Carrie's doing it, too

One of my best friends in the world, Carrie, has decided to do the full Clipper Ventures Round the World Race as well. She's just finished three weeks here in England undergoing her initial training. By telling her story here, in many ways I'll also be telling my own story of the early days.

Inspired by stories I told and videos I played when I'd stay at her apartment during brief visits back to Virginia, she sent me a text last January 28th, telling me she'd decided apply to join the race. Since that day five months ago, she's been reorganizing her life, arranging finances, and working out all that it takes for someone to put one's normal life on a shelf for a year. For me, as I have no normal life, making my own choice to do the race was simply turning from this path to that path. For people like Carrie and most others participating in the race, it's a huge physical, financial, spiritual, and emotional change of direction, something akin to bringing a freight train to a screeching halt and stepping off of it and onto a spaceship.

All Carrie's efforts of the winter and early spring culminated with her arrival here on May 8th to begin her Part A and B training.

Preparation for the race (whether you're new to sailing or a fully experienced sailor) is divided into three parts; A, B, and C. The final act, C, won't begin until July, once all the professional skippers have been chosen and assigned to particular boats, followed by the allocation of all crew to their respective boats. Once Part C begins, you are training with your actual skipper and actual crew with whom that you'll be sharing the experience.

For Part A, however, you are on a slightly smaller boat (60 ft) than the actual race boat (68 ft). Here one learns (or reviews) the basics.

Before Part A began for Carrie on May 11th, we stopped by a local boat yard where one of our 68's was dry-docked for various repairs. This gave us both a chance to view the hull in a way most people involved in this race will never get a chance to see.

The next day Carrie moved onto the 60 ft boat, Ariel, the same one I'd done my initial training in last June.



The following evening, after her first full day on the water, she burst into my apartment in an almost deranged state of happiness. In all the months preceding the actual beginning of her training, she'd been concerned about how she'd feel and how she'd do...and just how much she'd actually enjoy it. She was ecstatic to discover she was thrilled by it. Moreover, she felt comfortable, she felt able, she felt good. Though she'd said all along that she wouldn't commit to the full race until she'd finished Part A and Part B training, I think she knew after only one day that she was in for the long haul.

One of the initial tasks all participants are given in their first week on the boat is to climb the mast.

Climbing the mast is a basic part of seamanship. The lines entering the bottom of the mast and coming out the top are used to lift sails andperform other vital functions. Our racing boats have a total of 17 lines passing down from or around the mast (for greater detail, click on this and any other picture to get a full screen image). On the 68's, the area where the lines gather and are stored is known as the snake pit for obvious reasons.

The confidence to be able to reach and deal with whatever malfunction may occur in any one of those lines on any point of a mast, then, is critical. Climbing the mast also teaches proper teamwork and respect for the winches. Mishandling a huge piece of sail doesn't inspire such concern. The possibility of mishandling a human life does.

I tried to avoid visits to Carrie's boat to allow her a fully independent experience. One morning as she whisked by my apartment during her short period of time allocated to cleaning up, she had the chance to tell me that this was to be the day they climbed the mast. I was able, then, to be down on the dock to record the event.

It's one thing to be on the boat looking up a the mast. It's entirely something different to be aloft on only a seemingly insignificant length of rope with nothing but these views below and around you (taken from my own first mast climbing experience last June).





Though I hadn't yet moved to Gosport when I took the above two photos, the apartment I'd eventually move into is the yellow brick building on the horizon on the far left edge.

For the initial days of her training, I'd sometimes get a three minute summary of what was happening if she had the chance to swing by my apartment during her daily ablutions (yeah, that was a new word for me, too). In the middle of her first week on the water, however, I left for London to help deliver one of our 68's back to Gosport (previous blog entry).

Twenty-four hours after I returned, I saw her as she came by my apartment to shower for the traditional final dinner together (the marina has good shower facilities but my apartment is just as close). She looked exhausted and incredibly frazzled in such an adorable way but also so unbelievably happy.

Her Part A ended on the 18th and her Part B began on the 21st. This allowed her only two days to rest as much as she could before starting the process all over again.

I'd originally had planned to follow my own Part A training with the Part B as soon as possible but, after completing Part A in June, I delayed my part B until February. I had felt so overwhelmed with so much new information that I felt I needed time to absorb and digest it. Carrie didn't have this luxury.

