Thanks to Randy Leasure for finding  a speaker for Saturday night. 

The Figure 8 Voyage 2.0
We are elated to have sailing adventurer Randall Reeves share his sea stories as he sailed a 25,000-mile circumnavigation of the globe. In the fall of 2017 he departed San Francisco for the first-ever circumnavigation of both the American and Antarctic continents in one season. The route was to pass through all of the world’s oceans, approach both poles, and round Cape Horn twice. No one has done this before—no one has even tried.

Two months into the Figure 8 Voyage and while in the screaming 50s a mere 500 miles west of Cape Horn, Randall’s boat was caught in a heavy gale, which damaged both his self-steering devices and forced a stop for repairs in Ushuaia, Argentina. Two months later and while transiting the Indian Ocean, Randall met with another storm and a wave so severe that it knocked out a window in the pilot house and destroyed most of his electronics. By the time Randall had made the necessary repairs in Hobart,Tasmania, he judged it was too late in the season to continue with the Figure 8 Voyage for the year. Randall has subsequently sailed the length of the Pacific from Hobart back to San Francisco, completing a 25,000-mile solo circumnavigation of the globe via the Southern Ocean, what Randall is now calling the “longest shakedown cruise in history.” Because Randall has not quit, he will depart on a second try at the Figure 8 Voyage in late September of 2018. 

Jay Bietz