Captain's Log

Regular readers of BWS will know that I often mention the sights you will see when you embark on an ocean voyage, the pelagic birds and the little shorebirds that get blown offshore, the dolphin and whales, the Portuguese men-of-war, the basking sharks and sea turtles, the awe inspiring sunrises and sunsets and the moon waxing and waning.

So one of the reasons I eagerly accepted an offer to sail in this year's Caribbean 1500 was to have time offshore in a region of the North Atlantic between Virginia and Tortola that I have known to host many dolphin and whale and many sea birds.

But this year the North Atlantic seemed a different place. I can't say that I have undertaken any scientific research to figure out why it was we saw so few creatures, but here is the tally.

Leaving Norfolk, we had the usual overhead visit from the local seagulls. As we sailed down the shore we should have seen terns or shorebirds but didn't. Off Cape Hatteras we saw no birds at all. Heading southwest into the Gulf Stream, we saw one dolphin dash by close aboard, but it didn't stop to visit and was traveling alone. In the following two days, crossing the stream and emerging into the calmer and quieter waters south of the stream, we saw nothing even though the southern wall of the stream is normally overflowing with fish life and the larger predators that come to feed on them.

On the fourth day we entered the westernmost reaches of the Sargasso Sea and found many hundreds of acres of Sargasso weed. Usually you find sea turtles lounging around the patches of weed and it is normal to catch a mahimahi in the area since they like to idle under the weed and feed on the small creatures that live there. No turtles, no mahimahi.

The next day we were visited by two tropical birds, which was great although they just flapped by and disappeared in the direction of Bermuda. We still hadn't seen a petrel, a Mother Carey's chicken or a shearwater. Maybe we were too far south.

A day later we saw the strangest thing. We were 500 or more miles from the U.S. coastline and there, flapping around, we came across a small flock (five or six) of great blue herons. They must have been heading south on their usual migration but, by our calculations, were 300 miles off course. They looked tired, too.

We did hook a skipjack south of the stream, which made a fine dinner, and two days later we caught a monster yellowfin tuna that fed us handsomely for the rest of the trip. But no sharks came by to investigate the gallons of blood we washed overboard when cleaning the yellowfin.

We found only one flying fish on deck during the whole passage, despite blazing lights that emanated from the boat all through the night. And still no dolphin. And as we left the Intertropical Convergence Zone and entered the trades we saw one lone Portuguese man-of-war, which had its pink sail set and seemed to be heading north. After that nothing.

This was one eight-day passage through a large ocean. Yet, it made me wonder where all the sea life had gone. Maybe we just missed it. Or maybe what we are hearing about the effects of global warming on our oceans is true. Whichever is the case, it sure seemed empty out there this time.

Fair winds,