Diamond head / Fear of Death
Returning to Diamond Head just days after a close call with tiger sharks, I sought the thrill of the open ocean once again. But out in the deep blue valleys of the Pacific, a sudden, explosive encounter with a colossal humpback whale threw me into a terrifying fight against my own panic. Separated from my board above a bottomless abyss, I came face-to-face with the sheer, majestic power of nature.
Home / Stories
CHAPTER I
Since it was supposed to be windy on the south side of the island again today, I decided to drive back to Diamond Head, where I had an unexpected encounter with tiger sharks just two days ago. The drive down the east coast of the island is always something special. While we pass lush green mountains on the right, the most beautiful sandy beaches of the island stretch out along the ocean to our left.
In Waimanalo, the somewhat poorer native Hawaiians live. Here, you see a lot of unkempt houses and old, rusted cars parked in the yards.
The road continues past Sea Life Park, another tourist attraction. From here, it climbs steeply through a few curves up the mountain to a viewing platform, from which you can see the entire coastline all the way back to Kailua. Past this lookout, the winding road leads back down. After about a ten-minute drive, we arrived at Sandy Beach in the southeast.
Because of the heavy surf, there is always something going on here. Surfers from all over the island gather here looking for a thrill and some fun.
If you continue driving up the mountain from Sandy Beach, there are two large viewing platforms on the left side of the road. In the winter, you can watch the whales swimming close to the shore from here. The winding road climbs higher and higher up the mountain. To our left, the ocean is visible from the car. Once we reached the very top, we hit an intersection leading to Hanauma Bay. Hanauma Bay is a major tourist attraction for scuba divers, where countless corals and marine life can be observed.
Shortly after the intersection, the road heads down the mountain. The next town is Hawaii Kai. This is where I had one of my greatest adventures with a thunderstorm out on the ocean the year before. From there, a three-lane road leads toward Honolulu. Since we weren’t driving straight to Honolulu, we turned left toward Kahala Avenue before reaching Highway 1.
Here in Kahala is where the wealthy have settled. The rental prices here are exaggerated; for a seven-day stay in some of their extravagant houses, people charge up to $150,000. Once on Kahala Avenue, we drove about ten minutes to Diamond Head, the exact spot where, just two days prior, I had seen sharks in the water for the first time in my life.
Since we arrived in the late morning again today, looking down at the ocean, I once again saw only surfers. Not a single windsurfer. I guess I’ll be the only windsurfer out there again, I thought.
Our car was parked about thirty meters above sea level. Once again, we had to walk down the same narrow, steep path. We had to be careful not to slip on the red dirt in our flip-flops. Because I had to make the trip twice to carry all my gear, my T-shirt was drenched in sweat by the time I reached the bottom. We immediately took a refreshing dip in the water. After swimming, we sat on the beach for a while, watching the surfers.
As I assessed what was happening out past the danger zone where the surfers were, I noticed there was plenty of wind further out.
This was truly not a beach for swimming. The reefs are razor-sharp and clearly visible beneath the water. It was no wonder I had sliced my skin open two days ago. A tear of more than ten centimeters was clearly visible today. The wound still hadn’t healed, but at least I wasn’t bleeding at the moment.
While Mischko lay down again and continued reading her Stephen King book, I got to work. As always, rigging the sail was no fun for me, simply because I could hardly wait to get into the water with my gear.
As soon as I had my wetsuit on and finished drinking my Gatorade, I said goodbye to Mischko. As always, she wished me fun and told me to be careful. Standing knee-deep in the water, I waited for a gust of wind.
Behind the break, I saw a dozen surfers. They were waiting for their turn to ride a wave. Past the danger zone and the surfers, I watched the waves being driven from east to west by the strong wind that had been blowing for two days.
Barely any wind reaches into this bay. Therefore, I had to wait until a sufficiently strong gust came along.
