You get up early and have a quick breakfast. Next you jump into your layers of clothing – thermals, shorts, polar, thermal socks, sailing boots, foul weather trousers, foul weather jacket, sunscreen, sunglasses, gloves.
You slip the lines; 5, 4, 3, 2, 1, Start, and off you are.
The wind is howling at 25kts in your face, the swell is heavy and the boat is pitching up and down into one wave after an other. You’re sitting on the rail, Water is splashing over the foredeck and every 3rd or 4th wave the water splashes you as well. It’s cloudy, it’s raining, you start getting damp and cold in your foul weather gear; if not because of the water because of the sweat.
Nature is putting you, the crew and the boat to a test and you can’t but wonder why, why are you doing this, why are you putting yourself voluntarily through this.
And then the sea calms a bit down, the sky opens and you get a glimpse of that short moment that makes you forget it all and makes everything worth it.
The boat is pushing smoothly through the sea, you are sitting on the rail and have no option but to become a spectator of pure beauty. – Anarchist Sebastian.
