27 Dec 2005
Saying Goodbye at La Gomera
Roz has asked me once again to add a dispatch message. The satphone works alright, as she can contact me, but she is still having difficulty with the technology needed for doing it herself.
She is at last experiencing really encouraging wind conditions, although the sea is rough. She sounded really cheerful about the progress that she is making, and looking forward to getting out there again behind the oars. Speed today up to 2.5 knots.
The support yacht Aurora is paying her a visit today, just keeping an eye on her, as they do with all the boats in turn.
Roz appreciates the encouragement given to her by friends, many of them sending messages via her website which I pick up and pass on. She even takes note of some of the advice sent to her – some very helpful.
| Atlantic Row Part 1 |
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26 Dec 2005
Roz using her satphone.
Isn't it wonderful the way in which we can keep hearing from Roz about her daily life on the ocean wave? Until, inevitably, the system fails in some way. Perhaps the iridium signal that she uses was overstrained at Christmas with all of us onlookers sending messages to the rowers in the Atlantic Race. Whatever the cause, Roz has not been able to write and upload a dispatch on this Boxing Day.
A friend Adrian has given her some advice about the weather which has really cheered her up. She will be saying more about him when she is able to write her next dispatch. So, once again she is able to get behind the oars without being blown back towards La Gomera.
Keep thinking of her and encouraging her in your thoughts! Greetings for the New Year, Rita Savage
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25 Dec, 05 - 17:01
For GPS position, race position and miles from La Gomera, see http://www.atlanticrowingrace.co.uk
Happy Christmas!
Of all the latitudes, in all the oceans, in all the world, I had to pick this one.
It seems that I, and I alone out of all the race fleet, have found myself a uniquely unhelpful weather system. I've been heading south in a desperate attemp to avoid these headwinds, but didn't make it in time. Christmas morning brought the news that I had dropped several race positions, and that the winds would be against me all day.
For several hours this morning I valiantly but grumpily battled the headwinds, rowing hard just to stand still, nearly crying with frustration as time after time the fickle wind would change direction so in the space of a few strokes I'd find myself pointing completely the wrong way. Happy bloody Christmas, I thought.
Exhausted and fed up, I took a break to open my presents (thank you to Jan, Pauline, Peareys, and the Gurkha Spirit guys) and then checked my emails. One was from my friend Adrian Flanagan, who is currently bidding to be the first person to sail around the world via the polar regions. He sent me the 3-day forecast, showing much more favourable winds from tomorrow. The day suddenly seemed brighter.
So rather than row myself into an oblivion of misery and exhaustion today, I thought to hell with it - today I'll enjoy Christmas and get back to racing tomorrow.
So how have I spent my day?
One special experience was going over the side for the first time. Not many people have swum in 2-mile-deep water. I was worried I might struggle to get back in afterwards, and after Tara and Ian's scary shark experience last week I was a bit apprehensive, so I put on my mask, snorkel and Baltic safety harness and hopped in before I had a chance to think about it too much.
It was beautiful - cool and blue and limitless. I was supposedly there to scrub the barnacles off Sedna's hull, but had a good gawp around as well. I'd envisaged maybe a whole colony of wildlife congregating under my boat, living off any scraps that go overboard, but there wasn't much at all. There were a couple of tiny little stripey fellows, and further down hovering around Sid's rope was a bigger fish like a tuna. Apart from that it was just clear blue infinity.
That done, I washed my hair and bathed, did some laundry, cleaned the boat, and settled down to a good Christmas dinner of chicken with cranberries, peas, sweetcorn and gravy (it was good, but maybe not as good as it sounds - the chicken was diced and freeze-dried, and due to death of camping stove everything was served cold) followed by Christmas pud. Thanks, Tiny, for the pud - it was great with Irish Coffee syrup and sweetened condensed milk. Scrum!
I rang a few people, including of course my mother and sister, celebrating Christmas at Mum's house in Leeds. It is just the second Christmas since Dad died, and a bit of an odd one, with me being out here and my sister about to set off on a one-year trip around the world. Mum told me about my present - she got a new screen for my beloved Mac laptop, to replace the one that got smithereened between Lisbon and the Canaries.
So all in all a very satisfactory Christmas Day, my only gripe being that Father Christmas failed to deliver the one thing I REALLY wanted for Christmas - a nice steady northeasterly. But hopefully tomorrow...
Wind: 5-7 kts from the south/west
Weather: sunny
Sea state: slightly choppy
Hours rowing: 3
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24 Dec, 05 - 13:07
2434.666N,2445.901W,0M
For GPS position, race position and miles from La Gomera, see http://www.atlanticrowingrace.co.uk
Yesterday I turned 38. That is probably about half my allotted time on this earth. While I was at the oars tonight, rowing across the silent starlit sea, I was pondering on who i am and what I'm doing.
By some standards, I don't have much to show for my life so far - no career, no house, no spouse, no children. Not even a car. At an age when most of my contemporaries are settled down to a life of responsible breadwinning and parenting , I'm off mucking about on the Atlantic.
But I wouldn't have it any other way. I've been lucky enough to have experienced a more conventional lifestyle - apart from the children, I had all those sensible, grown-up things. It was great, I was happy. But I discovered that I didn't want to do that for the rest of my life.
And so I find myself at the age of 38 remarkably unencumbered by responsibilities. I'm free to do what I will. Selfish? Irresponsible? Some might say I should be more grown up.
Grown up. A past participle, as if growing up is something you do once and for all and then it's over. Congratulations, you are a grown up. Here's your certificate, and your carpet slippers.
To me, it sounds too static. I don't want to be a grown up if it means an end to growing and developing. I'd prefer to keep a naive enthusiasm for life, believing that anything is possible. I am happy to be 38 going on 18, except that now I am older and hopefully a little wiser than when I was 18 first time around.
Lying here in my bunk at 5.30am, listening to the silence of the sea, broken only by the occasional blowing of a whale, I feel there is nowhere, and nobody, I would rather be.
Christmas Greetings
Monty sends his love and wishes for a very Merry Christmas to all at Southbourne Junior School.
And I send a huge HAAAPPYYYYYYY CHRISTMAAASSS! to everybody back home.
Rita Savage's PS: Sponsored miles: Roz will soon be 500 miles from La Gomera, so thank you to B.Yates for sponsoring this mile - a Christmas present?
Wind: almost non-existent
Weather: sunny and hot
Sea state: flat calm
Hours rowing: 12
| Atlantic Row Part 1 |
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