CHAPTER II
Today, I had more luck than two days ago when I tore my foot open on the reefs. With a beach start on my very first try, I was moving much faster than the other day. Everything that happened two days ago flashed through my mind: when the gust died down, I had been forced to jump off the board. Landing on the reefs below, I only felt the hard rock and the cold water.
Later, while riding at full speed behind the break, I had discovered the ten-centimeter gash on the top of my left foot. The skin had been flapping almost like a flag on a mast. Because the board occasionally sliced through smaller waves, water sprayed over my feet, thoroughly washing my foot with white foam. Therefore, no blood was visible, and I had continued my ride.
I now wondered if it was just a coincidence that the sharks were near me two days ago, or if they had smelled my blood beforehand. After all, I had been sailing for at least five minutes before taking a short break. I had hung in the water up to my head for a while, holding the board with both hands, while my feet dangled in the deep. Gliding through the middle of the bay today, I kept an eye on the wound that wasn’t quite healed yet.
A few seconds later, I reached the danger zone, where the waves were about two meters high. Here, I had to cross carefully and with full control.
Once I left the waves and the dozen surfers behind me, I hooked into my chest harness, slid my feet into the foot straps, and accelerated.
Shortly after, I leaned back and was cruising at full speed. At the same time, I kept checking my wound. The board glided over the ocean surface; the white water sprayed all the way up to my glasses, washing the wound on my foot. My ears picked up two distinct sounds: the wind howling around my head, and the noise from the tail. My three fins were so loud it sounded like I was driving a race car.
I turned my head to look back, admiring how my board left a long white wake on the blue ocean surface. Behind me, the Diamond Head crater stood green. Down on the beach, Mischko was reading her Stephen King book. Then I saw the surfers behind the break, lying flat on their stomachs on their boards like seals. When I turned my head back to the front, all I saw was the color blue. The open ocean stretched before me, the blue sky and the sun’s rays reflecting off the surface of the sea.
Other than my foot wound not being fully healed, everything was perfect at that moment. I hadn’t given the sharks a single thought. If the wound opens up, I’ll just surf straight back to the beach, I reasoned.
The ocean wasn’t like it had been two days ago. The surface was churned up, making me feel as if I were navigating a mogul piste in the mountains during winter. Fully concentrated, I kept my eyes fixed about five meters ahead of the board, right where the sun reflected on the water. I had been riding at full speed for at least ten minutes.
Suddenly, it seemed as if there was something black in the distance ahead of me. I raised my gaze slightly to the spot and looked further out toward the horizon.
In that moment, I couldn’t believe my own eyes. In a fraction of a second, I let the wind out of the sail to reduce my speed. An estimated thirty meters ahead, I saw something black breach the water’s surface. I squeezed my eyes shut for a moment to determine if I was really seeing something or if it was just my imagination. As my board glided a bit slower in that direction, I immediately opened my eyes again.
All I saw was a water fountain, as if a bomb had just exploded.
My first thought was: Pearl Harbor and the US military. A submarine just dove into the depths right in front of me.
Since the board continued to glide slowly forward, I was now about fifteen meters away from the spot where the white water was fizzing in the sun.
In the next moment, it hit me: a submarine could never sink that fast. Suddenly, out of nowhere, the ocean opened up. A monstrous black creature breached from the depths about eight meters away from me. Like a bullet, it launched itself from the deep, pulling a massive amount of water into the air with its two pectoral fins.
I am not a religious man and I don’t believe in God, but as this phantom rose before me and looked at me with its giant eyes, the first thing that came out of my mouth, loudly in German, was:
“Oh Gott!” (Oh God!)
With its closed, roughly two-meter-wide mouth, it looked right into my eyes. Its eyes, which were about twenty centimeters wide, shone so warmly in the sun, as if it were smiling at me. Its friendly face seemed to say: Hey little guy, what are you doing out here all alone in these deep waters?
