Ok so I’m probably obsessing about the Southern half of the planet at this point but for some reason I googled what point of land, outside of Antarctica, was furthest south and got the answer South Georgia. At that point the world suddenly shrank dramatically. It turned out the only way to get to South Georgia is by sea and a few further google searches revealed that unless you want to go by cruise ship you pretty much need to sail there on a yacht from The Falkland Islands or the bottom of South America. As you can probably guess it is not like there are loads of yachts just waiting around for charter in Port Stanley but there was quite a lot of information readily available about the yachts that are based in that part of the world. One yacht, called Pelagic, immediately drew my attention and for all the right reasons.
The reason I remembered a yacht called Pelagic is because an old friend, who I haven’t seen for almost fifteen years, was the skipper. Sure enough I soon found several articles about the yacht Pelagic and her long term skipper called Magnus Day. Magnus and I worked together delivering events for the likes of Ingenius, Concerto and VAK Design in the mid noughties and lost touch when he left to pursue his love of sailing. I tried his old contact details but figured they were probably long out of date. I did some digging and came across a few possible email addresses on the websites of some of the yacht charter firms he worked for. There was of course the fact there was a pretty decent chance he wouldn’t remember me anyway but I thought “why the hell not” and pinged off an email to all the email addresses I had found for him. I was not really expecting a response but figured I had nothing to lose. To my surprise less than 20 minutes later Mag replied by email, from where he was currently living in Ontario, while taking a break from shovelling snow off his drive. Swapping numbers I called him on WhatsApp and after a long overdue catch up I told him what I had in mind.
Having spoken to Magnus and talked through some of the disorganised ideas swirling around in my head things suddenly became much clearer. I followed it up with a conversation with my partner in crime Paul Jordan who, being used to my half baked ideas, always gives sound advice on what is, or is not, realistic. Jordy was very positive about the whole thing, apart from the distinct lack of wineries, and suggested a few elements that added to the story we could try and tell about yacht races, the vast southern ocean, unspoilt islands, snow capped mountains, shades of Shackleton on a fantastic adventure and bona fide challenge to boot: Out from Chile, The Cape Horn Monument, Elephant Island, South Georgia, Over the mountains to Grytviken, Shackleton’s grave, Falklands & Home
“I must go down to the seas again, to the lonely sea and the sky, And all I ask is a tall ship and a star to steer her by, And the wheel’s kick and the wind’s song and the white sail’s shaking, And a gray mist on the sea’s face, and a gray dawn breaking.”
John Masefield
I’m not sure whether this would even work or if anyone else would be up for it but maybe with fair winds and following seas it’s a challenge for the future.
Deano's World 