La traduction française de cette page n'est pas disponible.Islands Odyssey 2017: some participants profiles
Start: 26 October 2017.
You can click on the pictures or the blue names to learn more about the participants.
DREAMCATCHER
KRABAT
LADY JANE
MOJITO
MR GREY
RUBICON
TAMOURÉ
VOYAGEURLars & Marie Westin Anemone
We are a married couple for 36 years with four grownup children and five grandchildren. Marie works as a midwife and Lars as a senior lecturer in nursing. Our interest in sailing started about ten years ago. Anemone is our third boat.
We started our sailing adventures on the big Swedish lake Vänern. We have had many nice summer memories of landing in small nature harbors. The last two years we have been around the Swedish coasts with some trips to Denmark and Norway. During this period the idea of going out for longer sailing trips was formulated in our minds. Now we are happy to realize this dream of going away for a one year trip.
Henning & Pernille Laursen Dreamcatcher
We are a family of 4 who have decided to travel the world for 3 years. Our plans are pretty loose… we will go where the wind blows and the sun is shining.
Our boat was born with the name Dream Catcher, and when buying the boat last year we decided to keep the name as it reflects our journey… catching dreams.
William Tee & Moira Shaw Krabat
While holidaying in Minorca, we would enjoy the sun set with a glass in hand overlooking the picturesque fishing harbour and small marina near to where we were staying. We were fascinated with the ease and sometimes slight mishaps of mooring up as boats returned after a day’s sail.
Bill suddenly turned to me and asked if I would like to learn to sail? It all looked very romantic and quite appealing but I gave it little thought after that. Holiday over and now back to the everyday madness of work and domestic life with 6 teenage children.
One evening Bill arrived home announcing with great excitement that he had found an adult learning course for us to enrol onto. I looked at him completely blank. “You know” he said “we talked about it on holiday”.
Suddenly the penny dropped and I realised with horror he was wanting us ‘both’ to enrol onto a sailing course.
“No Bill, it was just holiday talk” I said.
“But it wasn’t for me, I was serious!” he exclaimed.
I certainly couldn’t have imagined when we started learning to sail in 2006 and later when we purchased our first (and only) boat “Krabat” in 2007, that we would be joining the Islands Odyssey rally. We are really looking forward to making new friends, hearing other people’s sailing stories and learning from everyone’s wealth of experience.
“Krabat” is a fictional character from a children’s folklore ‘The Satanic Mill’ written by Otfried Preußler. Set in the early 17th century, the story follows the life of Krabat, a 14-year old beggar boy who begins an apprenticeship as a miller’s man.
He realises that he and the other millers, who were once ‘journeymen’ can never leave the mill as the master holds Black Magic powers. Krabat learns that for the master to retain his powers he must sacrifice one journeyman every New Year’s Eve.
Krabat secretly trains to increase his own magic powers so he can fight the master. In breaking the spell Krabat became known as the protector of travellers.
We loved the story and couldn’t think of a better name!
Allen & Maria Wadsworth Lady Jane
I blame Red Letter Days
Our sailing adventures started many years ago with a small gift from Maria to Allen of a sailing experience in the Solent. The fulfilment of a long-held ambition to step aboard a sailing yacht.
It was a beautiful evening of sunshine and light winds, good company, fine food, followed by a glass of celebratory wine back at the marina just to round things off.
And Allen was hooked.
So much so that he told Maria he wanted to buy a boat and sail off into the sunset – or at least into the Solent. A passing phase, Maria thought, after the previous enthusiasm for motor cycles and camping holidays. She is still waiting for the phase to pass 15 years later.
Sailing has stuck and that small gift has changed both our lives in a big way.
After several sailing holidays in the Mediterranean and many years of boat ownership, Maria’s ambitions and enthusiasm for sailing has more than caught up.
We are both lovers of travel and the sea, and have always tried to squeeze in visits to as many new places as possible during our working lives. A spell working in Singapore added greater impetus to our drive to see places less well travelled… and gave us a taste of life in the tropics.
And now after long careers in IT (Allen) and Finance (Maria) we are planning to explore as much of our planet as we can – at least the warm bits – starting by crossing the Atlantic with the Islands Odyssey in our much-loved Moody 425.
Although we don’t know the origin of Lady Jane ‘s name (she has always been called that) we quite like it – and given that Jane is Maria’s middle name, we couldn’t possibly consider changing it.
We chose to cross the Atlantic with the Islands Odyssey because of a combination of factors: the social side of the rally, its non-competitive nature, value for money, and its size. And of course the extensive knowledge and experience of the Cornell clan!
We intend to keep a blog of our travels on our website: untilthebuttermelts.com.
Gerrit & Pascale Bauer Mojito
We are Gerrit (*1959) and Pascale (*1964), we come from a little village at the north coast of Germany and we have two adult children.
We love the ocean, the nature, new challenges and to meet likeminded people. That’s the reason why we are happy to sail the Islands Odyssey. We are glad to have a year full of experiences, sailing and to get to know new places like the Canaries, the Caribbean, the Azores, Cape Verde Islands, Bermudas and Portugal.
Our catamaran “Mojito“ is a Privilege 445, built in the year 2007.
The reason for the name “Mojito“ was a travel to Cuba a few years ago, where we chartered a catamaran. We were excited to live on a catamaran, to get a new attitude to life. And of course, the taste of the cocktail Mojito. At that time we decided, if we’ll find “our“ catamaran, we are going to name it “Mojito“!
