Inslingeren

I’ve been on JAJO for two weeks now, and it’s been great. Wet and miserable, but great.

After a solid performance at the St Maarten Heineken Regatta, we sailed the boat down to Aruba with five crew and nine guests. The conditions were about as good as they get, but still it took me several watches to find my footing. A Volvo 65 is a complex machine, and sailing one feels like having to learn how to sail all over again.

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It’s also very wet and uncomfortable. At some point I was sent into the bow section to bail. While I was being thrown against the carbon fibre walls in total blackness, overcome by seasickness, I thought: this could either be a very effective torturing method or a very entertaining reality TV show with B-grade celebrities. That wasn’t the worst moment, though. The worst is when you lie in your bunk, exhausted yet unable to sleep through the horrific noise of carbon slamming on waves, and you count down the hours before having to go back on deck. Inevitably you think: why am I here?

But as always life is better on deck than below, and when you’re helming the boat as she goes down waves at 20-25 knots, the question answers itself. And then, after a day or so, the rough motion becomes normal, the salt on your skin just another layer, and you’re so tired that you sleep through any noise the boat makes (except the easing of the runners).

Aruba is a soulless place. All-inclusive hotels and cruiseships. Nothing to write about. Curaçao is slightly better but transformed by mass tourism it no longer resembles the island I grew up on.

The corporate sailing days have been valuable though. Yesterday, as we sailed to Bonaire, I felt in tune with the boat and the crew. We left both Aruba and Curaçao as new Round the Island record holders (just over three hours and just under seven hours respectively) and while the vomiting passengers may not have enjoyed the process, they definitely seemed pleased with the result.

Naturally I hope we’ll also break the Bonaire record, but other than that I’m mostly looking forward to the longer passages ahead. First to St Maarten, then east across the Atlantic, back to home shores. The last time I left Bonaire it took seven months to reach Amsterdam. This time I’m hoping for three weeks. A different route, a faster boat, and, more importantly, a wiser sailor.

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