The 'Iquique' is shown hove-to, from broad off the port bow. The tug, 'Warrior', is shown on the right in stern view, with black smoke trailing towards the sailing barque. The coastline of England can be seen on the far right with a building silhouetted against the skyline catching the light. Other buildings suggest a port or safe haven. The painting is probably a composite made after the journey, and one of a group marking his return from his first deep-sea voyage before returning to Fitzroy Street. The sea is highly stylized into diagonal lines of waves with exaggerated crests and the wake forms a honeycomb patterning. The sky is shown clear on the left and on the right a bank of darker rain bearing cloud appears over the land.

His first sea journey was in the sailing ship, the 'Iquique', built in 1892. She went from London to Sydney via Cape Town, 17 May to October 1898, and Sydney to London, December 1898 to April 1899. Aged 21, Everett signed up on the ship as an ordinary seaman and after Cape Town a new crew was signed up and Everett became bosun. They averaged 300 miles a day and Everett worked hard at being a deep-water sailor. He also made his first shipboard drawings, some of which he later turned into etchings. He used the deck fittings with a conscious sense of composition and stylized rendition of waves. The 'Iquique' became the 'Celtic Glen' in 1907 and then the 'Riverford' in 1915, before being sold to a Canadian firm. She hit an iceberg in the South Atlantic in 1921 and became a storage hulk in Durban before being towed out to sea and sunk in 1927.