Robin's final party of all parties for all his team members involved in his own 'round the world race over this last year had been long planned to be held on the 19th, so Carrie got to join me. I rented a car to allow us to reach the party's remote destination at a quaint cottage and drive home that same night, something none of the others planned on doing, so deep into the night was the party assumed to go. Everyone was invited to bring a sleeping bag to park on any floor for the night when one's limit had been reached.

Having the car led to Carrie's first big adventure on Saturday, the 19th. She got to drive on the wrong side of the road from the wrong side of a car. It was only from my apartment to a parking lot one block away and back, but still I think this experience meant more to her than when she got to meet universally known and celebrated (in England, at least) Sir Robin Knox-Johnston.

In that weekend of rest, she also immersed herself in further study and preparation for the Part B training, often using a model I'd bought to visualize what she wanted to fully understand. In addition, since we had the rental car for the full weekend, we drove around a bit in the immediate area and stopped in at a pub for a traditional Sunday roast. I tried to interest her in my favorite pub beverage, Guinness Stout. She demurred and sipped her lemonade.



Finally the time came for her to head down to the Clipper Ventures office to begin her Part B training on the larger 68. She was issued her permanent set of "oilies" (foul weather gear that, I'm guessing, takes it's name from the historic use of oiled cotton until more advanced materials were developed).

I didn't see near as much of her over that week, as her skipper drove them far harder. There were two other 68's full of Part B students working that week and, many times at dusk when I'd wander by the marina, I'd see those other two boats but not Carrie's. Later, long after dark, Carrie would come staggering in to my apartment for a moment, exhausted and yet happy with all that she was learning.

One night she did not come by at all. I'd thought they'd moored up at another harbor but she came by in the morning, utterly, utterly exhausted. They'd sailed the entire night through on rotating 45 minute watches, which in effect allowed no one to get any sense of rest. I'm not sure of what the logic was, if not to show them how it feels to be sailing under trying and demanding conditions. If that was the intent, it certainly worked.


A few days later, yesterday, she was done. She came home at 3:00 p.m. and collapsed on the futon couch before I'd had the chance to put the freshly cleaned linens back on.








More than four hours later, she hadn't stirred.

Finally, at around 8:00 p.m., just as the twilight sky was giving up it's last light outside, she stirred and moved the computer to check e-mails and bring herself up to date on the world. Outside the window, ships moved on the harbor she had departed each day as either of her boats headed for the Solent (the body of water between us here and the Isle of Wight seven miles distant) or fully out into the English Channel.


Today, as I write this mid day, she's fast asleep on the couch once again (this time with linens) after only a few hours of stirring this morning.



She flies home tomorrow and finishes the monumental task of not only ending one's life in a particular location but putting it on hold altogether. The Part C training begins at the end of the summer and she'll return as much time in advance of that as she can manage.

Because of our close friendship, the Clipper Ventures organization will specifically put us on different boats. Standard company policy even separates married couples. It's a good design with which both Carrie and I agree. While it is an experience that can be shared with those around you, in the end it's about the individual. Pre-formed alliances limit ones ability to grow and learn. I'm utterly delighted that I'll get to share my tales with her in each port of call and get to listen to hers, but I'm also glad that, in the midst of whatever challenges she may face, she will find all the strength she needs from within.

It will be a remarkable adventure for both of us. I can't imagine a better person with whom I'd rather share the entire experience.

London delivery

The 68's get moved around quite a bit for various publicity and corporate functions. This offers many of us the chance to gain a bit more experience in working and living on the boats.

"Singapore" was taken to the historic and beautiful St. Katherine's Dock in the middle of London for it's official naming ceremony by the ambassador from Singapore. I missed the delivery down, as I was occupied with Robin's homecoming on the 12th. The next day I took the train up to London to join up with the small crew bringing it home.

After dropping off my gear in the boat, I used my few remaining hours of daylight to revisit some of my favorite places in London, including taking a short walk down a slim pedestrian alley between Covent Garden and Leicester Square.


Afterwards, I joined the crew for dinner at a pub on St. Katherine's Dock.


I'd stumbled upon St. Katherine's Dock once before two years ago, when I first started spending so much time in London. I'd forgotten how beautiful it was. Moreover, what a luxury it was to be living on a boat next to a Starbucks. Boat coffee is always only instant coffee. The morning before we left, I crept out of the boat at 6:30 a.m. and bought a latté. I took it to the upper level seating to savor it. There I found two of my sailing mates already there.


