Rowing across the Atlantic ocean, part 2

The first week

The first few days pass by uneventfully and the routine – as tiring as it is, starts to fit. We’re all constantly tired and yawning throughout the day. I find that I can get to sleep incredibly quickly on the boat; perhaps a skill that transferred from the Marines – however it draws some consternation from the others when I start snoring within a few minutes of putting my eye mask on!

Our eating routine quickly takes shape also. Throughout each rowing shift, we’ll take it in turns to prepare a dehydrated meal for the other guys. At first, it takes around 20 minutes to find the JetBoil (our onboard camping gas cooker), fill it with fresh water and then boil enough water for the meals - often using too much . But within a few days, we cut this time in half with good gear placement and some concurrent activity. Getting resourceful with some of the bungee means that we can tie it up tight and not have to worry about holding it upright making things even quicker.

By day 4, the weather had changed for the worse. We’re getting small choppy waves rolling into our starboard side at high frequency – reducing our speed to 2 knots (we had to maintain an average of 3 knots to stand a chance of beating the record).

With the weather as challenging as it was, we decided to rehearse our shift changeovers. Whereas before we’d had everyone out on deck trying to move in or out of position (which we’d nicknamed ‘The changeover dance’ due to how hilarious it looked to anyone watching); we now realised this was too risky when trying to changeover in bad weather (if a wave had gone into an open cabin, this would’ve been catastrophic and could lead to a distress call or worse) – so we changed one crew member at a time, ensuring that cabin doors were always closed.

After days without a connection to the outside world (read mobile phone, internet and email), I noticed my mind becoming a lot freer and new thoughts coming into my head. Duncan also experiences the same and we remark just how nice it is to be disconnected. Little do we know, we’d crave this connection as the challenge takes a serious turn.

It’s day 5 and the sea becomes a rollercoaster.  We wake up to 5-6 metre swells and the ocean looks like a moving bed of energy. Thankfully the swell helps, and Rose glides through the water as if she’s been turbo-charged with nitrous oxide. I’m transfixed by the speedometer as we slide down these giant blue ramps and see our speed creep in to the 6 and 7kph, my inner child wants to whoop and holler but I decide to internalise it for fear of reinforcing my ocean rowing newbie perception (I was the least experienced rower of the entire team and had never rowed on open water before).

This won’t come easy

The issue of containing my enthusiasm would be short-lived. That day, the dagger board rope snapped. The dagger board – essentially a retractable keel – keeps a small ocean rowing stable in choppy weather by reducing the amount of roll from the waves. In calm water though however, it creates extra drag and slows you down. A minor issue to us but frustrating to know you’re not maximising you speed.

Next up, the batteries weren’t charging for reasons unknown to us. We’d had reasonable sunlight but they were not even replacing the energy we were using to power the autotiller, navigation light, water maker and AIS. So to compensate, we stopped charging all electrical items, turned off the cabin light and hand-filtered water (using a manual desalinator) – this would eat in to the 2 hours of rest time we had between rowing shifts, meaning less sleep (and more frustration).

By the evening, things would get much worse. On the 6pm-8pm shift, Neal and Duncan experience some navigation challenges finding it impossible to stay on the bearing. Whilst ordinarily I’d take the opportunity to jibe Duncan on navigation (it’s a military idiosyncrasy to mock another soldier when they experience navigational issues!) the auto-tiller couldn’t keep Rose on the required bearing. After 2 hours of constantly getting blown off course, Albert made the call to deploy the Para-anchor and investigate the issue in the morning light.

Our first night on Para anchor and three of us cramped into a small cabin with a ton of equipment making it smaller. Even though Danny and I are semi-used to sleeping in cramped conditions due to our military service, none of us get any sleep. It’s hot, uncomfortable and the air is thin. Getting up to wee is out of the question, so we all keep it in until the morning. I decide from that moment on, I’d always prefer to be rowing than on para-anchor; no matter how rainy and cold it is.

We woke up around sunrise when the cabin started to become a sauna and set about pulling in the para-anchor. Seeing it deployed under the surface made it appear like a giant yellow jellyfish as we dragged it through the azure blue water of the Atlantic.

