Adventures of the Silver Sailors

[Zen]

Whilst surfing around a Japan Based sailing site, I came across this link.
Since there was talk of age here, it maybe of interest to some

http://www.asahi.com/english/Herald-asahi/TKY200607140212.html

maybe we could post some links to other interesting stories of "Silver Sailors"

[EdD]

Zen,

Very interesting link.  I hope we will be able to follow his trip through media posts, etc.  Not only is he 67, but he is going trans-pacific in an experimental boat...I'm impressed.

Articles on silver sailors, or any other sailors would be great.  It is not only fascinating to read of other peoples adventures, but I think the stories encourage others to get out and do it...at least they encourage me.

EdD

[EdD]

Zen,

Slow day on the forum...everyone must be out sailing.  Some of us are still working.  Never did get your e-mail.  Look forward to hearing from you.

EdD

[Zen]

Part of an article from The Japan Times:

But then -- somewhere between LaLanne and the archetypal Okinawa centenarian -- there's Minoru Saito, 72, who ticks to quite another clock. It surely won't slowly wind down. Its mainspring will just someday snap, and that'll be that.

Loath to nibble on nuts and berries, or limit his alcohol intake to just a wee dram, Saito, a seven-time solo sailing circumnavigator, will drink 'em if he's got 'em. He's little focused on pacing himself, or balancing his intake -- especially regarding his sailing addiction, which has exacted a toll on both his aging boat and on him.

"All I want to do is get back to the sea. The ocean is where I want to be," Saito said one recent Saturday, holding court at a dockside barbecue as cronies and a ragtag batch of "experts" took time out from efforts to put his boat, the Shuten-dohji II (Drunkard's Child II), right again after a recent setback.

"I have no life on land," he added, popping a fried garlic clove into his mouth and chasing it with a chicken wing, the ice in his shochu tinkling.

Last year, Saito made history when he became the oldest person to sail alone, nonstop and unassisted, around the world. En route he turned 71 near Cape Horn, that infamous rock where South America ends, and where countless sailors' lives have, too, though Saito has rounded it many a time.

The unexpected happened
Saito sailed back to Japan in June 2005 after his 234-day run, uncorked some bubbly, took a breather, lopped a scraggly goatee and then set his sights on his next voyage. The plan was to get the boat patched up, then sail Down Under and maybe enter it in the treacherous yearend Sydney to Hobart race.


Minoru Saito completes his solo nonstop circumnavigation at Misaki in Kanagawa Prefecture on June 6, 2005. SATOKO KAWASAKI PHOTO 

But in April, the unexpected happened. En route with a couple of pals to Guam, in what could only be deemed moderate winds and swells, the Shuten-dohji II dismasted.

The stresses of seven circumnavigations, countless knockdowns, being rolled 360 degrees in the Southern Ocean, fending off icebergs and being rammed by pirates had finally taken their toll, pushing a mast crack beyond its limits. Towed to Hachijojima in the Izu Islands, some 300 km off the Izu Peninsula south of Tokyo, he later limped, or motored, back to Yokohama.

"It was unbelievable. I was on the radio down below with the Yokohama marina when 'Boom!' I ran on deck and saw the mast doubled-over, dug into the sea. It was my first dismasting," he said with a riotous laugh, spearing a slab of pork.

Saito had intended to take his boat down to Guam, a milk run for him, to get it re-U.S.-registered. Now he plans to try again in November, after the typhoon season. Before that, he has a rather full agenda, starting with being inducted in Newport, R.I., into the Solo Sailor Hall of Fame; then more awards in Japan; then off to Balboa, Spain, for the October sendoff of yachts in the next solo round-the-world race, now called the Seven Oceans Challenge. Saito completed three of its predecessor races, all after turning 50, which is also when he started sailing. Later, he plans to rejoin his boat on Guam and take it south, to Tonga, Fiji and other isles.

"If I could find a sponsor and a boat, I'd join the next solo race," Saito said, as his shochu was refreshed. And that's the thing about this man: He only has two speeds; his usual trot, and one a notch faster.

Where other seniors may tend a garden, or tech-savvy ones play with a computer, Saito is all about working with his hands, cutting, drilling, hauling, beer breaks, then more of same, trying to put the confusion of his parts-strewn boat, a junk heap of widgets, wires, lines (and roaches), right.

"Look at this!" he announces as he holds up two pieces of sawed-off, twisted aluminum mast where the break occurred. His old mast, now splinted, awaits being restepped to the keel. But then Saito's keen gray eyes find another stress crack . . .

And as if exercise were needed, Saito also takes workout walks, stretches, does isometrics and handgrips. Like Jack LaLanne, he, too, sports Popeye forearms and veins that pop out of his neck as he laughs.

Vial of nitroglycerin
But he has one vein that's a problem. Drawing a sketch of his heart, he figures he may have an aneurysm in an artery, but he refuses to have it stinted. He's also had a bum ticker for years, and suffered more than one heart attack, including when he got rolled off Cape Horn.

"I knew someone who had that operation. He was much younger than me, but he died two weeks later, anyway," Saito said, flashing his handy vial of nitroglycerin. "If I had the operation, I'd have to visit a doctor regularly. How could I sail long distances?"

Would he someday settle down in Japan? Been there, done that. He says he really didn't start to live life until after he sold the gas station he ran in Tokyo and got a divorce, both in the early 1980s. He has since sold his Tokyo condo, and now hangs with friends when in town, or on his boat, or wherever.

"People here have too much money," the nonstop sponsor-seeker said, setting down a half-eaten ear of fried corn. "They have so much, that's all they think about, and just want more. Not me. No thank-you."

If he can't race, Saito will just keep cruising as long as he can. He's more at home at sea, where sleep comes in catnaps and the platform never stops moving. There's no school of harder knocks, as his scars testify. Somedays the sea is a slow waltz, others it's a giant lambada, and you're in the way.

"I want to go to the Mediterranean, and then maybe the Black Sea, although I heard that area is dangerous. I'd also like to cruise the Baltic. But I would need a steel boat," he said, his gray eyes zeroing in on a fried shrimp, his metabolism like a gerbil's, or Pac-Man.

Always angling for any way to get away, offshore.

"When I die, I hope I'm at sea. I don't want to die on land and be buried," Saito declares. "I'll just go to the bottom and the crabs can feed on me."

At which a pal piped in: "Are you kidding? They'll find you too tough. They don't want gristle!"

Then again, that laugh.



The Japan Times
(C) All rights reserved