Read on Twitter
Sat here, stuck, trying to finish a piece for a journal I admire, it occurred to me that what I remember most from the years I spent at sea (and from all my other travels, before and after) are just a few moments, fragments, snapshots rather than cinematic narratives…
Sailing in a small yacht to Les Îles Saint-Marcouf, off the coast of Normandy, to picnic atop the ruin of a Napoleonic fort on deserted Île du Large…
Being caught by a breaking wave in another small yacht during a gale south west of St Kilda and rolled over 180º…
Becalmed at night close by the Aeolian volcanic island of Stromboli as lava spilled down its slope…
Skellig Michael appearing out of a mist off the south-west corner of Ireland, and sailing by it so close I could see the ancient ‘beehive’ monk cells on its high upper slopes…
Hooking squid with traditional fishermen off the north-east coast of Sardinia, then going ashore with them on a rocky islet in the Bonifacio Strait to cook black-ink pasta in a large steel pot…
Smelling damp, sweet soil in the night, in the Atlantic, 100 miles west of the Azores island of Flores, which is pretty much the experience its 15th century discoverer, Diogo de Teive, had.