Later that morning, as the tides in the River Thames rose to the appropriate level, we moved through the lock onto the river.



Once on the water, it was initially a fascinating voyage through the center of such historic sites...

...but eventually the river became just a river and the sail just just a sail. Still, passing such places as the cliffs of Dover and other notable places along the English Channel, even if only by night, gives one an enviable sense of experiencing history.

Timmy saves the day (sort of)

Robin arrived home in England yesterday, sailing into Portsmouth's Gunwharf Quay for his triumphant return. I was on board one of the two Clipper Venture 68 ft. racing boats (the ones we'll use in the circumnavigation) that had left port the previous night to be in position Saturday morning for when Robin was scheduled to sail past The Needles (the western-most tip of the Isle of Wight). There we would form a V formation with him and escort him in. Closer to home, four more 68's full of various dignitaries who had left port only that morning would join the formation, to be joined by two more 68's just before we passed Cowes on the Isle of Wight, the true center of all things sailing in England.



Unknown to the public, however, Robin had actually flown back to England last Monday, just as I had, and had been in hiding while he cranked out the last pages of the book about his latest adventure. It's scheduled to be published as soon as possible to take advantage of the extensive media attention his exploits have received in all of Great Britain.

Two of our shore team and two other professional sailors had taken his boat from Spain to The Needles, arriving two days early to be safe. There they spend 48 hours killing time out on the water to await the Robin's scheduled arrival from the shore by small boat on Saturday morning.

Image and timing, it is clear, is everything...at least from the viewpoint of Robin's growing lists of sponsors.

Though we had intended to anchor near The Needles, severe wind and weather that night forced us to dock in Cowes and leave the dock at 4:00 a.m. to be at The Needles by dawn. Just as Robin's boat came into view on the horizon, Robin himself sped by us in his RIB and joined up with his boat. Once he had climbed aboard and we all had formed up, a media helicopter that had been waiting for this moment flew over us, around us, by us, and even between us to capture enough footage to record the moment. Robin had dropped his headsails and reduced his mainsail to the fourth reef (the one Kiwi Dave and I had worked so hard to design, create, and finish in Fremantle, Australia last December). With a minimal crew on all of the 68's, we could not hope to safely operate all our sails in such close quarters with Robin so we relied on our engines to keep up, something we could barely do at full power.

An hour into our escort duty, two military transports joined us on each of our flanks, carrying dignitaries and VIPs in their windowed cabins while we sailors waived back amidst the wind and ocean's spray.

Closer to Cowes, once our formation included the other 68's, the media helicopter reappeared and made more passes over, around, and between us. As we passed the Royal Yacht Squadron in Cowes (home of the elite of the elite yacht clubs), their cannons fired out a 21-gun salute to Robin, an honorary member since his first historic circumnavigation in 1969.

After passing Cowes, we headed into Porstmouth, the main city across a small inlet from our true home of Gosport. There we moved in a massive formation of Robin's boat and eight 68's (the remaining two were away on other publicity events in London and elsewhere). At the port, the 68 I rode on was the first to make a momentary docking, allowing me and fellow Saga Insurance team member Charlotte Rigg to disembark before it pulled off again to make room for the other 68's. I was in place, then, to catch Robin's lines as he moved onto the dock. It was a small honor but it mattered to me. It felt like a kind of closure. As we secured the lines, Robin stood at the edge of his boat amidst fanfare, music, and just about everything else but fireworks.

An emcee jumped onboard and handed Robin a microphone to broadcast his first words. As his theme song has been Queen's, "Don't Stop Me Now," the first order of business was for Queen's drummer Roger Taylor to accept the first sip from a bottle of Old Pultney Scotch Whiskey, Robin's latest sponsor. After a few more such actions and other public interviews, photo ops, and sponsors touting Robin's glory, the dock full of people holding VIP passes moved to a private reception...the last public event of this grand adventure.



This, then, was quite the media-oriented event. Perhaps one half of Clipper Ventures 20 or so employees had labored weeks to plan, coordinate, and execute this morning to present the most inspiring arrival possible. I noted that, whenever the helicopter was overhead, the crew of four that had sailed the boat from Spain to here had to dive down below decks so that Robin appeared alone at the helm. Again, image is everything.

