Jeff interrupted my thoughts coming up with a cup of coffee to take over the helm and end my watch. We actually ran three eight hour shifts for sleeping and there were always two awake but Jeff had been doing some engine maintenance, a job we shared, which had left me alone at the helm. We exchanged small talk for a while and then I headed below, giving Mary Ann’s cabin door a knock as I went past. I put my head down as fell asleep very quickly, a habit which had developed on the trip. I slept for a couple of hours with the feint noises of refueling above. We usually refueled mid ocean, lashed to one of Rupert’s many support vessels. The support on the trip was amazing and the fleet they had just looking after us could have been used to invade a small country. At one stage we threw a pisto
