More than meets the eye

by John Curnow on 10 Jan 2017 Welcome to 2017! We do hope it is a happy and prosperous new year for you. From here, it certainly has the promise of being a big one! This month alone sees the inaugural Sail Maldives get underway. It is a two-month celebration of the location, the people and all the good things in life we should be celebrating. Now as an event itself it is not only auspicious, it may it also be a harbinger of great things across the cruising fraternity, right around the globe.

So, like a lot of things, the genesis of an idea can often be hard to trace, but ah-huh moments are usually much more memorable. For some time, the whole people taking to the seas thing has been a building phenomenon. Not hard to understand why. High stress, low connection with all that is real and poor relationships with the key people in your world.

Many consider jumping right off the grid. No IT issues, collect rainwater, grow vegetables, live sustainably and so on. As I sneak further and further away from the theoretical mid-point of this life, I certainly look at things very differently. When I travel I constantly look at places and go, ‘What would that be like?’ For the most part, it is a dream, because living without the interweb and other such delights is becoming harder and harder to do.

Yet there has been a critical mass reached. Previously we have written about how technology has helped non-sailors take to the oceans. Mainstream media has caught onto the whole idea too. Regularly, they write about ‘blue nomads’ and how they skip around the globe enjoying purity, sailing, snorkelling, exploring, chilling in a hammock and vast openness, thus leaving crowding, noise and atmospheric pollution, oppression and greyness to others.

However, it is not just a ‘grey’ phenomenon. Gen Y’s have also picked up on the idea. Just have a look at YouTube sensations, Vagabond, for a second and see what I mean. You could easily argue the whole thing has been custom built for the technology age, and the ones for whom the whole world apparently is all about themselves. The point is, that apart from often reflecting the title of a Shakespearean play, they are reaching more and more souls, getting corporate support to do it, and no doubt, inspiring more people to become sea gypsies.

So it is on the back of all of this that I ask you to carefully consider the image below, please. I need you to not switch off when you see the fat head (square top) mainsail, heady in a foil, not on a furler, and crew on the rail. Yep. It is a racing shot. And so with that, you have my ‘Ah-Huh’ moment, and thanks goes to Andrea Francolini for sending it to me.

The genesis of the idea goes way, way back, possibly even to junior school, but the overall point here is that cruising is huge, and when you could make an escape with the sort of emotive power that this image casts, then why wouldn’t you. Then the bigger picture comes into it. All these craft and people means we need to be more sustainable in the way we get around. From the very boats themselves, to the way we live on board.

It is not that far removed from cars, which now have a much higher percentage of recyclable components in them and don’t put out the same sort or volumes of toxins anymore, either. Let’s hope we can work more effectively on the keeping the planet around for all of us to explore and enjoy. Therefore, if you have any points about how you live aboard that you would like to share, then please let us know. We are keen to make sure the seas are around for all to enjoy, and that is going to get harder as more people take to them to make good their escape.

So apart from all that, the cunning plan must have worked, because it is on again! YeeHaa. Cruise to a great location. Stop. BBQ, and then return, just like before Christmas. I am certainly looking forward to that later on in the week. A highlight for sure, and I am so keen to be dragged away for the keyboard. Of course there are a couple of jobs to be done before departure, but an hour should see us leaving the quay by mid-morning. WooHooooooo… Hopefully, you can get to do the same yourself soon, if you are not doing so already.

Are you out there plying the seas and got something to say? We’d love to hear from you via editor@sail-world.com Also, if you would like to receive our newsletter each week, then please go to the 'Newsletter' button at the top of the Sail-World home page and enter your details. Simple...