The origin of the word comes from the African term “mojo“, which came with the african slaves to America. Mojo describes a small bag filled with herbs and items, which was worn under the clothes as a talisman. The term “Mojito“ is a minimization of “mojo“ and means “little magic“.
For us, our catamaran “Mojito“ is a “little magic“ every day.
Jan & Sabine Sørensen Mr Grey
We met each other in Hamburg Germany in 2009 and we quickly realized that we share the same dream – sailing around the world.
Sabine is a Swabian landlubber and except for the Bodensee she has not had much to do with the water. Her uncle who is Captain and Pilot sometimes brought Sabine along with him on the ships he commanded. She wanted to sail – become a ships cook and sail around the world on a sailboat.
Jan is Danish and he started sailing when he was about 5 years old in an Optimist. Since he can remember, he has had the dream of sailing around the world – Danish waters are nice but small he thinks.
We have three kids, Jan a daughter (24) and Sabine a daughter (19) and a son (22). Our kids are already standing on their own feet which enables us to follow our dream.
Our boat is a Hanse 505 called Mr. Grey – named so by the previous owner. The name gives us a lot of attention whereever we go and now as we have both gotten used to the name, we don’t want to change it.
We are really looking forward to meeting other likeminded people with Cornell Sailing and to share theirs and our experiences.
Johan & Lisa Persson Rubicon
My wife and I are in our early fifties and are retired or on sabbatical, we will see. Lisa has worked in advertising and I have worked in logistics. We have 2 children, Matilda (22 years) and Marcus (20). Both are now studying at university and we saw a window of opportunity! We hope that they will visit us frequently.
We got the idea to longterm cruise about ten years ago and have been planning and dreaming ever since. Lisa usually makes jokes that I am quite theoretical so I think I have read just about everything one can, including most of Jimmy Cornell’s books. Lisa and I also met Jimmy last year in Henån in Sweden at a seminar and that is where we decided to try and join one of the Cornell rallies.
Our boat, Rubicon, is a Malö 39 from 1999 that we have owned since 2010.
The boat’s name comes from the story in the ancient Roman empire. In northern Italy there was a river called “Rubicon“. When Julius Ceasar returned from one of his great conquests he camped with his army at the banks of Rubicon.
He knew that he was not allowed to cross Rubicon with his army unless asked to do so by the emperor. Defying this was considered an attempted Coup d’Etat. He waited for three days and was expecting a heros welcome and a victory parade in Rome. No word came from the emperor.
Furious, Caesar then decided to cross the river with his army anyway and challenge the emperor. Before he crossed he uttered the famous words: “Alea Iacta Est” meaning the dice have been cast and the game can commence.
The result was civil war and Ceasar eventually became emperor of Rome. Ever since then crossing Rubicon has meant that there is no return and one can’t back down and we found that an appropriate name for our boat.
We are looking forward to this adventure and expect to meet lots of interesting people from different backgrounds. We have spent the last 2 years equipping the boat and we think (hope) we are ready!
We have a blog if anybody is interested: syrubicon.wordpress.com.
It is in Swedish but Google translate can solve that. Hope to see you soon!
Martin Kramp & Caroline Bodet Tamouré
We are a German-French family of 5 and normally live close to Brest in France. Nils our youngest will celebrate his 6th birthday after the Atlantic crossing, Luna and Zoé are 9 year old twins.
We, Caroline and Martin, met in Martinique many years ago on a boat, and we always dreamed about family ocean sailing. In 2006, before we had our children, we sailed from Hamburg to Mexico on a sistership of Jimmy Cornell’s “Aventura III”. Martin’s first Atlantic crossing even goes back to the late 90s, already with a Cornell-organized rally.
Now working as coordinator for ocean observing systems and in need of contributions from volunteer sailors, Martin contacted Jimmy Cornell in 2013 when the new Odyssey series was launched, and together they set up a partnership with UNESCO’s Intergovernmental Oceanographic Commission; we are more than happy to become now ourselves active members of the Odyssey family.
Our boat is a 2005 built Fountaine Pajot Lavezzi 40 catamaran in a 4 cabin version, which we believe is an excellent solution with 3 children on board.
Its name was from the beginning Tamouré, a traditional dance in Polynesia. We liked the name so decided not to change it, in particular given that Tamouré already successfully sailed on our route three times in the past, with former owners.
We plan to be back in Brest early July 2018.
Per-Erik & Lotta Edwards Voyageur
We are Lotta (61) and Per-Erik (62), newly retired. Two children, a daughter and a son and two grandchildren. Our son Carl and Per-Erik’s brother in law Joost (Dutch) will join us in Cape Verdes for the Atlantic crossing.
We started our sailing life in the Gulf of Bothnia, when we lived in the northern part of Sweden almost 40 years ago, and have been cruising along the Swedish east coast from north to south. After moving to a small town just north of Stockholm we have been sailing mainly in Stockholm archipelago.
4 years ago we bought our sixth boat, Voyageur, in Scotland. Our adventure with big waves, tides and long distance cruising started on our way to the Med. We still consider ourselves as newbies in this kind of sailing.
We are the third owner of Voyageur and the name has followed the boat from the beginning. “Voyageur” (French) means traveler and that’s what it is all about…….so we decided to keep it.
The “big step” to cross the Atlantic feels good to do in an organized way. To meet likeminded people and learn from others experience on a small scale, as in the Island Odyssey, made us join this event.
