Early in the 2500 miles of the Lofoten's travels by fjords and open seas, the difference
between the two sorts of waters was like chalk and cheese. The former type was like
a calm ride on a nice boat on a mill-pond. The latter was like a torture chamber
where sickness was always waiting to happen!
Due to my stomach's history, sea-sickness was easy! I could NOT avoid it
- even on the Isle of Wight Ferry!! So , maybe, I can help others similarly affected to
overcome the problem and actually enjoy the journeys. Perhaps `enjoy' is too bold a word.
Certainly, a reduction in the problem and survival of the experience is obtained.
Basically, my mind and body suffered , initially from a combination of the following
problems:-
1. Fear of the boat capsizing or taking in water (not good in the Arctic!!)
2. Discomfort in the stomach from the movements of the boat.
3. Eyes and stomach not forming a unifying sensation of the movement.
4. Pitch, Roll, Yaw, Heave etc all get combined in a complex mixture of "being-
thrown-about" manoeuvres.
5. One's own movements compounded with those in Problem No 4.
Initially, I tried to overcome Problem2 by positioning myself in the best orientation.
This was found to be on my back laterally across the boat. The majority of beds are aligned
that way anyhow!! So the worst motion, the ship's Roll - is turned through 90 degrees and
one's own body has a 'pitching' motion, which isn't as bad! That means that the feet go down
and the head goes up - followed by the opposite situation. The lesser-problem of ships
pitching is transformed into a slight rolling of one's own body - i.e from side to side -
provided that one is truly lying flat on one's back and not partially or fully on one's side. I
find that, unless one is truly flat that way, a confused feeling of complex motions is produced.
With this position, if one also closes one's eyes, then the mind's confusion over
conflicting sights and the body movements (Problem No 3) is also eliminated - or at least
substantially reduced. This also helps to reduce the effects of Problem No 4.
Apart from the vessel's complex movements being miscorrelated by eyes, brain and
stomach, - further stomach/brain confusions seem to be compounded if one's own body had
its own intended movements by its owner (This is problem 5). Thus, to move about the cabin,
twisting over, moving off the bed and going `some-place', compound an already complex
situation into a, possibly, unbearable one that takes one's own acceptance limits `over the top'!
To overcome this problem, my findings included the following:-
(i) To save getting up for anti-sickness tablets, sweets, breath-fresheners, etc -
put these on a bedside chair or table within reach of the movement of the arm
only, without body-movements. That it, they must be reachable ONLY by
movements of the arm!!
(ii) When even that is "pushing one's luck", - put the required sweets or tablets
in one's pockets, thereby allowing them to be located with even less movement
- including ZERO movement of the eyeballs!!
My trip conquered the psycho-somatic problems (i.e. Nos 2 - 5), only just, before
reaching Bergen on the Southwards leg.
I haven't mentionned the solution to problem No1 yet. I cured that problem somewhat
earlier. I had experimented with:
(a) looking out of the porthole to correlate eye & stomach effects whilst seeing that
the craft's rolls & pitches were not too severe.
(b) NOT looking out of the porthole, both for calm and rough conditions
(c) instructing my mind about the statistics of capsizing and `taking on water'.
Dealing with (c) first, - since these Hurtigruten have been doing this route every day
for 100 years (2500 miles per day in total running time) without such problems, why should
it happen now after 2500 x 365 x 100 (i.e. over 91 million) miles?? Thus I was convinced
of the proven safety record of these boats !! Problem Solved!!
Even when motions felt severe, I initially tried (a) above, and they proved to be NOT
as violent as they felt. Having satisfied myself on matters (a) and (c), I therefore adopted
method (b) for comfort, cosiness and that also avoidance of Problem 5.
These 11 days of 2500 miles enabled me to `cure' my life-long problem of motion-
sickness. This was partly Mind-over-Matter, partly, "Mind over Mind" - but also " Matter
over matter (i.e the body)".