Stopover - Horta, Azores

Date: Thursday 13 May 2004

Day: 293, Day 57 Leg 6



Notes: Enough bile and rant, that cannot be the way. Adapt or die. Could I
really become magnanimous? Faial is a pleasant volcanic island, just the top-most tip of a mountain range soaring up from the abyss, a little part of what might once have been that mysterious place they called Atlantis. But it is much re-built since we passed through here ten years ago.



The earthquake of 1998 killed ten people but it could so easily have been
very many more. But by grim chance the disaster created longed-for economic boom with EEC channelling funds for restoration of the islands flattened houses.



The people are unfailingly polite and helpful and so we were able to make
great strides up the ladder of our worklist.



If on Day 328 of our voyage we are to halt the mighty roar of London's
traffic for the Albatross, on the dot of 11.30am on Thursday 17 June, as Tower Bridge lifts for the 'Save the albatross' banners on English Rose V1, just 38 years after the bridge lifted for English Rose 111, the old shippy will need to be in to form indeed.




Into the mist...


John Ridgway

Date: Friday 14 May 2004

Day: 294



Notes: We are sinking back into the soft underbelly of civilisation. We haven't quite re-arranged our sleep patterns for "A good night's sleep" yet, so we are usually ranging the hills in the early hours, trying to get as much exercise as possible.



The provisions for the next Leg of the voyage are being brought in by the rucksack. Plenty to do on the boat but plenty of distraction as well.



Each day see's the arrival of Superyachts enroute from the Caribbean season to the Mediterranean season. Today came 'Ranger', the brand new dazzling steel copy of the giant 'J' class yachts of the 1930s.



We must press on to avoid rush at the end of our stay here. This is the first place we have visited where the weather is just right for work all day long. It would be no bad place to live if only you could keep yourself; if not you would be just another exile. Perhaps is is so pleasant because there appears to be little or no tourism. Being further north than the Canary Islands and Madeira it will probably be gales or rain in winter and not hot enough for mass tastes in summer.



Into the mist...



John Ridgway

Date: Saturday 15 May 2004

Day: 295



Notes: I had a fairly frighening haircut, No.4 all over, among the matrons
of Horta. They were all in their curlers under the dryer. The single
hairdresser, a pocket battleship of an Azorean with square-cut black hair,
forced me back in my chair and jammed my neck into the jaws of a
funny-shaped wash basin. Next thing my head was enveloped in a jet of warm
water and Rosa Kreb was upon me with fingers like marlin spikes and a stern
expression which I took to mean she usually whipped whales at weekends.



This was a very liberal translation of "No.4 all over please." But I didn't
like to say. I got out in the end but it was the most expensive haircut
I've ever had, bar one. And I did think I heard some cackling from the
matron's as I slunk out. I never saw a sign of another man in there. I'm
sure the hair will grow back.



Five more Superyachts arrived today: Wind Rose, Squall, Erica V1, Kiss the
Sun and Leopard. I suppose we all feel the need to make some sort of
statement in life before we are overwhelmed and disappear.



I think I'll conclude with the last verse of 'Ardmore' by Norman MacCaig.

"The sea rips in between two claws of stone
Or races out, as meaning does with words.
- So, Here's a statement at its seeming end.
Only who makes it knows that it has flown
Into a space where dogs need never bark
Or roses in their thorns be overblown"




Into the mist...



John Ridgway

Date: Sunday 16 May 2004

Day: 296



Notes: "I was born, under a wanderin' star. Never seen a place - didn't look look better lookin' back." I've done this before.



After a while it's difficult to stop anywhere at all. I remember in '95 sailing back into Ardmorea fter 18 months of wandering through the Caribbean, Polynesia, Chile, Antarctica, Brazil. I sat in the Tower at home and thought "Why have we stopped here, at this lonely spot, on the NW corner of Europe? We are ten weeks out of South Georgia but in just two days we could be in Norway, home of Isso's Norwegian family, and in springtime too!"



East, west, home's best.



We are keen to get on now. Surely this must mean the rest is doing us good?



But the job list is long and we must be more wary now than at any time on the voyage.



Into the mist...



John Ridgway

Date: Monday 17 May 2004

Day: 298,



Notes: Affable people happily sign our 'Save the Albatross' Petition. Never
was there such an agreeable place to work on the boat. Perfect climate, perfect facilities: Powerul freshwater hose, shelter from wind and swell. A few months here (or maybe years) and everything might glitter once more. Is this "harbour rot"?



At 0630 each morning Marie Christine and I walk across town to the further shore and have a cup of coffee in a small workman's cafe. We have heard little or no news since last July but we don't need Portuguese to understand the fearful pictures on the TV. People around the world crowded together in hatred.
Poor Tony Blair, he meant so well. There he is, arriving in Turkey, "Go home Blair Dog of Bush". Is it another Vietnam? Since we've been away, has he told anyone really why he risked everything on the war with Iraq? Oh dear.



Out here on Atlantis, Marie Christine tells me the air is alive with birdsong. Unfortunately I left my hearing with the Army rifles forty years ago when I was being trained to travel the world, meet interesting people and kill them. But it didn't seem like that at the time and still I can see no alternative but to "talk softly but carry a big stick".




Into the mist...