How did I save the day (sort of)? I had the right knot in the right place at the right time.

I think that an enviable familiarity of knots is part of all boy's goals of knowledge to attain. We dream of impressing people and doing amazing things with obscure skills and talents:

"Golly, Timmy! NancySue's car has gone off the side of the cliff and she's hanging on for dear life by a branch! What shall we do!??"

Taking a deep breath, with his hand on his chin, Timmy ponders out loud, "Well, I just happen to have 60 meters of 11mm kernmantel line in my backpack and I could fashion a harness out of a bowline on a bight and use a munter hitch to rappel down. Then I could use a fisherman's bend to make a loop out of these two short lengths of 9mm line I just happen to have here and turn them into a prussik loops to fabricate a Texas-sytle ascender to come back up with NancySue's weak, helpless, and grateful body in my arms, breathing hot breaths into my ear as she gasps for air, lookin' sexy as hell as her hair falls back over my arms and shoulder..."

Boys think that way (men, too). Boys always want to be prepared to save lives, especially the life of the woman of their dreams (even if we don't know who she is yet). Knowing obscure knots really plays into that well.

In sailing, I've encountered eight knots that encompass all I think I'll ever need to know. The primary one is the bowline. I'd thought I'd learned it well enough but early on in my initial training with Clipper Ventures, too often I fumbled with it when speed was useful, if not necessary. Sometimes speed is even critical.

Since those alarming episodes, over and over again I've practiced my bowline and several other fundamental knots I think I'll need during my voyage. Now I'm confident that I could tie a bowline behind my back while hanging upside down in the dark with water being poured into my nose. Someday I may have to do just that to save NancySue, and perhaps even BillyBob. Maybe the life I save might be only my own.

In all my extra curricular study of knots, I've paused to consider the possibilities of a bowline on a bight: a bowline tied on a length of line folded back onto itself. Such a knot will result in three loops. Normally this is intended to be used to support a long object in three places, such as an unconscious person. It occurred to me, however, that if the loops are oriented in the manner of the second photo, this could also be used as a emergency climbing harness. The loop formed by the end of the bight could be adjusted to a waist circumference and the other two loops lengthened to be leg loops. Sitting into such a collection of lines would place one's center of gravity below the point of suspension-a vital necessity for stability.

I've practiced fashioning one out of a length of line I have at home and saw no reason why it wouldn't work. I've never actually tried it, however.

About thirty minutes before we met up with Robin off The Needles in the Solent, a cable-tie snapped that was holding two flags of Robin's race's main sponsor suspended together above our deck. One flag dropped to the deck, the other flailed downwind on a length of halyard (lines used to hoist sails) from the top of our mast. Nothing was endangered but, considering the hugely visible media event we were about to take part of, it was an embarrassingly unsightly indication of a lack of seamanship: mine. I was the one who had been given the task of hoisting the flags and had thought the cable-tie I'd used to link the two flags would be sufficient for that load.

There was one extra problem. Boats always carry something called a bosun's chair, a harness that enables someone to be hoisted up the mast on a halyard when something (such as this occasion) requires human attention at the top. Our first mate, however, had loaned our bosun's chair to another boat the previous day and had forgotten to retrieve it.

As the first mate and skipper discussed options, I moved to the mast and fashioned my bowline-on-a-bight instant ready-made climbing harness.

"This will work," I said, turning to face the first mate and skipper, then I confessed to my error which had caused the situation. "Since it's my problem, I'll go up in this."

Both the skipper and first mate looked at my idea with obvious skepticism, first because they'd never seen such a thing before and, secondly, because it looked like it would be painfully uncomfortable. The skipper came up with the idea of hoisting me on helicopter lifting strop, the kind that loops under someone's arms to a single point in front of their face.

I didn't feel secure with that, as all I needed to do was raise my arms directly over my head to completely slip out. As we had no sail hoisted but were only motoring along, the boat was rocking heavily left and right in the waves caused by that morning's considerable wind. If I lost control and was swung violently into the mast, I was afraid I'd loose focus long enough or worse, loose consciousness and allow my arms to come over my head.

I countered with an alternative plan. I'd wear my devised harness and be hoisted on the line I'd created it out of while the helicopter strop would be attached to a second line and I'd wear it as a back up. The skipper agreed. While Robin's boat and our imminent media rendezvous approached, two teams gathered around each of these two halyards and their corresponding winches to hoist me up.

