Chapter 7.
Sports Day Soon after I convinced my wife to let me take all the boys but Franz to the wreck once again, this time to try and fix up the little sailboat that I had seen in pieces on the deck.
She agreed as long as I promised to have them back and not spend a night on the wreck.
It was settled, and we sailed out.
While the boys searched for new things, I tried to decide how to get the boat out.
We didn't quite get the job done and returned to find my wife and Franz on the beach.
Until we have gotten everything we need from the ship, I have decided we should live a tent home.
Trekking back and forth like this is wasting too much time, she said proudly.
It was a good decision and we spent the next days going from the beach to the ship, building the sailboat and coming home to our first beach tent, happy and tired.
Finally, after days, we had built the sailing boat on the deck of our wreck, but now we couldn't get it over the high deck railings of the ship.
The only solution was to somehow blow out one of the railings of the deck to allow us to push the boat into the water.
I found a big cannon shell, filled it with gunpowder, and set a long fuse.
With the fuse lit, I hurried the boys onto our little boat, rowed our way to the beach where my wife was waiting, and just as we landed there was a giant bang on board the ship, with much spoke.
I loaded the boys back onto the little boat and once again we made our way out to sea and to the ship.
There we found our wreck, even more wreck.
Our bomb had worked.
The side of the ship closest to the shore was blown away.
We now could put rollers underneath the sailboat, on the deck of the ship, and let it slide right into the water.
The boys and I then spent our time fitting the sailboat with two small brass guns, much like cannons.
Finally, we set back for the beach with our old boat and our new sailboat and as we got closer I let the boys fire one of the brass guns with a bang.
My wife and Franz ran out from our tent on land.
We could see them jumping with excitement as they saw us.
When we landed we all laughed and hugged, very proud of ourselves, and my wife admired our beautiful sailing vessel.
Now, she said, you have to see what Franz and I have done to make things better here on land.
They took us on a tour of a garden they had made.
We've planted potatoes, sugar cane, fruit trees melons, peas and other vegetables.
My wife explained.
We've put the seeds where they will grow best.
I told her she had done a great thing and as it began to get dark, we headed back to the tent to relax, feeling very tired.
The next day I taught the boys how to use a lasso to catch a wild animal.
We spent the morning practicing, and it was Fritz who became the real master of it.
Later we decided to go back to our calabash wood, as we had named it, to make more bowls and spoons and other things we might need.
We loaded our sled with guns and powder and, with our donkey pulling it, called to our dogs to follow us.
Our little monkey, Nips, would not be left behind, so we carried him along with us as our mascot.
When we got to the coconut stand, Ernest stood underneath a tree.
"'I wish I could have a coconut,' he said.
As soon as the words left his mouth, a coconut landed right beside him, making him jump.
It seemed like magic until another and another fell.
Sure enough, we knew something was throwing the coconuts at him.
We looked up to see that there was something in the tree.'
It quickly dropped down and started chasing Jack as the dogs barked and chased both of them.
It's a coconut crab, I laughed.
It chased Jack around until we finally caught it.
It was difficult making our way through the bush toward the gourds we needed.
We cut our way along with some trouble, until we reached the woods where we set to work, carving our dishes, bowls and plates from the gourds and filling the finished items with sand to help them dry.
We made a fire, cooked our coconut crab, and gave our little monkey some coconut milk.
After dinner, Ernest went for a walk through the woods, but quickly came back shouting, A wild boar!
Come quick!
We chased the boar through the woods madly with the dogs until we had it in a clearing.
We were all excited until we saw that, in fact, it was one of our own pigs that had followed us.
We all fell down laughing again.
After that, we continued on our walk until Jack, who was ahead of us, cried out once again in surprise, "'A crocodile!' he yelled.
"'Come see!'
We again ran, and this time we found a giant iguana, which we captured.
We tied it up so it was safe to carry and took it back to camp over my shoulder.
On the way home, the boys gathered acorns and a new type of fruit which we first gave to the monkey to test.
He ate it happily, so we all tried it and were thrilled to find that it was a guava.
We made our way back to Falconhurst and had an incredible dinner of iguana potatoes and roast acorns with a guava for dessert.
We were getting used to these unusual meals.