John Ridgway

Date: Tuesday 18 May 2004

Day: 299



Notes: Another good day in a lifetime where some have been indifferent,
some dreary. But it is important to remember, the whole thing has been lived-out in the top 10% of the Earth's population as far as comfort is concerned. And that was pure chance. Fancy being Gordon Davies all my life and never knowing it until I was 65 years old.



I remember looking out of the same window from the shower block at the root
of the harbour wall here, ten years ago, and feeling the tension seep away. Perhaps not having arrived at 'the absolute truth' quite but maybe nearly the right attitude to receive it. Strut on, baby, into the mist.....



While hand-steering on grim nights in the Southern Ocean, I put together a
collection of poems and songs to cover my whole life. With the drop boards in place on the back of the dog house to keep out the weather, the wheel was a lonely spot. To cheer myself up I used to shout the poems into the wind. Well, since there can be very few readers of this column left now, I'll see
if I can't shake off the very last one: so here goes.



My recital begins with a poem which I have come to understand is
gratifyingly unfashionable. It was written by a chap called Henry Newbolt some time before Tesco Super Stores were ever dreamed of:



"There's a breathless hush in the Close tonight

A bumping pitch and a blinding light.

Ten to make and the last man in

And its not for the sake of a ribboned coat or a season's fame

But his Captain's hand on his shoulder smote

Play up, play up and play the game."



A line or two missing? Well I'd miss out the middle verse. Here's the last:



"The sand of the desert is sodden red

Red with the wreck of a square that broke

The Gatling's jammed and the Colonel dead

The Regiment blind with dust and smoke

The river of death has brimmed its banks

And England's far, and honour a name

When the voice of a schoolboy rallied the ranks

Play up, play up and play the game.



I'm afraid I left my Windsor House Prep School (1948) copy of Childrens's Verse at home. A chap called Lane in 3A had it before me I think.



Those two verses cover school and my twelve years in the Army. I'd follow them with a 1961 popular French song 'Milord'.



More tomorrow.



Into the mist...


John Ridgway

Date: Wednesday 19 May 2004

Day: 300




Notes: 300 days since leaving home. Another good day for inroads into the backlog of work. We'll just about have the old shippy ready for sailing round the world by the time we reach home. Doing things now which I've been meaning to do for five years or more. Reliable good weather is the key.



In the Southern Ocean recital, the next poem was for starting out in civvy-street after 12 years in the Army:



"There is a tide in the affairs of man, which, taken at the flood, leads on to fortune.

Omitted once, the voyage of their life is ever bound in shallows and in miseries.

On such a full sea are we now afloat and must take the current while it serves, or ever lose our ventures."



Of course this didn't do much for Julius Caesar but does seem to have worked for me, on the basis that the "Opportunity of a lifetime, must be taken in the lifetime of the opportunity"



More tomorrow - sorry about this - Horta is a very quiet place.



Into the mist...



John Ridgway

Date: Thursday 20 May 2004

Day: 301



Notes: Richard Morris-Adams our new crew-member arrived from UK today.
Richard has sailed across the North Atlantic with us and in the Caribbean. And he was with us when our daughter Rebecca became the first woman to kayak round Cape Horn. He will help us keep a good look-out as we sail up the crowded English Channel.



Here, with apologies to PB Shelley, a relative of my wife, is the next poem
from the Southern Ocean recital. It's about the 'Tall Poppy' syndrome, which sometimes follows success:



I met a traveller from an antique land

Who said: Two vast and trunkless legs of stone

Stand in the desert. Near them on the sand,

Half sunk, a shatter'd visage lies, whose frown

And wrinkled lip and sneer of cold command

Tell that its sculptor well those passions read

Which yet survive, stamp'd on these lifeless things,

The hand that mock'd them and the heart that fed;

And on the pedestal these words appear:

'My name is John Ridgway, king of kings:

Look on my works, ye Mighty, and despair!'

Nothing beside remains. Round the decay

Of that colossal wreck, boundless and bare,

The lone and level sands stretch far away.



I suppose it is only a Game, pulling yourself up by the bootstraps.



Into the mist...John.



John Ridgway

Last Day In Horta, Azores

Date: Friday 21 May 2004

Day: 301



Notes: We plan to sail tomorrow morning. Everything is ready,we can do no more. We must remain relaxed but aware that this is the trickiest part of the voyage round the world.



Delighted to receive an email from Moscow today - "very much enjoying the poems...". So here is the next part of the sequence. After the "Tall Poppy" crusher, I need something to help with pulling up the boot-laces. A snatch from a song by Jimmy Durante:



A few tinkles on the piano - a pause -

"What's that? I got it! I found it! The Lost Chord!

Well I'm bound to say, I'm on my way, to a place in the Hall of Fame

'Cos I'm the guy who found the Lost Chord!"



Then something by Teddy Roosevelt:

"It's not the critic who counts,

Nor the man who points out where the strong man stumbled,

Or where the doer of deeds could have done better.

The credit lies with the man who is actually in the arena,

Whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood.

Who,if he succeeds, knows the triumph of high achievement.

And if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly.

So that his place shall never be, with those cold and timid souls,

Who know neither victory not defeat."



I'm afraids there is still more to come - unless I'm too seasick...




Into the mist...John.

Now go on to 22 May to 4 June 2004 the passage to Honfleur in France.

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