We could have stayed in Cherbourg for months. Or years. We were growing roots, and Pristine was growing algae on her bottom. It was cozy enough—warm heat, fantastic people, great food. Other boats came and went. I waved them off and went back to writing, to laundry, to cooking—the simple rhythms of a life lived in my own (floating) home that I’d missed for so long.
But a clock was ticking in the back of my mind. There’s a lot of freedom in sailing, but there are seasons you miss at your peril. We had a shakedown to do pretty soon—Pristine’s first real test—if we wanted to make our bigger plans happen later this year.
So as each day dawned and another boat left, I began to wonder whether we were really up for this. Had we grown too sedentary? Too rusty? Too old? On the one hand, I felt a desire to root deeper. On the other, I had itchy feet. We’d put literally everything we owned into buying an expedition-ready vessel, and turned our lives upside down to get ourselves here. Was it all a big mistake?
We’d been off the water for more than five years. You don’t forget how to sail, just like you don’t forget how to ride a bicycle. But when you finally climb back on, your muscles are a beat behind your memory, and this was a new bike with different gears and a tricky route through hazardous territory.
The next step we were staring down was crossing the English Channel. Between Cherbourg and the Isle of Wight is about 80 nautical miles. A long day sail. No biggie. Except:
Weather: In early spring, our choices were either to sail in 40 knot gales or in the windless calms in between with lumpy seas. We weren’t ready for the former so we were stuck with the latter.
Tides & Currents: When I first read the tide chart in the Cherbourg marina office, I relaxed. “Oh, that’s not as bad as they make it sound,” I said to Colin. “We’ve seen some seven foot tides in San Francisco. We can do eight feet.” He hesitated. “No, Cheyenne,” he said gently. “That’s eight meters.”
A literal tsunami of water sweeps through the English Channel twice a day. That meant if we put ourselves in the wrong place at the wrong time, we could either run ourselves aground or the currents could sweep us there.
Traffic: More marine vessels to dodge than anywhere else in the world. Cargo ships, tankers, cruise ships, ferries, fishing boats, private boats… hundreds and hundreds of them.
And, oh yeah, rusty sailors in a brand new boat. What could go wrong?
We made a plan. The morning we’d set for my departure, these were my terrors: Would the UK marina be annoyed that I hadn’t gotten back to them in two days? Would checking out of France be complicated? Would we flub the docking on the other side?
In other words, all the wrong worries.
The right worries were the ones I’d been quietly not letting myself think about. Were we well rested enough to make good decisions in tough conditions? In a pinch, would I remember which side of a cardinal mark meant safe water? Would we make it across before sunset to avoid navigating unknown waters in the dark?
The pilot book had been telling me, patiently, to be better prepared. I just hadn’t wanted to hear it.
Colin had.
The night before our first planned departure, Colin made the call. We were not going to be ready to leave by six a.m. We’d been hyped up on the adrenaline of trying to be ready—fueling up, checking out, last-minute provisioning, routing, weather planning, trying to figure out how to get PredictWind on the plotter and flags on the boat and extra fenders purchased. We weren’t ready. Period.
It was one of his best moments as captain.
I got to wake up the next morning full of relief instead of dread. By the morning after that, we could leave with a different feeling. Butterflies, yes. But not dread.
We still left an hour later than planned—and the fear of arriving after dark would shadow me for the whole crossing. We hoisted the main, brought in the fenders. And then: no wind, and a horrendous sea state. Within the first half hour, we were both seasick.
“Will you go below and get the seasickness pills?” Colin asked. (They were buried in the deepest cabinet. It would take ten minutes to unearth them.)
“No way. I’ll throw up if I go below. Can’t you get them?”
“No. I’m too seasick.”
Mental list for next time: do not bury the seasickness pills.
It turns out—and this was useful information—that I can actually function while seasick. Not joyously, but I can do the basics. Check position. Center the main. Figure out whether we’re on a collision course with that tanker. Eventually, my heroic husband braved the upside-down and found the pills that made the second half of the voyage less bad.
We arrived in Yarmouth, on the Isle of Wight, twelve hours later and tied up to the dock just as the sun was blazing orange. It had been a motor-fest. We’d not been at our best—tired, seasick, afraid—but we’d also made it.
Our floating house was now a proper boat.
For all that voyage felt hard, I couldn’t help but think about Eleanor “Ellen” Creesy on the crossing—the real 19th-century navigator I’m writing novels about. She lives just at the edge of my imagination and my own sailing goals as we undertake this voyage.
I imagine she was a kind person (the historical record seems to agree), but still I think she would have found a private moment with Perk to laugh at how easy my life is by comparison and yet how anxious I still get even with GPS, a chart plotter, weather forecasts, an autopilot, and a motor! “Do you think they could do it like we did?” she’d ask him, and he’d hoot with laughter, not even needing to answer.
I’m ok with that. She’s the heroine. I’m just, well, me.
And real me has plenty of flaws. In my better moments I’m aware of my tendency toward impatience and take my deep breaths. I recognize a passive-aggressive tone and stop comments before they leave my mouth. But in my anxious, exhausted, seasick state, I was not my best self. By the time we tied up in Yarmouth, I’d been snippity for hours, and I was too wrung out to do anything more than crash into bed.
But the next morning I woke up to find that the pillows I’d stowed for passage had been neatly put back on the settee. And not even in the squared-off way that he likes best, but in the angled way that I like best.
In a day too intense and extreme to unpack a single thing before sleep, it was a gesture that meant everything.
I went back to bed and dreamed of my old loft in San Francisco—the place I lived for twenty years, the one my psyche still files under home. I woke up smiling, because I understood what the dream was telling me.
Home isn’t a place. It isn’t even a boat. It’s the three steps I know how to take without thinking. It’s the partner who re-stacks the pillows the way I like them when we can’t yet find the words.
And however many miles there are to go, happiness is also right now.
The crossing was the chrysalis. From here—sailing forward from the home we just found and the boat we just christened—the weather got sunnier, the ports warmer, the voyage more like the reason we came. I can’t wait to send you the next chapter.
Fair winds, Cheyenne
