Le Mars native begins final leg of Chinese ship's journey

(Photo contributed) Hugh Morrow, a Le Mars native sailing with a crew from China to the U.S. and back in a ship built from a 600-year-old Chinese design, stopped on Wake Island and visited the "98 Rock," a memorial for the 98 U.S. civilian prisoners of war forced by Japanese captors to rebuild an airstrip, then killed Oct. 5, 1943. One prisoner escaped and chiseled this near their mass grave. He was later beheaded. [Click to enlarge]

And typhoons.

Hugh Morrow, the Le Mars man sailing from China to the United States and back in an ancient-style Chinese ship, said the crew is on the last leg of the journey.

He checked in with the Daily Sentinel during a recent stop in Saipan, an island in the U.S. Commonwealth of Northern Mariana Islands in the western Pacific Ocean.

He and the rest of the crew aboard the Princess Tai Ping are about 1,500 miles from China. Home.

"We have to get going soon," Morrow emailed from Saipan. "Typhoon season is coming next month so we have to be out of water by then. We do not what to go through a typhoon on this ship."

Right now they are on schedule, but it's possible the weather won't be.

"We have to take in to account that the weather has been changing because of global warming," Morrow explained. "So the old pilot charts might not be so reliable these days."

The ship they are in was built with 600-year-old designs for a Chinese junk. The navigation technology they use, except a Global Positioning System (GPS), is from that era, too.

The Princess Tai Ping's journey began in the late summer of 2008 from China, on a mission to revive excitement about China's naval history and to testify that, possibly, the Chinese landed on the shores of the Americas before Christopher Columbus did.

In September, the Princess Tai Ping made port in California, then moved on to Hawaii, where the crew picked up six new members to replace those that had decided they'd rather not make the return trip.

"More of the crew quit when we reached Hawaii, so we recruited more there," Morrow said. "The ship has 10 people on board now and is quite crowded, the most crowded we have every been."

Sailing toward China from Hawaii proved treacherous at times.

"After two days into the sail we lost our wind instruments," Morrow said. "We sailed without them until we reach a small atoll called Wake Island."

Without wind gages, the crew relied on their skin, body hair and ears to feel where the wind was coming from.

"There are two types of wind: true wind and apparent wind," Morrow said.

True wind is the wind speed you feel when you are not moving.

Apparent wind, he added, is the wind you feel when you are moving -- like sticking your head out the car window.

"It takes experience to know which way the wind is really coming from when your moving," he said.

And wind isn't always the sailing crew's friend.

Sometimes it becomes a deadly enemy.

"The wind did hit us hard at one point and broke some of the batons in our head sail," Morrow said.

The ship hit winds of about 20 knots or about 25 miles per hour. Not good news.

"The ropes on the ship often get tangled and that causes the bamboo to break," Morrow said, adding that the sails can be pretty fragile if the lines aren't holding the sail just right.

They repaired the head sail while at sea.

Morrow, one of the few crew members who will make the entire journey with the Princess Tai Ping, helped teach the newer crew members how to make repairs.

"I have had to take a lead role in a lot of aspects on the boat," he said. "Most of the crew cannot speak Mandarin or Fujianese so I have to translate as well."

The stops along the way, Wake Island and now Saipan, are highlights, Morrow said.

"Wake Island played an important role during World War II. It is a military air force base," he said. "It has a lot of history and has some of the most beautiful beaches I have ever seen."

The island, he added was full of military personnel and scientists.

Crew members also spotted some nesting albatross and a lot of sharks.

"The waters are so infested with sharks you would be lucky to get a complete fish in the boat if you got one on the line," Morrow said.

The crew fishes while at sea to bring in fresh food.

"We caught a lot of fish -- some over 4.5 feet long," Morrow said.

They traveled on to Saipan, entertaining themselves along the way by performing skits aboard the ship, singing, and even having puppet shows using their socks.

When the crew arrived in Saipan, they were warmly greeted.

"The people here always smile when they see us," Morrow said. "There are not many Westerners here, so we are quite famous on this little island. Everyone knows who we are when we walk around."

People invite the crew members into their homes, to barbecues and to explore the island.

"We are doing some culture exchange with the locals here, learning some of the local traditions," Morrow said. "Today I went with a local class and taught them about Chinese culture, sailing and our mission."

When the Princess Tai Ping's crew bids Saipan adieu, they'll only have 1,500 miles to sail until they reach the mother land.

The crew's fans in China and Taiwan are growing rapidly in number, Morrow said.

"We expect a very warm welcome home," he added.

Morrow is looking forward to some creature comforts once they reach China.

A fresh water shower every day.

Modern plumbing.

And finally, sleeping in a warm dry bed.