THE SEA OF ADVENTURE

                 

DOWNLOAD: THE SEA OF ADVENTURE

 

It started off well enough. T he kids are just getting over measles and are bored silly. Their entire hols are ruined! 



Mrs Mannering suggests they all go off on a get-away holiday instead of going straight back to school. The children are overjoyed with the prospect, especially when it's suggested that they go along with a Dr Johns, an ornithologist, on a bird-expedition to a bunch of small islands in the north of Britain. Oh, the excitement! A couple of weeks camping out on tiny, remote islands with nothing but wild sea all around, and thousands of birds flocking about! But joy quickly turns to dismay when Mrs Mannering is informed that Dr Johns has been in a car accident and the expedition is cancelled.

Then good old Bill turns up. He's in hiding from some bad guys, and has been ordered by his superiors to "take a break" away from the action. It seems Bill has been upsetting a few too many criminals lately! So when he arrives in the dead of night at the Mannering household, and explains that he must "disappear" for a while, naturally the children suggest they all go away together to those islands in the north. And so off they go...

Bill and the children set out in their little boat to some remote islands in the north.

They visit a couple of islands before choosing one to settle on for longer. The island they choose has a large puffin colony on it. It also has a hill in the middle, a pleasant cove and a rocky inlet just right for their boat.

The islands are full of birds—and Kiki shows off to a couple of the local puffins.

It's dark when they arrive at the first island, and they set up camp and spend their first night in the open air. Everything is perfect! And as Lucy-Ann says once again, eating outdoors always makes food taste so much better.

But all is not as it seems. Why do planes drop parachuted objects into the sea? And what are the mysterious lights in the night? Bill begins to frown and worry over it, and one day he sets out on his own to investigate. 

Strange goings-on in the night! What's that light in the distance? Why does a plane keep flying over and dropping things in the sea?

He returns late, having visited umpteen islands without meeting a soul. He's still puzzled by the plane's activities. Have his enemies somehow discovered him, or followed him to the island? The next night, leaving the children with the tents, he goes down to the boat once more to radio a message to his headquarters. But then two men show up out of nowhere and overpower him. They take him off somewhere—but not before smashing his radio to bits in case anyone else is left on the island.

Bill is kidnapped

The holiday takes a sinister turn, however, when Bill disappears and the boat’s wireless and engine are destroyed. The next night a terrible storm strikes the island, the wind whipping away the tents and smashing up the boat. 

The tent blows away

A couple of days after Bill disappears the children see another aeroplane which drops a small packet hanging from a parachute. Two nasty sounding men turn up on the island, looking for anyone who might have been there with Bill – but they can’t find the children who are hiding underground in the puffin colony.

Philip is training young rats called Squeaker, Woffles and Nosey in this book. They come in useful when Philip is able to scare off Miss Lawson, a potential governess, by producing them 

The rats and Miss Lawson

He then befriends two of the puffins on the island, and names them Huffin and Puffin. They’re very useful pets as they bring fresh fish for breakfast in the mornings

Huffin, Puffin and Kiki

We also meet Horace Tipperlong who the children immediately christen Trippalong, he’s a rather weedy fellow and he has a rather bad time at the children’s hands – though you feel he deserves it for being so silly.

Poor, silly Horace Tipperlong

and the children leave the island in his boat to track down Bill. First they discover a beautiful lagoon, one full of mysterious packages – obviously dropped by the aeroplanes. Horace also ends up in the hands of the enemy and nearly sabotages the whole rescue mission.

Rescuing Bill from the clutches of the enemy was a much-waited-for event. Finally we'd get to see their mysterious base, the hub of their secret operation. I'd been anticipating this all the way through! Sadly, all we get is a boat tied up to a jetty, where Bill is being held—along with Horace Tipperlong, who we've always known is really an ornithologist, not a bad guy in disguise.

Two of the bad guys are enraged when Bill escapes from their clutches!

The end is very unexciting, with Bill and the children floating about in the sea and being rescued by Joe, one of Bill's colleagues. What happens to the enemy is explained by Joe as they fly home: "There'll be a fleet of our seaplanes up in a few hours...There's no hope for any of the gang now." This after circling over the enemy's lair and giving them a clue that they've been found out. Let's hope none of them escaped to other islands and hid!

Things are looking awkward for Bill and the children—until his colleague shows up in a seaplane! Hurrah!

So overall, a good start, and a very nicely detailed setting as usual Oh, and it goes without saying that, despite their best efforts to stay out of adventure, naturally Bill and the kids stumble upon the very men Bill had set out to hide from.