Day 17
8 people, strangers to each other, from different nations, on only 200 sq. feet, for three weeks and with no place to go or hide. This sounds like a good concept for any reality show. Especially when they in addition need to make food for each, do the washing up, be on duty for each other, help with sails up and sails down- day and night and not to mention sleep alongside each other as a bunch of snoring horses (this has not exactly been the boat of “quiet nights”)
As you may anticipate this could easily create some tension and open up for some good juicy conflicts. We haven`t actually had any of these. Seven “middle age “ men and one young woman (THE captain), all pretty well off, going on this trip with a similar mind and attitude of having a great sailing adventure together, worked better than any of us could hope for. This has been a great trip and something to remember for the rest of our life. There have been quite some challenges but nothing that we couldn’t cope with. Nothing at all.
I am not so sure that everybody will put their feet on a sailing boat again for some time (or never) while some of us would love to sail on for quite some more weeks or months. Nevertheless, I am very sure, that all of us are pretty happy that we are only ONE day away from Saint Lucia, a dozen of COLD BEERS and a shower in fresh water (the generator and the fresh water maker went to “hell”). Not to mention a full night sleep. For the last three weeks I have never slept any longer than 5 hours continuously. Mostly it has been 2-3 hours now and then. Give me ONE night with 8 hours of sleep please. So for the three last days there has been a lot of talk about the first sip of beer and LAND. The three weeks on Great Escape have gone very fast – and actually much faster than the three last days…
For those who have read our blogs, they have seen that we have had “everything” on this journey of wind, waves and weather as such. Stephen who has sailed the Atlantics several times, summarized our trip like this; “usually I am using my thick sailing jacket and trousers for only two days when crossing the Atlantic. This time around, there are only two days I haven’t used it”.
The last days have been tremendous with very nice weather and very fast sailing. We are actually slowing down a little today, not to reach Saint Lucia during the late and dark night. It`s better to be there in the morning, when the sun is up and when the bar has opened.
Jan