Richard Down narrates

22 May 2020

In the past weeks Alice, Liz and Richard have told us their favorite memories on board of the OOSTERSCHELDE. Today, Richard Down tells us more about his memories from his trip from Santos to Capetown in 2013. Richard and his travel companion Angie have joined the OOSTERSCHELDE on 11 voyages since 2012! This is more than 1 voyage per year.

“I have attached a picture from the 2013 Atlantic crossing which you may have seen before. It shows a clear siting of Tristan da Cunha on 19 April 2013 as we waited to see if we could go ashore.

This is a particularly poignant memory because seeing Tristan (and possibly going ashore) has been an ambition since long before I started sailing tall ships. I recalled hearing the news of  the devastating volcanic eruption in 1961. Also working on a school project to find out more about the island when the evacuees arrived in England a couple of months later.

When my wife told me she had the same recollection and told how she had written letters to some of the children to welcome them to England, we looked at the island again. We found out about the St Helena, a Royal Mail ship that used to sail from Falmouth, out to the South Atlantic via Ascension, St Helena and Cape Town to Tristan da Cunha.

We even looked at the brochure, but the whole voyage was impossibly expensive. Neither was my wife a very good sailor. I put the idea to the back of mind, perhaps a shorter trip from Cape Town and back would be possible one day?

Sadly my wife died in 2002. When I first sailed aboard the Oosterschelde in Cape Verde in 2012 and I heard about the upcoming possibility of crossing the South Atlantic. I knew I had to join the guest crew on the leg from Santos to Cape Town.

That way, at least one of us will have seen Tristan da Cunha or perhaps gone ashore. Even though the weather was not calm enough for us to disembark, the following morning we had a very clear view of the island as we headed off to Cape Town.