Hurtling towards Barbados like chocolate mousse towards our tastebuds
Apr 30, 2004 11: 38 EST
The mother and daughter are averaging 37 miles a day over the last 8 days and are currently expected in Barbados around 4-5 May.
Here is their latest report:
"It’s been a funny couple of weeks and through our shared experiences I have come to some conclusions. I have found the answer, the Holy Grail…The Meaning of Life!!
Now I wouldn’t want to spoil your search for the answer to the ultimate question but I will certainly help you with a pondering I’ve been having.
In life you need a little bit of hope but a good dollop of reality!
In the last week Mum and I have been struggling with the reality that if the weather didn’t change (as it hadn’t for nearly a month!) then we would not make it to Barbados. We desperately hoped it would but no amount of hope was going to turn the wind and the waves. We put a call through to Kilcullen and head honcho Kenneth Crutchlow answered.
“Hi Kenneth this is not an emergency, we just wanted to tell you our plan. We WILL cross the finish line whatever the weather brings but we may not make it to Barbados. We have 40 days of food left and we’re both fit and well.
Just thought I’d keep you informed.”
Kenneth promised to fetch us from wherever we ended up. At our current trajectory Martinique, if it got worse off the Florida Keys!! (unfortunately not Venezuela!!)
Mum had spent some time on her hands and knees calling out our food supplies. It came down to the following realities:-
If the watermaker and the cooker continued to work effectively (as usual) we had enough food and gas for nearly 60 days – ish (If we really eeked it out).
Without our cooker we could live on our 40 day supply of chocolate mousse, blueberry soup, chocolate bars, chocolate tiffin cake and various other treats.
Without the watermaker and the cooker we had enough ballast for 30 days, all the chocolate stuff and I’d be happy to spoon the chocolate mousse powder straight in!!
(Secretly I’ve already begun to sabotage the cooker!!)
We’ll come home so fat from our glorious chocolate gorging nobody would even know we’d been down to a waif-like 8 stone!
We gave Richard on Najojo a call telling him our grand plan to make it for the finish line, he’s much further north than we are and the struggle to maintain course, like us, has been getting him down too. But the weather has turned and we’re now hurtling towards Barbados like chocolate mousse towards our tastebuds. We haven’t heard from Richard so Mum and I are hoping he’s out on the oars on a new course south.
So I’m making no promises, no predications, no dates, just swallowing this good dollop of reality and saying we’ll take every day as it comes. (So don’t ask us …OK!!!!)"
Lots of love,
Sally ‘aching all over’ & Sarah ‘desperate not to burn’ Kettle
Mother and daughter team Sally and Sarah Kettle have been out rowing the Atlantic ocean for 100 days now. Sally's first row was with her boyfriend Marcus Thompson (Tommo). They raised money to highlight the need for research into a cure for epilepsy and as Tommo suffers from the condition.
The couple had to retire from the race after 6 days due to sea sickness which brought on Tommo's first seizure in over 2 years. That's when Sally called on her mom Sarah to replace Tommo:
"When Sally first phoned me from the boat asking if I could take Marcus’s place I couldn’t believe my luck! I packed some baked beans and some rice cakes and caught the ferry from Tenerife to La Gomera the next morning. I organized my home and my husband Steve. He has already employed a friend’s daughter to do the ironing and feed our pets. The ladies I work for as a gardener have been really fantastic and they’ve given me permission to have the time off."
Tommo is back in Brighton readjusting to a life without ocean rowing and the women will be the first Mother and Daughter team and only the second all female team to row the Atlantic: We don’t intend to win; in fact we know the only record within our reach would be the longest time spent crossing the Atlantic, which currently stands at 111 days!"
Ocean Rowing Society Atlantic Rowing Regatta ORSARR 2004 takes place to celebrate the 35th anniversaries of the first East-West solo ocean row by John Fairfax and first West-East solo ocean row by Tom McClean; and 33rd anniversary of the first Atlantic East-West double row by Geoff and Don Allum.
Sally and Sarah are team pink, Calderdale - The Yorkshire Challenger.
Image of Sally and Sarah out at sea, by Vasiliy Galenko, courtesy of the Ocean Rowing Society.
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