As we locked eyes, unconsciously, petrified, and terrified, I completely lost control and steered the board sharply to the west. For the first time in my life, I landed in the ocean with a wrenched neck, the board completely ripped from my grasp. Separated from my board, I sank into the ocean over a dark abyss that was at least a thousand meters deep.
CHAPTER III
Because I was wearing my wetsuit and harness, my body automatically floated up from the depths. Just before my head broke the water’s surface, I heard an explosion. In that exact fraction of a second, my head burst out of the water. White foam flew over my head and hands. From movies and books, I knew that a whale could easily smash small boats with its tail fin. Therefore, following that explosion in the water, I expected its tail to crash down on my head at any moment.
In mortal terror, I felt my heart racing with fear, pounding frantically against my ribs. My eyes were squeezed shut, tense and unyielding, while my two hands covered my head from above to protect it. Terrified and braced for a fatal blow to the head at any moment, the second second felt even longer.
Expecting a strike to my head with every passing moment, my fear grew exponentially, and I could feel my heart hammering against my ribs like a heavy mallet, striking harder and harder.
Second three. Beneath me lay an abyss of at least a thousand meters. Beneath me was a marine creature with a two-meter mouth lurking for me. My adrenaline level was breaking all records.
Both my hands were still over my head, and my eyes were pinched shut in pure tension. After about four seconds, I decided to open my eyes. I found myself in the middle of fizzing, sun-glinting white saltwater foam, created after its multi-ton body had slammed back into the water.
Terrified and in a state of mortal dread, I frantically turned my head in all directions, looking around. The whale was nowhere to be seen. Beyond the white spray surrounding me, the sun reflected off the churned-up surface of the ocean. My second thought: The board!
Disoriented, I twisted my head frantically in every direction. Only now did I realize just how far from the beach I was, and because I couldn’t see the board, the fear inside me multiplied by the second. Now, for the first time, I felt entirely alone in the middle of the turbulent ocean. Beneath me was nothing but a dark abyss at least a thousand meters deep, and this multi-ton black monster with a mouth the size of my apartment’s front door.
Because I couldn’t see my windsurfing gear, the thought hit me that the whale had landed on my board. Now I panicked even more. How was I supposed to swim the three kilometers back to the beach over this endless dark abyss? Even though I couldn’t see the whale, the sheer idea of having to swim that long distance to land over the dark depths terrified me to my core. I could feel my entire body trembling. Two days ago, I had injured myself. A long swim would reopen the wound. There are no lifeguards on this beach. These thoughts filled me with absolute dread.
I kept looking around, thinking that if it had smashed my board, I should at least be able to see the wreckage. Still trembling in a panic, I spun in every direction. Because the sea was choppy and I was caught between the swells, all I could see were the sun’s rays reflecting off the blue ocean surface. Neither the sail nor a piece of my board was in sight. Nothing! Now, for the first time, I asked myself: Where could it be? and tried to think logically.
The current goes west. Naturally, I thought of this and looked west toward Waikiki. After several seconds caught between the swells, a wave finally lifted me high up from the trough so I had a slightly better view, and indeed—I saw my pink sail.
“Verdammt!” (Damn!) slipped from my mouth because I only saw the sail and not the board.
I looked more closely across the sun-reflecting blue ocean surface. If the board had detached from my mast, it had to be even further west, behind the sail. While staring past the 5-square-meter pink sail, the 2.60-meter board suddenly emerged from beneath it. The terrifying thought that the board had broken loose vanished. I would have never caught up to the board swimming against that current, I thought.
The sail and the board were bobbing in the waves of the choppy ocean about fifteen meters away from me.
Trembling in panic and distress the entire time, my mind had been fully occupied with finding the board. Now I saw the light at the end of the tunnel, but to survive, I had to reach the board first. The thought that my feet were currently dangling freely over a depth of at least a thousand meters terrified me. Because my feet hung over the endless abyss, I felt as if I were suspended in mid-air, floating beneath the blue sky. At that moment, I felt completely lonely, helpless, and lost. Just the idea of having to swim those fifteen meters made it feel as though the board were miles away. My legs were currently in danger, but as I began to swim, I felt fear gripping my chest and spreading across the entire lower half of my trembling body.
