Their supplies soon ran out and they were forced to rely on their ability to catch fish and sea birds.
"Sometimes our stomachs would hurt," Vidana said, referring to regular three-day stints without food, and one occasion when they caught nothing for two weeks.
They had more luck with the rain and managed to collect water to drink on most days. As well as facing up to the threat of slowly dying of thirst or starvation, the men had to contend with the terror of being swallowed up by the deep.
"Two times we thought we were going to sink. Two times we thought we were going to die," Vidana said, remembering the waves crashing into their boat as they frantically bailed out water.
But the men said they kept desperation from taking hold by reading the Bible Ordonez had brought.
"We read the Bible all the time, and all the time we prayed, all of us together," he said.
And as they prayed the days, weeks and months passed, with the little fishing boat drifting 8,850km westward.
The men said that they had used a compass to show which direction they were going, and they had guessed that they must have reached the center of the ocean when they went for months without seeing another vessel.
They knew they had reached the other side when ships started appearing on the horizon again.
"We would be happy when we saw a ship and we would wave our arms [at them] but when we saw they hadn't seen us and went on their way we would get sad," Vidana recalled. "Sometimes we would cry, but then we would forget it and start chatting again."
Salvation eventually came when they were asleep. The Taiwanese ship spotted their vessel on its radar and went to investigate. The men said they didn't realize what was happening until they heard the motor bearing down, and even then they didn't quite believe it.
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