Before being lifted off the deck, I unclipped one end of the safety strap on my PFD that I'd normally use to secure myself to the boat in heavy weather. I looped it around the other lines rising the length of the 80 ft. mast and reclipped it to my PFD. This would keep me from swinging wildly away from the mast if I lost control but still I had to cling to the mast using both my legs and my arms for the full ascent and descent while the pitching of the boat tried to throw me left then right then left again.

This morning the insides of my thighs ache like I'd been riding horses all day yesterday.



I've climbed a mast in port (photo above) but I've never done it at sea. Unfortunately I was unable to enjoy the view. I was just too busy clinging to the mast as it repeatedly tried to throw me off. The top was reached, I grabbed the errant halyard and flag, clipped it to myself, then motioned to be lowered. Moments later we linked up with Robin and, not long after that, the helicopter began filming.

Lessons learned

• cable ties aren't that strong
• my emergency climbing-harness-out-of nothing-but-line works

It's always nice to save the day now and then, even if it is only in one's own mind.

One round-the-world race done, one to go

From Sir Robin Knox-Johnston's final blog entry and summarizing collection of memories one day before arriving in Getxo, Spain, finishing in 4th place in the Velux 5 Oceans solo circumnavigating race:

One of my happiest recollections is from the team supporting me for this venture and the camaraderie that has built up and those friendships will, I am sure, endure.

This was a common theme that seem to run through everyone's minds over these last ten months, ever since I joined Robin's effort in July and became the first of what was to become the growing group that evolved into the blue-shirted Team Saga Insurance. This great sense of friendship would often surface as a toast over several of our many dinners together as a team.

Of course, this has always been the underlying theme of everything I do: it's not about whatever I'm experiencing, be it on the land, in the air, or at sea. It's about the people I'm sharing the moment with and what their states of mind contribute to the content of my life.

On the surface, then, this last week in Spain was about taking my well-earned part as a team member in the conclusion of Robin's round-the-world race. We went out to sea to meet him at the finish line, rushed back in to catch his lines as he pulled up to the dock, and stood by him while he sprayed champagne on the admiring crowd (including hordes of sailing reporters and photographers).

In truth, however, the best part of this last week in Spain was about my Spanish friends, some old and some new. My greatest feeling of honor and privilege of the week was not standing next to Robin as the champagne flew but being part of the massive flotilla of boats that escorted in local hero Unai Basurko after he crossed the finish line six miles from the port.



Unai's boat is the one carrying a sliver of orange foresail. In the photo, the marina where the race started and finished is just out of sight to the left. Unai's home is just out of sight to the right.

Unai, then, is not only the local boy done well. He has become a source of great national pride, both as a Spaniard and, more importantly, as a Basque. In all my time in the region in and around Bilbao over this last year, I've yet to see the red and yellow Spanish flag. Clear and even vague representations of the orange, white, and green flag of the Basque region, however, are everywhere.

In the overall standings at Norfolk last month, after 30,000 miles of sailing completed and 3000 miles to go, Unai was in third place, with only 40 hours over Robin in fourth. First and second were so far ahead as to be assured, so the only question left in the race was whether or not Unai could hold off Robin and hang onto third.

During the two weeks of the relative sprint of a race across the Atlantic, Robin gained and held a consistently improving lead over Unai that from time to time gave some the optimism that he just might take back the third overall position. In the final days however, it was evident that he would not and so Unai's position of third, a podium position, was secure.

Even before the final race, I was obvious in my favoritism for Unai. In Norfolk, Virginia, standing with Unai and his girlfriend Marissa, I told them how much I wanted him to come in third, and not Robin. Marissa pinched a piece of my blue jacket that clearly identified me as a member of Robin's team, pulled it up closer to my face and said in a sweet mocking tone, "How can you say that?"

I shrugged and laid my hand on Unai's shoulder. "It's the way I feel. Robin's had honor enough. It's Unai's turn." Unai grabbed both my shoulders in his typically physical way and nodded. "Yes!"

