2020, A Strange Year: Firebird’s Adventures in Brief
Knowing when to turn back is a key skill for any sailor and sadly it was a decision that we had to take for FIREBIRD this year. With so many borders on our route remaining closed to visiting yachts we were caught between the Devil and the Deep Blue Sea and had to make the call to return to the UK, reset and restart our world circumnavigation in 2021. Our FIREBIRD is coming home! (Albeit in somewhat less joyous circumstances than the victorious England football team in 1966.)
However, we feel very lucky to have been able to spend the best part of the year at sea, sailing away from the chaos and difficultly which the pandemic inflicted across the globe. We havetaken many positives from our travels so far and will take this time to further upgrade FIREBIRD and her systems ahead of re-starting our adventure in 2021. Over the coming months we will delve deeper into our archive of footage, exploring and sharing our stories of the inspiring people, rich cultures, epic scenery and amazing wildlife we encountered during the course of 2020.
Let’s start from March in Antigua, where we were for the Super Yacht Challenge Antigua. Here is where the pandemic madness began for us and where we were first quarantined. When the Antiguan government finally allowed some boats back out to sea, we were first out the blocks to go diving with accomplished diver Leigh Cunningham. Leigh showed us the many wondersincluding a rare shipwreck and Ariadne Shores, where we tried to hold our cool while being encircled by a plethora of crustaceans and Remora fish.
From here, we sailed over to Panama to make our way through the infamous Panama Canal. This section of our trip turned out to be a real highlight thanks to the refueling station in the canal itself. Amidst a global pandemic and widespread economic downtown, it was inspiring to see a small business using innovative thinking to turn compulsory regulatory requirements into an ingenious marketing tool – more on that in a later blog post!
Once through the Panama Canal, the South Pacific Ocean lay ahead of us. In the UK, when the pandemic first hit, there was pandemonium, toilet roll shortages and month-long waits for a supermarket home- delivery slot. Aboard FIREBIRD, we had our own food conundrum – how to feed the crew for several weeks at sea with no supermarkets in sight. The lockdown obsession with sourdough was off the cards for us. But do not fear, we have our own culinary delights to share with you in more detail in a later post.
Our final stop was French Polynesia. An overseas collectivity of France, French Polynesia is located in the South Pacific and comprises more than 100 islands stretching over an area largerthan 2,000km. French Polynesia was not part of our original travel plan and was introduced into our itinerary instead of Cape Horn. While we didn’t quite make it around every single island, we made a strong start, and we couldn’t be happier that circumstance led us to French Polynesia. Although the locals were extremely weary of us when we first arrived, after reassuring them that we had been at sea and as such ‘self-isolating’ for many weeks, they opened up to us and taught us much about their islands and their culture. Not that we have reached the level of Paul Gauguin’s local insights but on reflection we realised many of the islands’ problems were very much global problems and we learnt a lot from the local’s approaches to the problems they faced.
As frustrated as we were to have to turn home early, as you can see, we definitely made the best of a bad situation. We refuse to get stuck down in the doldrums about having to hang out with theland-dwellers, we’re trimming our sails and digging through footage, so keep your eyes peeled for our next update!
We’d also like to take this opportunity to wish everyone a Merry Christmas and a joyful New Year. Here’s to 2021 being plain sailing!