As I swam with the current for several seconds, the board and sail disappeared from my sight behind the swells. Right in the middle of the churned-up ocean, far from land, swimming through the small waves over an endless abyss—a person could not be lonelier on this planet. As I swam westward in terror, my thoughts remained fixated on the whale the entire time. I kept thinking that at any moment, it would open its massive mouth and snap its jaws shut over my ribs. I looked ahead longingly over the waves. When the sail reappeared, cresting out of the swells, I saw the light at the end of the tunnel again. It seemed I had gotten closer.
As I swam quickly, water pooled in the front of my wetsuit on my chest. A water pouch formed, like a balloon filled with water, acting as a brake as I swam.
Since I was closer, I watched as the first strong gust of wind suddenly flipped the sail westward over the wave. That meant I would have to swim even further. Internally, I prayed that the strong wind wouldn’t rip my mast from the board.
As I swam, the thought that this could happen sent me into an even deeper panic. With every stroke of my hands and every kick of my feet in the water, I expected the whale to open its mouth and drag me into the deep. It was pure horror. I trembled with fear, swimming while thinking it could happen in any fraction of a second.
I wasn’t even thinking about the injury I had gotten two days ago, or that the wound on my foot could burst open at any moment and start bleeding.
Amidst this grueling exertion and panic, I gradually ran out of breath. Involuntarily, I decided to stop and take a short break. Floating without swimming, I once again hung over the dark abyss, looking for my gear.
Only a few seconds had passed. With the thought that the board was drifting further away from me, I immediately forced myself to keep swimming. I saw the sail abruptly flip west toward Waikiki again over a small wave. My heart hammered like a drum.
After that brief pause, I swam for at least another minute and a half until my hand finally touched the board.
CHAPTER IV
Now I had to flip the sail into the correct position. That takes at least ten seconds. A lot can happen in ten seconds. While I turned the sail into position with trembling hands and mortal terror, my thoughts were constantly on the whale and its massive mouth. Because of this, I kept craning my neck the entire time, glancing at the water’s surface behind me, right in the direction I had last seen it.
There was nothing to see.
Because I wasn’t fully focused, just as I was finally ready for a water start, the wind ripped the boom right out of my hands, and the sail shot westward toward Waikiki like a projectile.
I cursed loudly to myself.
My left foot was still on the board, while my second foot dangled in the deep. Lying horizontally with my back in the water, I looked helplessly up into the blue sky. In a panic, I pulled the board toward me with my foot, grabbed it, and let my foot drop from the board into the abyss. Because my water start had failed, my fear escalated—I was now going to be in the water with my feet dangling for at least another fifteen seconds. My entire body was shaking; with trembling fingers, I repositioned the sail back to the east, where the wind was blowing from. While working hard with my legs in the depths, I grabbed the boom with both hands and lifted it off the water’s surface above my head. When the wind caught enough power to lift me out of the water, with my arms fully extended over my head and my neck craned, I looked behind me and suddenly saw the whale in the southeast.
This time, about thirty meters away from me, it shot vertically out of the water and breached toward the southeast. Almost at the exact same moment, I lifted the sail higher over my head; it caught more wind and pulled me up out of the water like an elevator. Simultaneously, my second foot cleared the water and touched the board.
This time, my water start was successful.
My entire body was shaking. My heart was still beating as wildly as if I were still in the water. Because my legs were trembling and my knees were weak, I could barely stand. With trembling hands, I could barely hold the boom.
Land was about three kilometers away. The board was barely gliding, so I moved toward the beach as if in slow motion. If anyone had been watching me, they would have thought I was on a board for the very first time and about to fall into the water at any second. I could feel with my own trembling fingers that I was on the verge of letting go of the boom and falling back into the water at any moment.
