Tim Kent talks about the challenges of his Around Alone race.
April 17–24
Nursing a Tooth, Gaining Ground, and Picking Up Hitchhikers
The boat is holding up well, but one of the oldest parts on board—the 50-year-old skipper—sometimes is not. One day recently I began getting an ominous ache in one of my lower left molars. I could tell that it was clearly going to cause a problem. It is one of the few medical emergencies that I feared the most: a dental problem at sea.
I called a dentist on shore. He prescribed an antibiotic, which I carry on board, along with a strong painkiller. The good news is that my aching tooth is aching less. Later, a doctor recommended that I switch my painkiller to simple aspirin. He said that it was very effective against pain and swelling. He was correct. I can actually bite down on the tooth now.
We're making better time than I expected. I crossed the equator back into the Northern Hemisphere on Monday, April 21, at 4 a.m. Greenwich Mean Time (12 midnight Eastern Daylight Time). While the boat Tommy Hilfiger Freedom America still has a commanding lead (I'm in second place), I am hanging closer to it than in any leg so far. For 16 hours, we were picking up serious miles on Tommy Hilfger: We had closed to within 146 miles of the red, white, and blue rocketship that's won every leg among my racing class, the 50-foot boats.
One nature note: I had a hitchhiker one morning. I left my dishwashing bucket tied in the back of the cockpit. During boisterous conditions, it becomes partially full of water. When I went to get the bucket to do the dishes, I found a tiny flying fish swimming furiously around the bucket! One of his larger friends, about eight inches long, was lying not far away, and had perished from lack of water. But not my little hitchhiker! I took his photo for posterity and dumped him back into the sea. Maybe he'll stay clear of sailboats in the future.
Tim
April 12–16
April 12-16: Tim Rounds the Bulge of Brazil
I am under way!
I began the fifth and final leg of the Around Alone race from Salvador, Brazil, on April 13. It was a gorgeous, sunny afternoon. The day started early. My staff was down at the boat by 7 a.m., but there were just a few odds and ends to be done—packing and stashing, no running around.
The sailing right now is uneventful. That's putting it mildly. A brief, toothless squall is all that has interrupted my somewhat stately progression up the coast. The seas are flat, the wind is light, and the boat is moving along nicely. It needs little input from the skipper. I can only tweak so much.
Sailing in these conditions leaves little to do onboard. I monitor our course, make certain the sails are trimmed correctly, and keep track of battery levels. Aside from that, I read and try to catch up on correspondence that lagged during the stopover.
The heat is brutal. Clothing is down to bare essentials: boxers, hat, and sunscreen. At times I wish that I could retreat to the harbor back in Salvador for cold water and a nice lunch. Warm water and one of my favorite tuna sandwiches will have to do.
If it has to be hot, at least I often get the kind of sailing you would want: about 14 knots (16 mph) of wind, and two sails pulling me along quite nicely. Without this wind, life onboard would be miserable. I'm approaching the doldrums again—the area of ocean around the equator with calms, squalls, and light, shifting winds. I am sure that misery is still waiting.
By April 16, I poked the nose of the boat around the bulge of Brazil—the part of the continent that sticks out into the Atlantic Ocean. At that time, Newport, Rhode Island—the end of the race—was 3,500 miles away. It's a straight line now from the bow to the finish, a small milestone.
Tim
April 1–9
An American Abroad
Salvador, Brazil—Perhaps you have heard this one:
What do you call a person who speaks three languages? Trilingual.
What do you call a person who speaks two languages? Bilingual.
What do you call a person who speaks one language? American!
I sure feel like the butt of that joke here in Brazil. This American-abroad problem was masked by my previous stopovers—England, Cape Town, and New Zealand—where English is readily understood. So far, I have picked up enough Portuguese to say "thank you," order dinner, and take a taxi.
When I go out with Gilles Campan—my French teammate—he and the other crews chatter away in French, while other people chatter away in Portuguese. I feel like I missed out on the language thing a long time ago. I sure wish that I had paid more attention in high school French class. Acquiring and using a second language is really important. I plan to take a weeklong intensive French language course for myself this summer.
We are knocking things off our list of chores. We installed a new furler, which is a piece of equipment that reduces the sail. We replaced a part for the autopilot and a new battery switch. We installed chart software on the laptop for Leg 5. The food and clothes are all packed. We are far ahead of where we normally are at this point. A lot of that has to do with Gilles. Meanwhile, Cheri Kent has arrived with a suitcase full of last-minute parts. Cheri is my chief supporter on land, my former wife, and the sole parent dealing with two very active grade-school children.
We will go out for a test-sail tomorrow, April 10, to make certain that the new parts all function properly. We start Leg 5 at 1 p.m. local time on Sunday, April 13 (noon Eastern Daylight Time).
Thanks to one of our sponsors and our three-week stopover, I made a quick surprise visit to see my daughters in Milwaukee last week. I missed them terribly and got almost enough talking and snuggling to get me to Newport. There is a lot of sailing to do and we will leave better prepared for it than ever before. And now, back to work.
