Most of us have formed an unrealistic picture of life on a desert island. We
sometimes imagine a desert island to be a sort of paradise where the sun
always shines. Life there is simple and good. Ripe fruit falls from the trees
and you never have to work. The other side of the picture is quite the
opposite. Life on a desert island is wretched. You either starve to death or
live like Robinson Crusoe, waiting for a boat which never comes. Perhaps there
is an element of truth in both these pictures, but few of us have had the
opportunity to find out.#
Two men who recently spent five days on a coral island wished they had stayed
there longer. They were taking a badly damaged boat from the Virgin Islands to
Miami to have it repaired. During the journey, their boat began to sink. They
quickly loaded a small rubber dinghy with food, matches, and cans of beer and
rowed for a few miles across the Caribbean until they arrived at a tiny coral
island. There were hardly any trees on the island and there was no water, but
this did not prove to be a problem. The men collected rainwater in the rubber
dinghy. As they had brought a spear gun with them, they had plenty to eat.
They caught lobster and fish every day, and, as one of them put it 'ate like
kings'. When a passing tanker rescued them five days later, both men were
genuinely sorry that they had to leave.&