It took an eternity until I reached the surf with the surfers and crossed the danger zone. Here, behind the break zone in the shallow water, I had to be careful once again not to damage my fins on the reefs.
When I was finally just shy of the beach, I jumped off into knee-deep water. Normally, I carry the board and sail out of the water. This time, consumed by fear and with trembling hands, I had no strength left to carry the gear.
I grabbed a foot strap and dragged the gear out of the surf onto the sand. Once it was on the sand, I lifted the board and sail and carried it about ten meters over to Mischko. She was still so deeply engrossed in her Stephen King book that she didn’t even hear the board and sail slamming onto the sand.
As I approached her, she finally lifted her head and looked at me.
“What is going on with you? You’re so pale and you’re shaking!” she said.
“I just had an encounter with a humpback whale,” I said.
“You what?”
“I just had an encounter with a humpback whale.”
“A humpback whale? Wow,” she laughed, adding, “You should be happy.”
“It breached right in front of me, about eight meters away!” I said.
“Wow,” she said, happy for me.
“It must have been thirty meters big!”
I then told her about the moment it emerged from the depths and I looked up at it.
“Its mouth was as big as our front door in Berlin. And the eyes… they were at least thirty centimeters wide!” I told her. Its eyes were at least as big as my feet.
While my entire body was still shaking, she was simply happy for me the whole time. After I had told her the whole story several times, and she had expressed how happy she was for me, she just went back to reading her book.
I sat there for a while, looking out into the distance behind the break where I had just come from. While sitting there, the scenes played out before my eyes the entire time, as if it had been a nightmare. Over and over again.
After about forty-five minutes, I felt my body slowly begin to calm down. Only then did I pop a piece of candy into my mouth, and only then did I truly realize what I had actually experienced and what had unfolded out there. How incredibly lucky I had been.
To see a whale so close, breaching from the depths right in front of me and giving me the scare of a lifetime. I slowly started to grin, finally feeling a sense of joy.
CHAPTER V
After about two hours, I took my board and sail and went windsurfing again. When we returned to Kailua that evening, Nancy was sitting on the terrace. I could hardly wait to tell her about my encounter with the whale.
You could see that she was thrilled for us.
“Texan, you were so lucky two days ago with those tiger sharks. And today, a whale breached from the deep right in front of you. A beautiful vacation and unforgettable adventures,” she said.
After showering, we went to Pizza Hut for the buffet, just like every evening. Before driving to Pizza Hut, we went over to Tom and Lucinda’s at the last house on Kaimalino Street. We had stayed with Tom and Lucinda the year before. Since they were currently renovating their house, we were staying with Nancy. Because my English isn’t good, Mischko told them what I had experienced today. Tom asked me how big the whale was. I told him about thirty meters.
We then said goodbye to them and drove down the winding Kaimalino Street. A few minutes later, we were sitting in the restaurant, grinning at each other. I kept telling her over and over how it looked at me with its clear, shining, thirty-centimeter-wide eyes. It truly looked as though it had smiled at me.
A few days later, I was curious to know just how big a whale like that could actually grow. Nancy had the marine life book we had flipped through two days ago. I had insisted I had seen dolphins two days prior, but the book proved that I had actually encountered sharks. Tiger sharks. Now I wanted to know how big this humpback whale had really been. The book stated that humpback whales can grow up to fifteen meters long. In my terror and shock, I had seen double.
The next day, I absolutely had to go back to Tom and Lucinda’s. Mischko translated for me, explaining that I had been in shock, which was why I saw it twice as big. She told them we had checked the book and found that a whale can grow up to fifteen meters. I had told him it was thirty meters. Once we cleared that up, I felt much better.
A few years later, I watched a TV program in Berlin about whales. Researchers had discovered that whales can actually smile and laugh.
In that moment, I thought back and called out to Mischko: “See, I was right after all!” They had just said on TV that researchers found out whales can laugh. “When it rose into the air, it really was smiling at me!”