Women sailing adventurers- Ginny MacRobert
by Ginny MacRobert on 2 Nov 2009
Ginny’s boat Dai Long Wan at Inhambane in Mozambique SW
Jessica Watson might be young, but she's otherwise unique only in that she wants to circumnavigate without stopping, and by rounding Cape Horn. While usually the only sailors who do that are record-seekers, there are many women who skipper their yachts around the world, many of them solo.
The difference is that they do it quietly, with passion, and hardly anyone except their immediate family and friends know about it. Ginny MacRobert is just one of them, and she here tells her story, in the first of a series of articles about women sailing adventurers
Some people are just lucky, or so it seems. In October 2006 I became one of the luckiest people on earth, those who get to go ocean cruising. I decided to circumnavigate and sailed most legs with various crew and single handed some, on our family’s catamaran called Dai Long Wan, a Robertson and Caine, South African built vessel, 13.7 metres in length and 7.4metre beam. Bought in the BVI, she kept me and crew safe in all kinds of challenging conditions visiting about 20 nations and many more stops.
This dream has been one that was long nurtured, and which grew in to a long period of preparation, mostly that of training and educating the skipper, myself, on as many aspects of the nautical life as possible. This included courses in celestial navigation, radio telephony, storm tactics, and those subjects covered in the RYA Offshore classes, weather, tides, safety at sea and yet more navigation. A quick Pacific crossing in 2004-5 was valuable training in putting my knowledge and new sailing skills to use.
I planned the circumnavigation to start and arrive back in Hong Kong, where I was living at the time, to last for 18 months. Although too quick, there were numerous reasons for this, and it was either give it a go while I could, or not go at all. I have 6 children and this period coincided with some gaps, in which no major exams were being experienced by any of them.
My husband was unable to come and is not fond of ocean crossings, preferring to potter around the islands in Hong Kong. The other major reason was to avoid revolving tropical storms in the north and south hemispheres and to catch the trade winds. My route took me through the tropics, except for going south around the Cape of Good Hope.
Finding crew was my biggest difficulty with few people being able to take extended time out of their busy lives or who wanted to go ocean cruising. Most crew worked out very well, even though it was tough changing crew and training each one for the coming legs. My permanent crew was my large dog, Henry, and later Coco de Mer, a kitten from the Seychelles who became Henry’s playmate.
Highlights of the trip included a visit to Chagos Archipelago, Salomon Atoll, where being anchored is like living in a tropical aquarium, with manta rays and schools of coloured tropical fish and sharks swimming around the boat. For an avid snorkeler it was heaven.
In the Seychelles I met a number of very interesting people and really enjoyed the social life there. The mix of races and culture is a fascinating one, and not surprising given the Seychelles geographical position. Visiting Isla Del Coco again (Costa Rica, World heritage Marine Park) and Galapagos were both amazing experiences. Isla Del Coco is famous for the large schools of visiting hammerheads and other varieties of sharks, which can be seen even by snorkeling.
Galapagos with its variety of birds and lizards in unexpected colours and places, penguins and sea lions, seemingly out of their right regions and the giant tortoises all added to the exotic atmosphere that the islands evoke.
Just as rewarding at sea were the frequent visits of dolphins of different kinds, whales from the largest to the small pilot whales, and sea birds large and small. Whales seem attracted to small boats and although we loved having them visit, it was with a little trepidation at times especially as one about 25 metres long wanted to rub against one hull.
I had wanted to try single handing Dai Long Wan on at least a couple of legs of the journey. I chose to sail across the Caribbean from Trinidad to Panama with only dog and cat as crew. Conditions were generally good, a bit challenging having 32-40 knots constantly for a 3 day period at one stage. Meeting a 14 nations military exercise at sea near Panama, all ships not using any navigation lights (blind exercises)caused me some loss of sleep from having to track so many vessels on the radar.
Sailing from Yap, Micronesia to the Philippines single handed became more than I bargained for when I ran into a gale there and lost all electronics temporarily from having been doused by a large wave. I did more than I thought I could when I was forced to hand steer in appalling conditions for almost 17 hrs. Being on your own at sea is a great experience, refreshing, but keeping a tight hold on yourself is essential. I kept up routines strictly, exercising, eating well, never out of the pot, keeping a careful check on navigation, dutifully righting up the log book, writing up daily experiences and performing boat checks. I never slept more than one hour at a time but somehow didn’t get terribly tired. Henry the Dog and Coco the Cat were great company.
Downsides of the journey included running into a force 12 off the African coast. The freak storm was not predicted by the weather forecasters and killed people on shore when their homes were washed into the sea. Coming through the storm safely brought a feeling not only of relief of course, but also of the satisfaction of feeling I made the right choice of storm tactics at the time. We spent about 36 hours hove to because of the gigantic breaking waves and Dai Long Wan rode the wave tops like a confident duck. Once I had received a detailed weather report regarding the direction of the storm we were able to turn back and head north again leaving it in our wake.
Approaching the Galapagos Islands, about 90 Nm north of them, we were harassed by fishermen in a small open boat. We had been approached in other parts of the world by fishermen but they usually wave, are friendly or ask for water. These men tried to take hold of our transom step railings, both sides, to pull themselves aboard as we continued under sail.
Henry my dog, barked fiercely with hair standing on end, and they were deterred by his brave defending. We crew also had our emergency flares in hand. They also tried to stop us by stopping in front of Dai Long Wan but had to quickly get out of the way when it became clear they would be rammed instead. We reported the incident to the Ecuadorian Navy who thought they might be illegal shark fishermen, and remarked that they had experienced trouble from them before.
Near St Helena in the Atlantic we lost the cat, Coco de Mer overboard. By the time my crew turned the boat to wind, started motors and then woke me , Coco was lost from sight in lively seas. We decided to search just the same and took a course down wind of the overboard position. About a half mile back I caught sight of his tiny head appearing and disappearing on the wave tops and he was still swimming strongly. A half hour after his rescue he was bouncing around the decks again as if nothing had happened.
He was to go overboard again while underway!
Having had the opportunity to circumnavigate was a huge privilege, and one I would repeat, though over a much longer period next time. For me, a woman of a certain age, it was a huge effort that took all my strength, ingenuity, patience and courage at times. Approaching land after long passages was always exciting, sometimes challenging dodging vessels and other navigation hazards, and always wondering who you would meet there and what you would see.
The overall experience was life changing and I have no regrets that I went sailing.
Ginny has written a book of her adventures which is expected to be out in November this year. It is entitled 'Gin's Tonic: Ocean Voyage, Inner Journey' published by Proverse in Hong Kong.
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