Following the rounding of Good Hope, we began the 5,500 mile passage home across the Atlantic.
I called at St. Helena, the final resting place of the exiled Napoleon Bonaparte.
James Bay made my list of the ten worst anchorages anywhere, but the island tour
was stupendous.
Watch out for those squalls in the doldrums!
I made the mistake of even thinking that Ruth Avery was going to go
all the way around without any major equipment failure. While musing on
just how the critics would take that, Neptune dealt me a humbling blow. Approximately
800 miles east of St. Lucia (Caribbean), Ruth Avery took a hard roll, dunked her boom and
CRACK! then she no longer had one. I ended up having to sail the remainder of the
passage with a loose-footed mainsail, which worked suprisingly well.
On April 17, 2004, Ruth Avery dropped anchor in Rodney Bay, St. Lucia. With
that we had circumnavigated the world. Hooray! Celebrations were somewhat subdued,
however, by all the work needing to be done. It took me three weeks to repair the
boom, toiling under the hot tropical sun all the while. A boat at anchor is
not the most convenient woodworking shop, either. But as I was now officially
a Circumnavigator, naturally I had to maintain a heroic nonchalance
about the whole thing. Arrr.
On June 1, we put to sea from St. Thomas, homeward bound
for Orrs Cove, Maine. While becalmed in the Horse Latitudes I rowed out in
the dinghy and took some photos. I also went for a swim.
On the way home I visited some old haunts, places where I used to sail with my family, back when I was a kid. I called at Block Island, Newport, Martha's Vineyard and Nantucket.
On a very foggy morning, of July 23, 2004, Ruth Avery dropped anchor behind Snow Island, in Orrs Cove. The voyage, which began nearly three years before, had ended. She has since moved north about 1/4 mile, and up twenty feet to where she now sits on the hard, at the Great Island Boatyard.
Well it's time for me to pack up. Thanks for staying with me.
As no one sails for commerce or king anymore, naturally people wonder
what the point is. I would say that it all boils down to a modest, incremental gain
in individual freedom. Sure, I was never truly self sufficient, I depended on the
vast economic network of the civilized world for the many things I needed in order
to sail and to live. I also learned that one does not escape the meanness
and pettiness in everyday life by sailing away to Paradise, for such
things exist wherever there are human beings. But just the same, I did learn
to repair my own gear, to catch fish, to bake my own bread, and keep myself company
when I had none. Of course I both want and need the company of good friends, but I
gained some confidence that I can still hold my own too.
My horizons have since grown wider; I think I have a better sense of what really matters.
Like those sunsets in the tropics, for instance ...
The End