The first portion of the journey that is about 1,05,000 kilometres up to Cape Town passed off very enjoyably. On the 2nd day out of Cape Town, they started to encounter strong windstorms. Windstorms did not worry about the narrator. But the height of the waves was alarming up to fifteen meters above that was as high as the mainmast. On the 25th of December, the writer?s ship reaches in the southern Indian Ocean that was about 3,500 kilometres to the east of Cape Town. The family welcomed the New Year on the ship.
At the dawn of 2nd January, the waves were huge in size. Unfriendly weather and massive waves forced the sailors to slow the speed of the ship, drop the storm jib and take various other precautions. The risk was so obvious that the sailors accomplished a life-raft drill, attached the lifeline boats and the life jackets. Unexpectedly at 6 pm, a terrific explosion shook the Wavewalker and the writer was thrown overboard. The Wavewalker was about to overturn when another massive wave hit it throwing it upright one more time. The writer was thrown back again on the deck, his head and ribs were smashing touching the walls of the Wavewalker. In spite of a lot of injuries, the writer took charge of the situation and decided to handle it on his own. Larry and Herb started pumping out water from the ship.
The author somehow managed to cover the canvas across the gaps to stop the water from entering into the ship. Moreover, their hand pumps stopped functioning and the electric pumps short-circuited at the same time. Luckily, the writer found a spare electrical pump that was in a working condition. The entire night everyone was pumping, steering, repairing and sending radio signals for help. The author checked the charts and found that He Amsterdam, a French scientific base was their last hope.
