MOUNTAIN LIFE - Blue Mountains | Summer 2020

67 a good story later, I was back on the boat. When you get to my age and you live like I do, stuff like that happens.” Minor as it was, a recent head injury for a captain starting a multi- week sail seemed a bit touchy. And Ann, plagued by weeks of constant seasickness, had her own concerns. At the last minute, the four enlisted a final crew member: Will’s brother-in-law, an ER physician. Arriving with a full bag of emergency medical supplies and the enthusiasm of an experienced sailor, Ben settled into the boat just days before sailing from the Canaries. The 18-day crossing that followed was, for the most part, smooth sailing. No major storms or mechanical failures—even Ann’s seasickness abated. “We all had time to slow down and focus. The littlest things entertained us, like the lone bird who lighted on the sail, thousands of miles from shore,” says Gillian. For Ann, the experience of five extended family members surviving in such a small space for nearly three weeks has parallels to our global experience this spring. “When your whole world as you know it changes—either watching land disappear from you or the WHO announcing a pandemic—your first response is just to hunker down and focus on food and shelter. Then, once those are in place, you can explore the next phase of adaptation.” The crew’s particular focus on food was part necessity, part entertainment. They ate like kings from their 30-day food supply (they shopped and packed for a worst-case scenario), got creative with their massive bundle of bananas (banana bread for weeks) and tested every manner of fish preparation. Besides maintaining the boat and strategizing freshwater conservation, their days were quiet as they fished and cooked, cleaned and sailed, read books and watched movies. The highlight of every day was simply gathering in the cockpit to watch the sunset. Sighting land on the horizon was a bittersweet moment, an end to a long-anticipated adventure. “If I could, I would have turned around and sailed right back across the Atlantic,” sighs Gillian. “When your whole world as you know it changes … your first response is just to hunker down and focus on food and shelter. Once those are in place, you can explore the next phase of adaptation.”