Strange stories from the Black Sea: sailing to “the ghost island”

An unusual navigation, from which a beautiful book was born. “The Odessa Sail” by Luciano Piazza. (a 50-year-old Roman who quit his job a few years ago to devote himself to sailing and writing) recounts a sailing trip (for the record, a Bavaria 350 Lagoon, 11 m long) to one of the seas less frequented by yachtsmen: the Black Sea. “I started from Poros, a small island not far from Athens,” Piazza recounts, “and I sailed along the Aegean Sea, the Dardanelles, the Sea of Marmara and the Bosporus, before arriving in the Black Sea. I tried to recount both the preparation for the voyage and the stages to get to Odessa, with all the excitement that such a long route can offer, including sailing up the Danube for a short distance. Then, slowly, homeward, retracing the long route back to Rome.” The book is having great success and is among the finalists for the Carlo Marincovich Prize. We publish the first of three excerpts that Luciano selected for us.

THE GHOST ISLAND

Ancient maritime legends, those bogus and abused tales that for centuries have bounced among the tables of taverns in ports around the world, often tell of incredible visions and sudden: phantom vessels and islands, appearing for only an instant to imprint themselves like a flash in the eyes of those watching the horizon and then disappearing again. Always, charlatans and swindlers have fed these legends in bad faith so as to better beguile the unfortunate person on duty and rob him, after charming him, in addition to words, with a few glasses of rum. But nowadays who can still believe such fantasies? Sometimes we play at it, because those who go to sea always have a hint of romance in their hearts, but at the moment of truth the man of the third millennium weighs his choices on demonstrable facts and scientific knowledge, never on superstition. Least of all a rationalist like me.

What is it then, I wonder, that strange thing I see silhouetted far away, against the light, on this deserted sea of boats and smooth as oil? A stretch where according to the nautical chart there should be nothing but water. I have been watching it for a while squinting well, but unable to grasp its shape and size. I grab the binoculars and frame it but not much changes. Even a telephoto photo, enlarged later on the computer, cannot give me any more detail. Partly out of curiosity, partly because there might be someone in trouble, I take a little detour and go to see what this is all about.

Many years ago, a few miles off the coast of Civitavecchia, one morning when a decided Force 6 was blowing, a similar sight later turned out to be the bow of a small speedboat sinking. Around them, soaking already for an hour in the cold April sea, were two shivering boys and a girl whom I fortunately picked up before they ended up freezing or worse. Will it be something like that now? Accompanied by the crackling of the engine I get closer and closer, continuing to observe and believing he first recognized the outline of a boat, then a fishing boat intent on hauling nets, and finally a small island. But there are no islands here, unless one suddenly popped up in the night.

Fabulist hypothesis? Not really. In July 1831, following the eruption of an underwater volcano, a sixty-meter-high island emerged in the middle of the Sicilian Channel. It was christened the Ferdinandea and sank again within five months; still enough time for the Bourbons, British and French to ontend its sovereignty.

That it is something covered with vegetation becomes clearer and clearer to me as I get closer; I can now see perfectly the outline of a bundle of river reeds barely stirred by a very light wind. Decidedly in disbelief, as if to pinch myself, I check the nautical chart again obtaining the same information: there are no islands here. But at sea it is not easy to grasp the exact size of things, and only a very few hundred meters away can I tell what it really is: a huge clod of land several meters square, covered with vegetation, floating motionless on the surface of the sea. The thought immediately goes to what might happen by crossing it at night; it would not be very healthy to hit it at five or six knots of speed. Probably some flood of the Danube ripped it away from the embankment, dragging it to its mouth and then letting it drift into the Black Sea.

Who knows, perhaps some ancient sea legend was born just like that, searching the otherworldly for answers that the human knowledge of the time was unable to provide and identifying from time to time in the cruelty of the devil or the benevolence of the deity the punishment or salvation that Mother Nature often dispenses with fatalistic randomness. Resorting to the supernatural is often the most convenient shortcut for lazy minds to find answers to the unsolved questions that accompany our entire existence.
However, the island that isn’t there, or rather that shouldn’t be there, seems to bring me luck: a little wind picks up and I can then turn off the engine and regain the perfect silence of sailing.

EXTRACT FROM.
The Odessa Sail
by Luciano Piazza
196 pages

SYNOPSIS: An unusual destination, a little-navigated and little-known sea, yet rich in history and culture. A journey of discovery, a search for an elsewhere beyond the planetary standardization of tourist destinations. A long sea voyage aboard a small sailboat, confronting the daily difficulties of navigation and border bureaucracy and continually processing the thousands of stimuli and questions that such a journey brings. Six months and three thousand miles told in a lively, literate and often humorous style. Rich in historical insights, reflections, and sea life. Preface by Simone Perotti.

YOU CAN PURCHASE IT HERE