Hello!
I will begin to do it in a logical order - that is, from the beginning of the trip to nowadays.
Perhaps, St. Petersburg, Russia, can be considered the starting point of my journey, there I got the first nautical skills (mostly theoretical, because sailing season is short there) and there the core of the crew of our ship has formed.
But how can a group of a young and quite adequate people decide to buy a sailing boat?
Good question.
In two words, the ship for us - it is the physical manifestation of the desire for freedom,
materialistic but so symbolic at the same time.
We wanted to explore more than we could do at that time, all this was kinda risky of course, but it’s not a one-day-decision.
First ambitious plans even includes a treasure-hunting expidition for searching Alexander the Great lost fleet, but we still not able to perform it the right way:) If you’re interested, I can make an another post about it later.
But Perfect plans doesn’t exist in this reality, so we needed to try in on practice, installing it in our lifes and see what hapens next, being a good or bad example for others, depending on point of view.
We are not one of those people who is doing sport on the boat, or coming for a weekend - we live on it.
Around 6 years ago, one of our friends showed us an interesting advertisement for the sale of the boat, and we decided that we are losing nothing if we go to see it.
So we went to Sweden, and you know what?
We liked the ship immediately, despite his depressive condition after a long downtime on a tiny island in the Stockholm suburbs - it seems so big and beautiful after all little sport yachts we’ve sailed before!
An interesting point for those who read Cervantes - the name of a sailboat is Rocinante.
It’s a custom build 56 feet ketch, she’s 28 years old and almost 30 t weight, because she was build in 80s using the new for that time technology called «sandwich», which is wood with a thick layers of plastic.
Modern yachts are much more lightweight, but Rocinante fat belly saved our lives at least twice.
There’s enough space for 8 people, may be even 10 if they sleep on a kitchen, but it’s hard to manage such a big crew on one boat!
So we shook hands with the young Swedes - owners of the boat, and began to prepare for the first trip.
That means stuck with much older marine comrades on the boat for about two weeks with no rest!
It was boring, but at the same time exciting - a great adventure has begin, those days we didn’t even realise how drastically it will change us.
Our first trip - from Sweden to Tallinn, where we found a place to pull the belly of Rocinante out of the water, to dry and patch it.
We went in Estonia - without working lights and engine, but with the paper maps, sails and the old sea wolf as a captain.
He vanished soon after it, actually we've changed several tutors in our way, because it was hard for old and experienced people to accept our experimental lifestyle - such as from classical pyramid hierarchy at sea, that they used to, to more of a circle or a dome scheme we use when moored.
It was more or less OK, the ship was going forward, (remember, not floating - the shit is floating!) soul was singing and nothing has clouded our young faces, like, say, the tiny plastic dust, sprays of paint and other joys of repair that we'll meet later.
Inexperience does not interfere with inspiration, even on the contrary - as they say, who doesn't know what to be afraid of, is not afraid.
However, no matter how, but the sail was pushing us forward, literally and figuratively.
I’ll write a further development of this maritime story in the following posts, feel free to ask your questions,
Stay on wave!