In Spain on the morning of Unai's anticipated arrival, I joined my friend and host German on his sailboat. With us were his father José and another friend Inma. In the hours we waited just outside the harbor, I endured what has certainly been the worst short-term weather I've ever experienced on the water. A squall passed over the flotilla, beginning as a heavy rainfall that eventually turned into a thunderstorm with lighting striking the water only a kilometer in the distance and hailstones pelting our backs as we turned away from the wind. I had waterproof camera with me that I'd finally purchased to be able to photograph such events but every time I lifted my camera to try to capture any image of the maelstrom around me, the impact of pea-sized and even larger hailstones on my bare hands was too painful to endure. I contented myself with photographing the hailstones gathering around Inma's feet. German, at the helm, had to take these hailstones directly on his face while he kept a lookout for all the other boats he knew were around us and within a boatlength or two, but could no longer see through the heavy veil of precipitation.

The water (from what I could see of it peering out of squinting eyes shielded by my stinging hand) took on a marvelous and almost mystical image, as the impact of the hailstones smoothed out any larger sprays of foam and left only a bluish and lumpy undulating surface with a whitish tinge. It was beautiful and breathtaking. Knowing how rare an opportunity it was to witness this made it even more attractive. Though I did manage to capture a rough image of it (below), it of course does not truly record the starkly beautiful image we all savored.



As the hail subsided, a small water spout (the equivalent of a dust devil on land) formed and moved within 50 meters of us, laying one sailboat in front of us completely on its side just as it came into our view out of the mist. We all grabbed ahold of anything we could, as it seemed we were destined to be next. Thankfully the waterspout passed 50 meters to our side and then over the nearby land and dissipated without having struck another boat.

Finally, as visibility opened up from 50 meters to a kilometer, Unai's immense orange, green, and white boat was dramatically unveiled before us just as he crossed the finish line at the end of a jetty in the harbor. Instantly small RIBs (rubber inflatable boats) zoomed up and offloaded his shore crew, a camera crew, and Unai's girlfriend. The shore crew took over the boat, the camera crew mounted cameras to their faces and shoulders, and Unai began to dance and dance and dance.

Even now as I write this six days later, the emotions of that moment rise within me. All around us, drenched and yet utterly happy, scores of sailors, friends, strangers, and other locals screamed, whistled, sounded horns and lit flares. Unai took a flare himself and held it out to the celebrating crowd, shown below in a photo taken from the press boat by my friend Rafa Aspiunza .



Robin came in on Friday morning, May 4th. Unai came in on Saturday, May 5th. Among the throngs on the dock were Robin's girlfriend Julia and Robin's press agent Sophy. They told me later that as Unai and his massive flotilla rounded the corner to the marina and came into view, they both burst into tears.

"Why are you crying," one asked the other.
"I don't know," she answered. "Why are you crying?"
"I don't know, either," she said. "It's just so emotional."

As Unai passed me in the pressing crowd while making his way from his docked boat up to the awards podium, he saw me, grabbed me, hugged me, and kissed my cheek, giving me my first insight into what it's like for a woman to be kissed by a man who hasn't shaved.

I next saw him that afternoon while he was signing autographs. It was our first chance to truly greet each other. When he saw me, he grabbed my shoulders and spun me around in a dance while we both laughed. A photographer started shooting pictures (above) which German graciously tracked down for me unasked.

Unai has become such a great friend, like the handful of others I've made in my times in the Basque region this last year. It was a very happy time for me. I can only imagine what it must feel like for Unai. Few thought he would last long in this demanding race. That he not only did but rose to third is an unbelieveable achievement.

That night German and I were joined by his friends Imna (center) and Arantza (right) as we wandered about the harbour, looking for the celebration we were certain we would find. Unai, however, had apparently gone to bed, having been up the previous 36 hours without sleep. Who could blame him, of course.


The following afternoon, my last in Spain, I had one last gathering with the great friends who have come to define my perception of this region of the world, Saioa and Rafa, Hugo and German. On Saioa and Rafa's balcony we drank coffee and sipped pacharan, a drink unique to the Basque region that I have come to savor and enjoy. It represents to so much to me; these friends and others of the region such as Unai and Marissa, the beauty of the land, and the adventure on the sea of a few elite racers of which I've been lucky enough to be a part.

There's one more party to attend on the 19th here in England, where all members of Robin's shore team and support crew will have one last closing event to bring an end to Robin's latest grand adventure and our parts in it. In my mind, however, the task is done. Robin's circumnavigation is complete.

Next up: my own. One hundred and twenty-eight days to go.