Hello everyone,
I write this little note, still sailing upwind, in the English Channel, almost halfway between the TSS of “Les Casquets” and that of the Pas de Calais, on course 75°, alongside the freighters highway.
The night was quite windy, I had put on one reef in the main sail and the staysail – I sometimes had more than 20-22 nds of real wind so I don’t regret it! But for sure that at the end of the night I was a little under. I pulled a lot of tacks in the afternoon and at night, and with the current some look really bad!
In the afternoon, I will meet a whole fleet of English sailboats – probably a trans-Manche regatta.
According to the routings and the weather forecast, I should arrive in Nieuwpoort in a little over 24 hours, at the end of the afternoon tomorrow Tuesday, August 26. I still have a little trouble believing it, given all the route I have left to sail.
Question time
So after 11 days at sea, of course the time for questions is approaching! And I must say that I did not wait so long to ask myself about these, of course!
What are you doing here?
I think I never really wondered what I was doing there, in the sense ‘why did you go get into this mess’. For me it’s quite clear, it’s a grip and test navigation, of the boat and the man, with a beginning and an end, and I didn’t really think to give up – after a while, when I was really far from the coast, it would anyway not have any sense at all, and I have to bring the boat back anyway! And I got to it of my own free will, without constraint!
I could of course stop in one of the ports I come across but hey, the weather is rather good to return (not easy either but it could be much worse!), so I might as well go all the way!
What memories will you have of this experience?
I know myself, I only keep the good memories!! But honestly for the moment this long solo outing was quite incredible, of exceptional richness and beauty. Every day the conditions were changing, and with the pace of single-handed navigation, on quasi permanent monitoring making life very intense!!
I’ll have to sort through my WhatsApp and videos that told the story my navigation almost directly to be able to relive it – and publish this famous “solo at sea” recipe book 😉
But of course encounters with marine animals are always magical: dolphins, pilot whale, whale (spotting in the distance), birds (notably the storm-petrel)…
What did you learn about yourself?
This is one of the big questions! When you leave like that, it’s more for introspection than for anything else. I found myself facing myself for days and nights, in an altogether hostile environment – I am not a dolphin!
I went quite far in terms of stress the first few days, and then I managed to handle it better. Is this a normal process of habituation to this new situation, or have I developed new skills in managing my stress? It’s probably still too early to tell.
I also learned that I could live for more than 10 days almost alone – I actually had a lot of contacts (messages, calls, and even video calls) with my relatives and friends who support me by following my adventure. It matters a lot! THANKS A LOT TO ALL OF YOU, I LOVE YOU!!
In terms of navigation, I also learned a lot – but also I realized (I knew it) that I still have a lot to learn before being really comfortable sailing offshore solo on La Promesse.
How do you feel about the project Tous Capables ?
I believe that with this first phase, I managed to directly sensitize several hundred people (and indirectly much more thanks to the ‘ambassador’ effect) to the cause of non-oralizing children, and to the absolute need to presume their abilities. It is already a great success in my opinion.
And this project also seems to me to resonate very clearly with the stakes of the solo offshore sailing, where each situation is new and a different issue, which can only be apprehended by presupposing the ability of the navigator to face it, without him/her having ever been exposed to an identical situation. The presumption of capacity is also essential here – otherwise we must not cast off!
And the rest of the project, how do you see it?
That’s really the big question – I’m going to have to digest this navigation and draw conclusions, but it will take a little time!
Take care