Hauling out and heading south: Pete Goss on the unexpected call of the deep

The boat is tucked up for winter, but an unexpected opportunity has sent Pete Goss on an instant, freezing trek following his hero, Shackleton

Whilst the sun makes its way south to drown us in clouds of leaves and darkening skies, so we have had cause to shut down for the winter. Logs, seasoned through the summer, have been split. Our final tide of the year carried Oddity down the Tamar River to hibernate in her favourite corner of the boat yard. As ever it was with a sense of loss that I trudged after the hoist as another season of memories dripped from the keel to run down the slipway.

Despite a busy and distracted year we managed to cumulatively live on board for a month and a half which included a wonderful trip to the Isles of Scilly. Throw Antigua Classic Week into the mix and it has made for an interesting year of sailing within which future threads of adventure have started to be spun on NellyS, a stunning 50-foot Dazcat.

Introduced through a couple of training sails, she has shown herself to be fast, exciting, comfortable and safe. Next year heralds some training races as a fun work-up towards the 2027 AZAB (Azores and Back Race) followed by an ocean crossing and the Caribbean 600.

Fate and a generous benefactor has disrupted our well-trodden seasonal rhythm, for this year we find ourselves following the sun’s migration south. Indeed, I find myself writing this column in Punta Arenas Airport as we await our delayed flight to Stanley. Unable to fly through Argentinian airspace to the Falklands we have had to bounce through Santiago.

Not wanting to waste the opportunity we grabbed a day out of our schedule to tour the city and visit a vineyard. Balmy weather, friendly people and an interesting culture lulled us into a sense of false security until we stepped out of Santiago airport to be slapped in the face by a southern ocean storm.

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As I sat in the buffeted bus, invigorated by the cold, I watched an airport trolley blown across the car park at pace. Time to start taking things seriously. A boot full of Musto thermals offers a sense of reassurance; at least we have the best gear.

I’m not one for having heroes, but if push comes to shove then it’s Shackleton for me. I read his book aged 11 and he has ever remained an inspiration that set me off on adventures of my own. Understandably, the passage of time has kept him just beyond reach, a distant personality kept alive through black and white pictures and writings of a bygone era. A giant who gambled his life for those blanks in the map that needed filling. A leader who would gladly lay down his life for his men, a giant.

My hope is that in sailing to South Georgia, and hopefully Elephant Island, we will get a deeper sense of Shackleton and his crew. It has already started with a tingle of the man as we drink in Shackleton’s Bar. A room steeped in history, to think he had been in this very building desperately trying to raise the funds to charter a ship so he could steam down to Elephant Island, hoping against hope that the crew he left behind were still alive.

Their survival, resting on his efforts, will have carried him through hardships that beggar belief as the James Caird, a mere speck in this endlessly hostile ocean, fought her way to help.

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The post Hauling out and heading south: Pete Goss on the unexpected call of the deep appeared first on Yachting Monthly.