Below you will find our unorganized thoughts on Robin Knox-Johnston’s “A World of My Own: The first ever non-stop round the world voyage.” The words are unorganized as we are in the midst of reading multiple stories of solo circumnavigations, and the primary post regarding the particular book will be within a final post we’ll write in the near future. I want to put something out on this specific book though, as it is Dirty Sailor Company’s first article on the amazing race that resulted in mulitple amazing journies and stories.

It was 1968, Robin Knox-Johnston had a history of sailing already. He’d crossed the Indian Ocean. He’d soloed around the high seas. He had just finished building his boat the Suhaili. He wanted to do something big, so, even before the British announced a race to circumnavigate solo – first and fastest – “Sunday Times Golden Globe Race” – Knox-Johnston;s intentions were set. When the race was announced, he and many others were already in a position to ready their vessels. Knox-Johnston was one of a dozen to launch in the late summer, early fall, of 68 to attempt the round the world.

Prior to 68, many solo sailors had completed a half circumnavigation. All the world had been “discovered.” Epic adventures were happening, under the guise of nationalism, heroism, and entertainment (something that would eventually evolve into the a fad of extreme competitive sports, like the X-Games).

I had heard of the Sunday Times Golden Globe Race mostly through the tragedy of Donald Crowhurst. I’d heard bits a pieces of the other men and vessels in that race and was curious about the mental states of those men. If Crowhurst, a weekend sailor at best, went absolutely mad in this race, what happened to the others. I knew that Moitessier decided not to finish, and opt to begin again!  What was happening on these boats? What was happening in the heads of these men…

On Communication with the outside world: Pg 122: “No seaman would have given the absence of mail a moment’s thought. Even today mail to ships abroad is unreliable, and if a seaman gets none, he shrugs his shoulders and says ‘There’ll be a ton of it waiting at the next port.’ Still, I suppose to a person who had never gone without this benefit of civilization, it would appear as vital to my morale. He would be wrong. The only effect then, and now, when I think about it, was to make me angry, angry that if there had to be ‘rules’ they couldn’t have been formulated clearly in the first place, angry at the silliness of some of them.”

On Yachtsman: Joshua Slocum poked fun at weekend sailors and yachtsman – calling out a bunch of them near Australia as the “three jolly tars.”  Knox-Johnston pokes fun too: (pg 99) “Now I am not an expert yachtsman. It has been said that seamanship in the days of sail consisted of manipulating the yards, sails and cordage to maneuver a sailing ship by applying, in a rough and ready manner, the principle of mechanics to the propulsion of the wind-driven ship. That’s about as far as I have progressed. I’ve sat in yacht clubs listening to people arguing in detail about how to get the most efficient ‘slot’ and things like that, and frankly I do not understand half of it. I have not sailed a wide variety of boats and my experience, apart from the dingy sailing that Bertie gave us, has all been picked up from Suhaili.”

Favorite Watch: (37) I slept through to 6AM when I got up and made my rounds of the deck, setting what adjustments seemed necessary for the rudder, Admiral and sails. Breakfast followed, usually fried eggs and something else, followed by a mug of coffee and the first cigarette of the day. If it was fine enough I always sat on deck for this. Nothing can compare to the freshness of the early morning at sea. My favorite watch on a ship is the 4 to 8 because one gets the sunrise and the delicious feeling of newness that comes with it. Whilst smoking I would plan my day.”

On superstition and religion: (171)  “It is not surprising that most of them thought more than their counterparts ashore about the cause of these forces, and not in the least surprising to me that so many were strongly superstitious or developed unshakeable religious beliefs, and sometimes both. I have found myself thinking deeply on the matter when out in rough weather in a small boat. It is all very well for someone sitting in an office to explain logically how waves can build up before the wind, for we have discovered the natural laws that control this, but to a seaman, the explanation of these laws does not always seem to be sufficient. However practical you like to think you are, the felling comes that there is more to it all than just natural laws, and if you have been brought up in a society that bases its philosophy upon the existence of a Superior Being, you come to consider that this Being is responsible, and to accept that he exists.”

Us normal people easily fall into the trap of believing others have something we don’t. That a celebrity, a hero, an medaled athlete has something we do not. In this case, as probably all cases, we are justifiably wrong. Primates are prone to the pecking order just as other post-reptilians are. We subconsciously bow to authority – regardless of how they’ve arrived with that power. I read this book expecting to be shook. I assumed Robin Knox-Johnston was special…. He’s just a dude that did something amazing. Something that other dudes and dudesses have done since, many times over.  Read his book – “A World of My Own.” It reveals that humans are so closely related, even those who’ve earned our respect and have been placed on the mount.