her crew. Not normally a drinker, I had many beers that night. The fishermen rightly cheered the boat and not the skipper because there was nothing I could have done to climb those pair of monstrous waves. We survived because of the boat. The North Wind was an ugly brute, but a well built brute that could handle any sea on earth. She never let me down. It's bad luck to rename a boat, or I would have re-christened her "My Mary."