Tuesday, May 29, 2012

5/29/12

Noon Position: 34 27' S, 138 05' W, SOG 4.8, COG 050, Day's Run 140nm.
A few well intentioned emails have gotten me thinking about the future
for the past few days, about what lies ahead on shore. For almost a
year now my world has been focused on this trip, planning, preparing,
then sailing, first south, then forever east. The thought of returning
to shore to face the unknown has filled me with a mixture of black rage
and anxious dread. I've wished any number of times that I could just
keep on sailing east, but south America lies in the way, with Cape Horn
reaching down to the now icy depths of the pacific, and winter is here,
bringing with it increasingly violent weather that I'm now fleeing
from. I wonder if by turning North now I might be quitting before I've
gone far enough, but at the same time I'm afraid of going too far like
Santiago, losing myself as the winter takes great toothy bites out of me
and the boat alongside, leaving nothing but great bones washing through
the sea. If I could just catch the right wave, warm and gentle, to ride
around the world, but Odyssey is tired and so am I, wet and moldy and
breaking down. So instead I'm sailing back north towards the trades,
out of the fearsome and violent south, wondering where I'm bound.

2 comments:

  1. Most people wonder where they are bound and what lies around the next corner, and more often than not, it is usually a nice surprise of one sort or another. Stay safe Eric.

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  2. You'll use what you've learned the rest of your life...

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