Mike Mate

Lucky with the weather – to drop a camera between two and three-hundred meters below the surface – in sunshine and absolute stillness we capture quality images. Twelve miles to the east the snow-white mountains of West coast Norway sparkle through crisp spring air, it is one above freezing. But where Lophelia grows way down below us there is only darkness. Our camera has bug-eyes on stalks, spotlights, which illuminate strange shrimp crawling forward, darting back. Shrimp live four years. Then the camera goes a bit further and the cold water corals, motionless but alive – living for eight thousand – come into view. We work day and night, taking advantage of the good weather window. A trawler passes nearby. Greenpeace wants this area (and some others) protected, off-limits to the bottom trawlers – not a large area to protect, just a drop in a plundered ocean. Surely human-kind can give a little slack. Scientists recommend 40% of the oceans be closed to fishing, as marine reserves, before we loose it all.

We spent the weekend sheltering from snow, rain, hail and wind in Ålesund. Our berth alongside a busy road was also opposite a petrol station and a night club – we could not lower the gangway, it would have projected into passing traffic. At night it was worse. Shortly after 2am, when all the crew were tucked away in bed, the night club doors opened and spilled their contents onto the icy streets. Drunks began mingling around the petrol station pumps and our presence came to their dim attention. They weaved and staggered across the road in front of cars, like zombies, to reach their urinal, their spittoon, the Rainbow Warrior. An enormous fellow reeled, unable to steady himself, he kicked at the steel hull, screaming murder. Extra crew were woken up for reinforcement. When one of the zombies tried to clamber on board the boat a barrage of Spanish came at them from out of the shadows of the main-mast – the Viking stopped in his tracks – a coke bottle flew across the deck. For hours the Rainbow Warrior was harassed and at one point it was noticed that there were no ropes holding us to the roadside – they had all been thrown off the bollards and it was only the wind that kept us pinned in position.

It is beautiful, here in Norway, both above and below – the snow white mountains to the cold water corals. Due to weather we were forced to travel up the inward passage from Bergen to Alesund, through the Fjords, it was spectacular. These scenes are the ones found on tourist’s postcards, and seen by passengers from the decks of cruise lines in summer (when there is less snow). But here we are, a little boat filled with my favourite people on our own journey through spellbinding scenery. Bergen is where Edvard Grieg was born and inspired to compose – I let classical music flow gently out the bridge doors and across the still water as we navigated the Fjords, complimenting the dramatic landscape. And I found myself pondering the purpose of it all – why is there so much beauty on this planet?
Off ‘Briedsund Djupet’ we lowered a camera to 300 meters below the surface and explored the bottom, looking out for cold water corals – Lophelia Pertusa. Scientists tell us that if we protect these corals – turn them into marine reserves – then little fish will reach maturity in safety leading to plentiful oceans. The trouble is that bottom-trawls with their steel trawl-doors and rock-hoppers crash and crunch their way through the coral reefs in that desperate search for the last fish.

The mixed reception in Bergen started with a loud thumping on the deck above the mess-room. Crew and campaign team where inside meeting about science. It was sunset and Thom, the radio-operator, was alone folding the Dutch flag on the poop-deck. He had his back to the gangway when a mad woman lunged at him reaching out for his throat. In one outstretched hand she held a stuffed green crocodile. “I’ve been watching you” she screamed in her attacked. Thom stomped on the deck to summon up help – crew came running. the madam encouraged ashore and watches doubled. She left the green crocodile as a gift. It’s cute – stuffed with beans – but it has a creepy smile. Garbage was thrown on board and eggs more often, drunken men turned us into a urinal grunting as they went about their business. And when it came time to sail, one of our mooring lines was found chained to the quayside – we came alongside again, cut the chain with bolt cutters and sailed free.
But there was another side to Bergen. At the open boat we held in near-freezing conditions, and a bit of hail, nearly 800 people visited the old Warrior in just a four hour period – they were enthusiastic and receptive people. They wanted bottom-trawlers to stop smashing cold water coral reefs and supported the war against destructive fishing.

Yesterday evening we started the engines and made the final miles up to Bergen. And this morning I brought the Rainbow Warrior through the fjords to Bryggen – the centre of town. In the afternoon I walked up a hill with the chief engineer, we walked onto the snow and into a forest where I could smell spring.

There are three important things we need do to save ourselves on planet earth: adapt to clean renewable energy, increase efficiency in the way we use recourses and thirdly, we must conserve what little we still have in good order. It is this last point that Rainbow Warrior will focus on in Norway. Cold water corals are being destroyed off the coast of Norway by trawlers dragging nets. This little crew will do research with a drop camera of both pristine and damaged coral reefs and we will stress, once-again, the importance of creating marine reserves. I think governments are more willing to listen now – something has changed – I feel hopeful.

A bumpy first night out pitching to a head wind. Not a cloud in the sky, the sea liquid-silver under full-moon light. On reaching the German Bight glorious sunshine overcame us. We all wore sunglasses on deck this day – but the cold wind cuts, it is only just above freezing. Sailing in these latitudes is not as laid back as the tropics. Sail training; swinging booms, placing preventors, setting then reefing and then finally sheeting out to a fresh beam sea, de-clutching and feathering the propeller. Feeling the boat heel over to port as the wind takes us to Bergen.

The deck broke out in giggles, it was a delightful sound and it came from under the fore-sail – girl-giggles. Little hand-shapes wrestled beneath the white canvas and then, as Maite turned the grinder handle, the sail lifted to reveal three deck-hands. The sound of their laughter escaped, it carried up aloft as the sail slid into position. Rainbow Warrior is now ready to cross the North Sea, on her way to Norway.