Now I was always on the VHF trying to contact people and did make many such contacts. One large bulk freighter called the Fort Brontenac actually contacted my home and told them of my situation. This large freighter passed about 3 miles astern of Starcrest as they motored on a great circle route to Kobe Japan from Los Angeles. Finally, at about latitude 46 plus, I made contact with a cruising vessel that I had met up with in the islands. They were headed to points further north than I and said that there was no reason for me to be this far north. They advised me to "flop over now," which I did.

The next day or so took the boat far south. I lost latitude rapidly and was afraid I would end up in Mexico, as a friend of mine did a year earlier. But, this would not be the case. Soon the wind shifted to the north east, then the north. There was now no problem heading east. In fact, these were the most majestic sea conditions I had ever experienced. The beam-to swells were about 10 to 15 feet and they would surge up and down, or undulate much in the fashion that a snake moves its body. In the trough of one wave all I could see was a wall of water. As the boat would surge up on top of these huge swells, I could see forever.

The challenge now was navigating, as sighting the horizon was tricky. I used special 90 degree azimuth bearings which I had to figure by doing the calculations backwards. This could be done twice a day any time the sun or moon was bearing due east or west.

It was about 1,100 miles to the coast after turning east. Soon I began laughing as I knew I was indeed truly homeward bound. Through the next few days, I had to interpolate from the way north and then extrapolate from the way east – just where was I when I turned east? To this day all I can figure is that I was above 46 north and slightly east of 147 or 148 west. That’s about 600 miles south east of Kodiak Alaska. And the weather was cold enough for it to be so.