Immediately after
arriving in Denmark Alexander and I bike to where ‘my’ boat is.
A friend and I who
had been wondering how four young people could afford to take four years off
and sail around the world had surmised that perhaps one of them had a rich
parent who had bought the boat for them but it is immediately obvious that this
is not the case with this boat. They saved their pennies to buy it. And it
looks it.
The 70' of decking
is gleaming real old teak and looks fabulous. ‘Wow, it’s huge!’ we say. But
when we descend below the interior, which would have fitted 8 very nicely, has
had extra bunks squished in everywhere so that it will now sleep 14, I guess,
though we will see. It looks tiny. Man, and I thought I had a wee space last
year. Little did I know. My own cabin from before – with two doors, a bunk, a
wash basin, a whole cupboard, and floorspace - seems a mere fairy-tale, lavish
wrt to what I will get this year. At least I will have fodder for my blog -
though maybe not a place to keep my laptop (literally). No big flat screen TV
on this boat like on the last one, no auto-pilot, no AC, no hot water heater, no
personal cabin, no wasted space, just a tiny tiny interior…
… and lots and lots
of things that obviously need to be finished and then stuffed, somehow, into
the boat. The dock beside the boat, all 70 feet of it and more, is piled high,
very high, with bits and pieces, coils of rope and spare engine parts and
woodwork that needs painting, and there are two long long lists taped to the
mast; things to do and things to buy. One of the owners is there and a teenager
helping him out but it looks like hundreds of man-days of work still remain. Alexander
and I almost ditch our bike tour of Denmark to stay and help. We can see they
need it. ‘Are you going to leave on time?’, I ask. ‘We have to,’ the answer is,
‘too many people have bought tickets to join the boat along the way’. And I get
a queasy feeling in the pit of my stomach: I was on a boat before that didn’t
wait for good weather and the results were tragic. The two owners who are not
joining us right away are working, one as a security guard, trying to get enough
money cobbled together to sail on their own boat! All in all it looks like a
disaster waiting to happen. I am worried.
Two of my children
will be in Copenhagen to see me off, and yet, at this very point, despite this,
I fear that I may yet fly home with them at the end of August instead of
embarking. I can’t see surviving with so many other people in the tiny space
that is this boat. It looks impossible that they will be ready to go on time. I
am concerned about their sailing according to schedule rather than according to
the wind. I am seeing lemons lining up.
