Good On Ya!
Australia celebrates her success:
Teen sailor Jessica Watson has completed a triumphant return to Sydney, with thousands of people on land and water giving her a hero’s welcome.
After a 210-day journey of a lifetime, the 16-year-old from Queensland’s Sunshine Coast has become the youngest person to sail around the world, solo, non-stop and unassisted.
Just two days shy of her 17th birthday, Watson sailed her 10-metre yacht Ella’s Pink Lady up Sydney Harbour, the same spot she left from almost seven months ago.
Sailing the southern oceans in a 33-foot boat is a major accomplishment, no matter how old the skipper. You would not feel comfortable being out on the waters of Choctawhatchee Bay in anything much smaller – you can do it, but you will probably end up wet. Handling sail while doing it makes the trip even more “interesting”.
Update from Kryten in comments: Official Jessica Watson Blog
13 comments
It’s truly amazing! What an amazing young lady. 😀 She has as much courage as my entire team in Cambodia, and I’m not exaggerating! This is a person who has the will to accomplish anything she sets her mind too in the future.
One of the things that helped keep her sane was her blogging. She has gathered a rather devout following! If you want an insight into her experiences on her voyage, have a read:
Official Jessica Watson Blog
Her boat is a marvel of modern fitout, but given the conditions and her age and lack of any real experience, truly amazing!
One of her recent blogs about the kick she got from fixing her broken little engine made me smile! 😀
Nice to see someone beating the odds for a change. 🙂
Among the admittedly small group of long distance sailors I’ve known, and few Naval types, I don’t know anyone who has a kind word to say about the southern oceans. Even the crazies think they’re a nasty piece of work that is constantly trying to eat your boat and drown you. A lot of New England whalers ended up on the bottom down there during the 19th century.
It was a remarkable achievement, no matter what carppers in magazines may say about the distance. Hell, staying sane after 7 months alone in a boat surrounded by nothing but water is a remarkable achievement.
Oh yeah… The waters are treacherous around here (It’s not just the flora and fauna that will kill you if you don’t watch yourself here). Just crossing Bass Straight on the Ferry to Tasmania can be a test of courage. 🙂 We have a LOT of shipwrecks around Aus to prove how dangerous it is (over 6,500 I believe, I think there is an official site with logs about the wrecks).
Here’s a photo on Jessica’s blog showing a swell (I won’t link directly to the pic).
Taking It As It Comes
One hell of a gutsy lady! I wonder what Amelia Earhart would think? 🙂 I’m sure she would welcome Jessica to her ranks with open arms. 🙂
Oh, a note about some of the sour grapes, especially about the announcement from the WSSRC, here’s a media release from Jessica’s team:
The Facts About Jessica’s Voyage
Seriously, some people just have to try to kill any achievement. We call it “The Tall Poppy Syndrome” here. The World is still full of fools… but Jessica has shown (and amply proven) that there are some real Champions too! 😀
If the WSSRC doesn’t recognize anything done by anyone below the age of 18, commenting at all makes them look like prats. All they needed to say was that Jessica was too young for her voyage to be considered.
She could be a Dame Ellen MacArthur in the making, if she wants to continue sailing.
The reality is that at 16 she set a goal and went on to accomplish it which is an amazing thing for a teenager, no matter what the goal is. She has also learned to exist alone, and that television is not the world – valuable in their own right, because it allows her to appreciate other people and the media with a sense of discretion as she now knows they aren’t central to her existence.
I don’t know anyone who has a kind word to say about the southern oceans. Even the crazies think they’re a nasty piece of work that is constantly trying to eat your boat and drown you.
this is what people who have been there tell me too. major accomplishment, and yeah, good on ya, jessica!
You have to admit that Australia leads the world in horrible, terrifying ways of dying. 😉
You have to admit that Australia leads the world in horrible, terrifying ways of dying.
Yup! 😀 Just ask anyone who ever met one of us on the battlefield! Oh… wait… you’ll need a medium and a seance. 😈 (Well, after the Gurkha’s, of course! Even Aussies are smart enough not to p*ss off a Gurkha!)
Natural selection works here, survival of the fittest. 😛
I’m glad you don’t take it seriously, Kryten. I’m still freaking out over the wombat. It’s not just that you have dangerous animals, it’s that some of them are cute. Our nasty animals look the part.
I laugh every time I hear that some nut overseas (and even here) wants a Koala as a pet! You think a rampaging Wombat is bad, you haven’t seen a seriously p*ssed Koala that’s missed a few days of it’s special Eucalyptus fix! They are cute when they are in their Eucalyptus induced stupor (and it’s a certain kind of Eucalyptus).
You should know Bryan that most Aussies don’t take ourselves too seriously. 🙂 We take pride in taking things in our stride. Just look as Jessica! And here I was thinking that Aussie spirit and attitude was probably going to die with my generation. Good too see there are some flag bearers amongst the new generation, and not all off them a going to end up with SMS RSI, car crashes or in alcohol and drug rehab!
Most of the sane smart Aussies understand where we live. The others, end up as part of the food chain! 😈
But… keep sending tourists! (It keeps the nasties from looking for us, they tend to prefer the easy prey!) 😆 😉
It is rather amazing how many people miss the potential of the Koala’s claws, but I general attitude towards wild animals is that if they don’t bother me, I don’t bother them.
There are a number of things around here that I don’t like or trust, but I’m not going to annoy them just because I can.
I still can’t get over the idiots who feed ‘gators or bears. It’s the animals that end up dead or relocated when it should be the people.
There are always a few who don’t want to go along in any generation, otherwise humans would have died out long ago.
We had a news item a few days ago (that I didn’t really pay attention to) about some guy being attacked by someone’s per croc! I remember I just thought “Idiots!” LOL *shrug*
Thing with the Koala that amazes me is that it is actually one of the most insane animals on the planet and would be a maniacal shredding machine, but Mom Nature provided the only food source they eat and essentially filled it full of tranq’s! (It’s not that simple of course, but you get the drift). Talk about amazing! 🙂
And as you say, common sense goes a long way here too. Many Aussies spend a lot of time going bush, even if only for a holiday for a week or four. And it’s rare to hear of someone being attacked, unless they were stupid. 🙂 You take some basic precautions, and watch where you are treading, and you are usually OK. One thing they taught us in basic was always to stuff something in your boots when they were off to stop nosy local critters looking for a nice place to take a nap! Scorpions or one of the nasty spiders or even snakes get annoyed when you try to squish them with your toes! 😉 😀 We generally put our socks over the boot tops to air and sometimes dry them out after a nice march in the sunshine, or a tropical downpour! Doesn’t matter what wet-weather gear you have, you are gonna get wet in one of those storms! (Same with sand in the desert too. Get’s in everything! Never spent so much time carefully cleaning equipment daily!) Another thing they generally forget to mention in movies! 😆
Join the Army, see the World… and clean, clean, clean! (Funny… I don’t remember that getting a mention during induction!! They LIE you know!) 😐 🙄
Crocs are ‘gators with no sense of humor.
When we wore shoes down here, we checked because, in addition to scorpions or spiders [brown recluse & black widow], they attract pygmy rattlesnakes and coral snakes. The pygmy rattler’s bite is painful, but the coral is a cobra and without anti-venom your are dead. Corals aren’t aggressive, but no one likes getting stepped on.
Cleanliness is the path to life, especially if you are depending on an M-16. I never underestimate the joy of clean and dry socks.