Tim
March 24–31
Tackling "The List"
Salvador, Brazil—By 10:30 a.m. it is already amazingly hot. Fans go full tilt in the cabin; on the deck it is blistering. The marina is nestled right against the city. Old battered buildings lean up against new ones and are surrounded by churches—more than 160 of them in the town. There are a lot of tough-looking police around—I don't know if they make me feel more or less safe.
One of the members of my support team, Frenchman Gilles Campan, has arrived to help out with the long list of tasks to prepare the boat for the final leg of the race. That's a 4,000-mile trip from Salvador to Newport, Rhode Island, beginning April 13.
We wake up early. As Gilles and I get to work, we watch the local fisherman in the dawning hours as they fish with nets, hand lines, or by diving. Many of the fishing craft are literally dugout canoes—a big tree hollowed out by hand, with three or four fishermen working from it. We will see them returning to the harbor in the late morning, sometimes a series of them towed by a small motorized boat. The catch is for sale in moments—truly fresh fish.
Without a single day of sickness in this race so far, I have finally been laid low with stomach problems. It's common to Yankee visitors in South America who are not careful enough about drinking the water. So it's early to bed.
Each day, we chip away at The List, which includes replacing lines, wires, and solar panels. We have fixed cabin lights that didn't work, and sent one of the sails off for repair. I'm getting my sailing clothes cleaned and repacked. We have met someone who keeps a boat here in the marina who speaks both excellent English and Portuguese, and who knows where to get EVERYTHING. He's our new best friend and has been a great help in sourcing parts locally.
Gilles and I decided after lunch one day to get haircuts. We found a barber off the main square in town, a tiny shop with ancient stone walls, a few battered old chairs, and one barber. The barber understood no English and very little French, so it was up to Gilles to get across why we were in town and how much to cut off the top. We spent four "reals" for each cut. That's about $1 each (the real is the Brazilian currency, pronounced "RAY-al").
Aside from adventures like that, we are keeping our heads down and focusing on the most important, immediate goal—finishing Leg Five.
Tim
March 17–24
Tim Takes Second in Leg Four
In a light wind and an aggressive tide, Everest Horizontal crept into Salvador, Brazil, near midnight local time, on Saturday, March 23. Accompanied by three boats full of my friends and fellow skippers, I crossed the finish line for Leg Four in second place, behind Tommy Hilfiger Freedom America. Leg Four was the longest of the five parts to this race: 7,800 miles across the Southern Ocean, around Cape Horn, and up the coast of South America.
The last week of racing featured plenty of squalls. One afternoon I sat in the middle of eight squalls and went nowhere for almost four hours. Nowhere. And according to the GPS track, we went backwards for almost four miles during this period.
The last day was frustrating too. I was just 60 miles from the finish at breakfast. There was one five-hour period of so little wind that I turned off the autopilot and just drifted in circles. But the easterly winds finally filled in toward dusk and I charged off toward the finish.
After crossing the line, I approached the dock. People swarmed the boat. The night lit up with fireworks in honor of my arrival! We went to a cafe for a hamburger. It was a great ending for a great leg.
It's Sunday now, and the sun is setting on a typically steamy day in Salvador. It is brutally hot there. Crews show up to work at daybreak when it is not unbearable, and by 10 a.m. it is unbearable.
One leg remains. Everest Horizontal is just 4,000 miles from Newport. I am going to find my hotel, take a long shower, clean up this ragged beard, and have a nice dinner. Work to prepare the boat for the final leg will begin in earnest tomorrow.
Tim
March 9–14
Life on the Tilt
The weather has certainly varied over the past week. When high-pressure systems dominate, I go nowhere fast. In one 22-hour stretch, I traveled only 85 miles. Yet other times, there are plenty of headwinds, requiring me to tack—or zigzag. When it's squally, I spend the day reducing the sails and letting them back out as the squalls pass over.
Weather like this brings speed: One day I sailed more than 200 miles. It's easy to find the boat at extreme angles most of the time. I call it life on the tilt. The boat launches off waves repeatedly, landing with a BANG, and causing the entire boat to shudder, all day, all night.
Weather like this continues to toss things around in the cabin: a pillow, headlamp, and alarm clock all landed in the water that sloshes around on the floor. These items are headed for the trash bag. (The water comes from a leaky water ballast system.)
When it's cold—or bouncy and wet—I'm discouraged from taking one of the most important trips on the boat each day: my evening "walkabout." While there is still daylight, I dress up, harness up, and take a walk to the foredeck. All I am doing is checking things such as lines, sails, and other hardware. I have frequently found small problems that could escalate into very large ones: a worn line has been replaced, a loose nut tightened.
Yet as I get closer to the equator, inspections are becoming easier. Now, I'm far enough north that the weather has gotten much warmer, to the point where the past few days I wore a bathing suit and sandals. Now I do the evening walkabout in a T-shirt.
Another sign of warmer weather: The deck was littered with flying fish this morning, March 14. They shoot above the water, trying to elude their predators. I threw six of the little guys back into the Atlantic.
Tim
