Re-entry
PASSEPARTOUT
Christopher & Nirit Slaney
Wed 30 May 2012 12:21
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It is midday in Punta Delgada, one of the easternmost
islands of the Azores. Nirit and Yael left a few hours ago on a flight to Lisbon
and eventually Tel Aviv, so now I can contemplate a lunch consisting of
'forbidden fruit'; foodstuffs which are on board for emergency use only and
stay at the back of the cupboard as long as Nirit is busy with the fresh
and nutritional stuff. I think I'll have baked beans on
toast.
In forty eight hours it will be my turn to pack a bag
and head to the airport, after twenty one months of voyaging I am going
back to work. On Friday I head for Berlin and a rendezvous with a colleague with
whom, by coincidence, I spent my last day on the job in July 2010 before heading
to France to go sailing. On Sunday I'll be on my way to Warsaw where I have
a temporary assignment to produce television coverage from the UEFA European
finals.
I never imagined this would be in the cards. At the
start of the voyage when people asked me, 'are you retired?, I answered
with a firm 'Yes'. Within a few months I had changed this into a definite maybe.
In Martinique last year a French woman remarked, 'But surely you are not
retired!" And it started me thinking. The sailing life is everything I dreamed
it would be but not without its downside. Nirit and I both miss our
children and would rather be closer to wherever they are than on the other
side of the Atlantic. The constant need to maintain the boat and cope with
various equipment failures has begun to wear me down. Some money from working
will obviously come in useful but more than that I need the intellectual
stimulation that comes with the job and the interaction with
colleagues; something I've missed a great deal.
So already last September I met up with my former
employer in New York and laid the groundwork for this football assignment. Nirit
and I then formulated a plan to relocate the yacht to the Mediterranean this
summer, make arrangements for winter storage, pick up the threads of our
previous life in Israel and then divide our time equally between sailing
and what we've chosen to describe as 'Not sailing'. Not sailing for me will
hopefully mean part time employment and I am already committed
to four months, Nirit has a few projects to keep her busy at
least until the end of this year. We hope to get back on the
water in May 2013 and slowly cruise parts of the Med we've previously
rushed through, like Corsica and the less crowded coasts of Sardinia.
Maybe we'll also be able to find our way back into the racing
scene.
The preferred place to store the yacht is at
La Seyne sur Mer in the bay of Toulon but first we have to get there. So
after the final whistle has been blown at the EURO 2012 tournament we'll
reconvene here in the Azores and complete the last leg of our Atlantic
circuit, probably making for southern Portugal. We are also looking forward to
stopping in Cadiz, Tarifa, Gibraltar and Barcelona before our date with the
French crane driver at La Seyne. By the time we get there we will have been
gone for two years exactly.
We are looking forward to the change from being
sailors to part-time sailors, but I have no idea how it will feel to be back at
work. I hope I don't screw up. All of the faces I'll be seeing are familiar, no
changes there, but there's probably new technology to get to grips with and
skills I haven't used for a long time which have gathered rust. There are
also a few practical matters I have to attend to before arriving in Poland, I
have a pair of shoes to wear on land but this afternoon will have to hit the
shops of Punta Delgada for a pair of long pants.
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