Dutch teen solo sailor, 14, begins her voyage

by Nancy Knudsen on 5 Aug 2010 Laura Dekker, 14, finally allowed by a Dutch court to sail away from Holland on a solo voyage around the world, has only one regret - she will miss her dog, Spot.

Yesterday she set off with her father on a test and delivery sail to Portugal, from where she will begin her great adventure. Laura was born in the middle of a circumnavigation, had her first boat when she was six, and began sailing solo aged 10.

A psychologist might ponder that her great urge to keep sailing is a search for her early childhood, but Laura is simply full of elation at the beginning of her two-year voyage in her 38ft Jeanneau Gin Fizz ketch, Guppy.

'I can be sailing now, and that's great,' she said, 'I am very happy.'

Over 100 well wishers gathered at the dockside of the southern Dutch harbour of Den Osse to wave goodbye to Laura and her father.

Dick Dekker is accompanying his daughter to Portugal before she begins her solo voyage from there to the Canary Islands before a solo crossing of the Atlantic late this year after the hurricane season ends.

Just last week, Miss Dekker won a bitter legal fight to overturn a child protection order that had placed her under the guardianship of social workers to stop her setting sail last year, aged just 13.

She has become a Dutch folk hero after rejecting, with parental support, claims by the child protection authorities that the long sea voyage would be too dangerous and damage her 'emotional development'.

The teenager has also shrugged off warnings from Nato commanders about piracy off the Horn of Africa and hoisted the black Jolly Roger of The Sea Shepherd Conservation Society as she set sail.

Laura will now be able to forget the tribulations of the last three years. She first came to the attention of authorities at age eleven when she arrived unexpectedly in Britain, having sailed from Holland solo on her earlier yacht Guppy. When they saw her age on her passport, they promptly slapped her in a children's home and called her father.

Dick Dekker came to the rescue of his child, escorted her to the British shore, and she sailed home again, again solo.