“A lot of people live aboard their boats in a marina somewhere in the world. They take the occasional short trip from that marina and return in a day or two. I just happen to wonder what is over the horizon and want to experience it.”


– Jeanne Socrates She sat on the end of the dock in


front of the Empress Hotel in Victoria, British Columbia. The number 82 painted in big black letters on her bow, well proportioned and sturdy looking 38-foot long by 12- foot abeam, this sailboat (Najad 380) had so many different lines hanging everywhere it looked as though she was going to smuggle Samson braid to wherever she was going to go. Jeanne Socrates invited us aboard


and we walked into the colossal mess of her carefully sorting out what seemed like hundreds of thousands of different things for her journey. It would be a long one. In a few days the 68 year- old grandmother of three would leave Victoria on a seven month long, single- handed, nonstop circumnavigation of the world. That is SOLO, by herself, in case I’m not clear! Jeanne would be towed out to the


exit of Victoria Harbor, as you aren’t supposed to sail within the harbor, and the rules of her trip precluded her using her motor to go forward. She would be cast adrift into the waters of the Strait of Juan de Fuca and wave goodbye to a boatload of her friends and well wishers. When I asked her why, around the world solo and nonstop she answered, “Why not?” I had no answer but I had a lot of envy for her courage to undertake such an adventure. Leaving Victoria, on Vancouver


Island, British Columbia in late October, Jeanne would turn right and head the 90 miles out the straits and, entering the Pacific Ocean, turn left and head south, cruising about a hundred miles off shore to avoid the crab pots and shipping lanes. She would be sailing away from the approaching winter into the approaching summer warmth of the Southern Hemisphere. October


Chasing That Horizon


68 year-old grandmother of three leaves on seven month, single-handed, nonstop circumnavigation of the world. By Warren Miller


25th weather of May 25th


in the Southern hemisphere has the in the Northern


hemisphere; it is almost the arrival of summer down there. Even though Cape Horn appears


to be due south of Washington and British Columbia, it is over 3,000 miles east of Seattle. Jeanne will have to travel southeast for a long time at her maximum sailboat speed of 8.9 knots just to get that far. When she finally gets to Cape Horn she will make a left turn and head for the Cape of Good Hope at the southern tip of Africa.


Prior to leaving, she was given a


mysterious black box that automatically reports her GPS position at regular intervals so that some “around the world committee” officials somewhere can proclaim at the end of her trip that she never touched land. Passing Cape of Good Hope, she


will sail farther east and south into the always dangerous, roaring forties, and go below New Zealand. She has to go there to travel the required number of miles to add up to the circumference of the earth. The Roaring forties is an 48° NORTH, DECEMBER 2010 PAGE 29


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