Extreme and exotic!

September 28, 20193min read

September 25, 2019

Extreme and exotic!
"Perhaps this is the most extreme sailing regatta in the world!" – says the Englishman Simon Walker. Well, you should believe him, because Walker does not have any experience: at one time he twice traveled the globe from east to west, crossed the Atlantic 17 times, and sailed in the Arctic and Antarctic.

Extreme and exotic!

So what does Mr. Walker call “the most extreme regatta”? It turns out the Kraken Cup race!

Actually, we already talked about the Kraken Cup at one time. But that was already a long time ago, and since then we have had several times more readers. So it’s not a sin to repeat something.

This race is very young – it was first held in 2015. Until recently, her route was this: they started in the city of Lindi in the south of Tanzania, finished on the island of Zanzibar. The entire distance is approximately 280 nautical miles. Overnight stay – on uninhabited islets. Exotic! But in the summer of 2020, the organizers plan to significantly increase the distance: from the island of Kilwa in Tanzania to one of the towns in southern Mozambique. About 800 miles!

But the main exotic is that the participants go on boats called ngalawa. Local go to them for many centuries.

Hollowed out ngalawa from the trunk of a mango tree. The length of the hull is 5-6 meters. Width – 50 centimeters, with outriggers – again 5-6 meters (this is handmade, so the boats are different from each other). And the Latin – triangular – sail area of 30-40 square meters. m

Russian-language publications about this sailing adventure are extremely rare, but still exist. Here, for example, how in such a publication one of the participants described his personal experience:

“On the first day, we rolled over and lost all our things. I had a cage with a chicken with me, and while my partner was swimming around, trying to collect everything I could, I tried to keep it above the water, clinging to the hull of the boat slippery from algae with my other hand. We were chatting on big waves, forces were running out and … yes, I let go of the cage. Poor Willoughby … When we got to the shore that night we hardly slept, repairing the boat. Somewhere at four in the morning we raked over the reef and began to wait for dawn to continue the journey (according to the rules of the regatta, sailing is possible only in the daytime). Then I thought: "What could be more stupid – we just nearly died on this thing, and here we are in complete darkness again go out into the ocean on it." By noon, we were again in trouble – our outrigger almost came off, we had to jump into the water and tie it back. By this moment, we had already begun to understand something in what we were doing, and were able to safely get to the first course of the island, where we found other participants. Judging by their stories, everyone did not chase, but tried to survive – the boats sank, turned over, fell apart. Until the morning we talked, shared stories and repaired boats – the night was incredible! ”

Now the organizers are accepting applications for the race, which will be held in the summer of 2020. Involuntarily the thought arises: maybe it’s worth a try? Where ours did not disappear!

Sailing Adventure Site –