Once it was back in and packed away, we made some breakfast and started running diagnostics on the systems. We found there was very low charge in the batteries even though the AIS was the only thing running that night. 

After a bit of tinkering, we tried to set off but found the autotiller still wasn’t holding our position frustratingly. After trying several different remedies and calling a specialist friend on satphone, nightfall had crept up on us and with it – another night on para-anchor.

As the oldest member of the team, Neal was still getting dreadfully seasick – especially when in the forward cabin with 2 other guys (the worst place to be when feeling seasick due to the proximity to waves). Duncs kindly offered to give his position and we formed the ‘Lads and Dads’ cabins respectively (due to Albert and Neal both being fathers and an average age of 54, and the other 3 of us having an average age of 30.

The record is off

The words hit me like a ton of bricks. I wanted to punch something, but realised that wouldn’t help the situation.

“We have to get to the Canaries and replace the batteries. This means it’ll become a supported expedition. And that means the record is off”.

This challenge had been my focus for almost 6 months, and now I was hearing that it would no longer become a world record attempt. I could barely contain my frustration and a stream of swear words escaped my mouth, unedited. 

In just 48 hours, this expedition had gone from being a dedicated world record attempt to just another Atlantic crossing. I thought of all the supporters, sponsors and those that had donated – I’d have to face everyone and tell them the double world record wouldn’t be happening; because of some faulty batteries. I hadn’t even thought about asking whether they had been replaced since the last crossing at this point.

With the batteries now at a desperately low 20%, we set off on a new bearing towards Lanzerote. To maintain the remaining charge for the AIS, we were now hand steering and manually desalinating seawater. Little were we to know, the situation would get worse still.

With progress now painfully slow and visibility in difficult at night, we deployed the drogue in the hope that it would increase our average drift speed at night. The drogue is like the para-anchor except it has a massive hole in the centre and so will drag you in the direction of the currents. 

Life on board a boat that sometimes works - but we’ve not seen anything, yet

With Christmas only a week a way, we were in a race to get to the islands before everything closed down. The repairs we needed could potentially mean having to order new equipment that may not be available on the island. At best this could mean a week sitting around. At worst, it could mean up to a month waiting for the parts.

Having concentrated full-time and unpaid on the world record attempt in the months leading up to the challenge meant that I had to be incredible frugal in my outgoings, but this amount of time in the Canaries – as nice as it would be – could cost a fortune. I had to start thinking about whether I could realistically carry on in the event we were there for that long.

But I’d have little chance to worry about the financial implications of staying in the Canaries when the next problem set in. When the rudder started to malfunction, the likelihood of getting to the Canaries now seemed uncertain. We’d been on the open water for 8 days and Rose had seemingly little appetite for visiting South America again.

In order to save the remaining battery power for our collision warning systems, we resorted to manual steering – meaning that one rower would be taken off the oars and in charge of the steering lines. But now, we’d seemingly lost the ability to steer altogether. We’d get spun around by waves and the bearing would change tens and even hundreds of degrees with little or no warning. If you were in the cabin, you’d feel the boat violently jerk around like someone was doing hand-brake turns.

 As we limped towards Lanzarote with the boat now almost completely unsteerable, morale was taking a serious hit. The weather had turned from reasonably kind, to constant rain, strong winds and high waves. To add to the fun, we had to tie off the rudder in its neutral position to keep us moving forward. With the waves pushing us off course, we had to row perpendicular to them – meaning that you could only row with one arm and get blindsided over the head by breaking waves. Days on end being soaking wet reminded me of ‘wet and dry’ routine in Royal Marines training, but out here there was little respite from being wet.

After 2 days of rowing with just one arm, the team developed acute back and shoulder pain from the muscular imbalance. Every few minutes you’d get an intense pain like someone was inserting a needle into your neck and shoulders – useful for keeping you alert, but unappreciated for when you want to switch off at night.

After a few weeks of constant wear and being wet; our bodies started to show visible signs of damage.