Stopover in Honfleur, France

Date: Saturday 5 June 2004

Day: 317

Local time: 1200 GMT

Leg Number: Leg 7, Azores to Tower Bridge, London

Position - Latitude, Longitude: In a quiet port on the north coast of France

Position relative to land: Lying alongside a stone wall adjacent to beautiful gardens

Distance travelled in last 24hrs: 0nm

Distance sailed this Leg: 1,493 miles (2,765 km)

Total distance from Ardmore: 28,261, miles (52,339 kilometres)

Air Temp: 23C

Cloud cover: 0%


Notes:

Lovely sunny early-summer weather. In a tiny, ancient port on the North coast of France. Such a contrast with Tenerife,

Capetown, Melbourne, Wellington, Stanley and Horta. We are the outermost boat in the port, moored alongside a park, full of

green trees and roses. Marie Christine and I will not be the same as we were when we left home.



I was eighteen when I last felt like this. I had been at sea for six months, steaming around Africa in the merchant navy and

I found I missed Britain more than I had thought. When the ship finally arrived home, the first port was Avonmouth and I had

a day to myself, walking alone in the Somerset summer countryside. I have always remembered that day and although this is

France, I feel the same way now. Perhaps at my age, being sentimental is a rather pathetic, something not appropriate.




Into the mist......John.

Date: Sunday 6 June 2004

Day: 318,

Local time: 1200 GMT

Leg Number: Leg 7, Azores to Tower Bridge, London

Position - Latitude, Longitude: In a quiet port on the north coast of France

Position relative to land: Lying alongside a stone wall adjacent to
beautiful gardens


Notes:



60th Anniversary of D-Day Normandy Landings. 15K troops and 2 Aircraft
Carriers provide security for 16 Heads of State.



Marie Christine and I went to a morning service in an old wooden
church. Built long ago by boat-builders, the high roof reminded me of one of our old wooden boats at home, upside down. The Confirmtion Service for children and the wonderful singing voice of the man conducting the service, the clouds of incense and Frenchg families gathered there, were a re-assuring message, sixty years after the landings to liberate this country.



16K British servicemen died many of them from the Parachute Regiment.
Traditionally the Army provided a family for the homeless. RMA Sandhurst and the Parachute Regiment provided that home in my life from the age of 18 to 30. Formative years.



Much of what happened to me in following 35 years has been influenced by
the uncompromising training the Parachute Regiment gave me.



Into the mist......John.

Date: Monday 7 June 2004

Day: 319,

Local time: 1200 GMT

Leg Number: Leg 7, Azores to Tower Bridge, London

Position - Latitude, Longitude: In a quiet port on the north coast of France

Position relative to land: Lying alongside a stone wall adjacent to beautiful gardens


Notes: Lost in France. Uncertain if the "Absolute Truth" is to be found here. Full tick on anchor drills, waypoints and fears of the Goodwin Sands. The final push to Tower Bridge for 17 June will be undertaken by the original 3 musketeers: Nick Grainger, MC and me, plus Igor who has been with us since Capetown. At least there is a better chance of getting picked up nowadays if we land on a sandbank. No albatrosses here. Found out today, that maybe some people have been reading this log. We have been unable to access H2G2 on the trip so it was a surprise to find a few messages. Ward Irvin should phone me on +8816 315 23952.



See him at Tower Bridge or in St. Katherines' Dock on 17 - 23 June.



Into the mist......John.

Date: Tuesday 8 June 2004

Day: 320,

Local time: 1200 GMT

Leg Number: Leg 7, Azores to Tower Bridge, London

Position - Latitude, Longitude: In a quiet port on the north coast of France

Position relative to land: Lying alongside a stone wall adjacent to beautiful gardens



Notes: 320 days. Pretty ga-ga really. Particularly slow it appears. We are pretty much up to date now and plan to sail on up the French coast tomorrow.



We will try and access H2G2 when ashore but it is difficult. I suppose it is a little late to track, let alone to reply, to someone, 320 days after they wrote to us with a helpful suggestion on H2G2. I am very sorry about that. We just can't access H2G2 on the boat. I guess I just wasn't up to it. There always seemed to be some more pressing immediate drama and internet cafe's were far away, my mind was not thinking along those lines.



Into the mist......John.

Date: Wednesday 9th June 2004

Day: 321,

Local time: 1200 GMT

Leg Number: Leg 7, Azores to Tower Bridge, London

Position - Latitude, Longitude: In a quiet port on the north coast of France

Position relative to land: Lying alongside a stone wall adjacent to beautiful gardens




Notes: Our friend Jim Abbey collected Nick, Marie Christine and me from the boat at 0900 and drove us to the site of the Normandy Landings. The survivors of that Day are nearly all over eighty years of age now. As well as Bush, Putin, Blair, Chirac and Schroder, Normandy has seen great numbers of visitors in this week of glorious weather, they have all gathered here for the 60th Anniversary of D-Day, 6 June 1944. And they are claiming here in northern France, that so overwhelmed were these Heads of State, that they have agreed to withdraw occupying forces from Iraq by the end of this month. Perhaps Protestants and Catholics, Arabs and Jews, Hutu's and Tutsi's, Hindu's and Muslims should come here.



In 1983/4, while on a non-stop voyage round the world with Andrew Briggs, I wrote a book called 'Flood Tide'. It was mainly an account of the first twenty years of my marriage to Marie Christine. In uniform from twelve years of age until I was twenty-eight, my life has been very much bound up with the Parachute Regiment and its history. We were 203 days on that voyage and saw the land only once in all that time. One of us would sleep while the other stood watch and there was plenty of time for reflection.



By way of dedicating 'Flood Tide'to Marie Christine, I quoted on the opening page, a coded poem written for Violet Szabo, a British Agent captured by the Nazi's in France. The poem is dear to us. Imagine the desperate terror of capture and torture for risking all, simply for what you believe in.



'The Love that I have is all that I have and that love that I have is yours
But the love that I have of the life that I have is yours and yours and yours.
A sleep I shall have and a rest I shall have and Death shall be but a pause,
For the rest of my years, in the long green grass, shall be yours and yours and yours.'



In Normandy today, the weather was again perfect and we were among thousands of quiet visitors from many nations. As well as the scattering of proud veterans, there were a great many American fighting vehicles of the time and servicemen dressed in the uniform of the day. A Sherman tank fired across the bay. We saw films of the Landings, visited museums and Pegasus Bridge. In the immaculate cemeteries we walked in silence, aware that whatever we said couldn't really express our feelings, certainly no-one spoke to us.



In the British Cemetery near Bayeux, a bespectacled, bent figure, in a worn navy blazer and medals, darted out from the throng. Grasping Marie-Christine's arm, he tugged her the few yards to the red wreathes laid about the foot of the Central Stone Cross. He pointed down to a little thin wooden cross, perhaps 4" x 2"; pinned to it was a scrap of paper with writing in biro.
"Look!" he said and began to read in a slow, thin voice, as if speaking to a foreigner, "Violet Szabo - shot in the head - Dachau." Someone had come here, 60 years on.



All around, line upon line, the white gravestones blurred into the distance. Tens of thousands of brave souls, lying for the rest of their years beneath the long green grass.



The price of our freedom.



Into the mist......John.

Now go on to the next few days 10-15 June 2004 Honfleur to Tower Bridge.

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