My friend Bill has been pining to return to this goal of circumnavigation.

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I have a friend who is insane. I’m quoting him here, but now he’s saying he would prefer that I say, “Who may be insane.” I’ll tell you his story and you can judge for yourself.

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If you were to meet Bill, you would say he was the soul of organization and critical thinking. Well, he would have to be — he’s a deep-sea sailor and you have to have accounted for every possible eventuality when you’re in the middle of the Atlantic. On Oct. 15, Bill is setting out to complete his circumnavigation of the world. He has already done half the planet with a trip that began in 2016 and ended just prior to the pandemic. On that trip, he sailed a 45-foot Catalina Morgan sailboat with a Yanmar diesel engine. This next trip will find him on an expeditionary vessel, a Nordhavn 46 power-yacht, which makes his mother, his girlfriend and his kids all somewhat relieved. And I say “somewhat” because the hazards at sea are manifold.

Bill’s first round-the-world trip started out in Nova Scotia and took him across the Atlantic, through the Mediterranean to Turkey, then down the west coast of Africa to Cape Verdes, back across the Atlantic to Trinidad, through the Panama Canal, and he wound up in Fiji. The original plan had been to continue around the world, but Bill sensed something in the wind and decided to sell his boat. Good choice, as the people who bought Bill’s boat got stuck in pandemic restrictions and couldn’t even leave the marina for five months.

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Since that final day in Fiji, Bill has been pining to return to this goal of circumnavigation. And if there’s one thing........

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