Salty Podcast: Sailing

Salty Podcast #41 | 🌊❄️Patagonia to the Arctic: Epic Sailing Adventures with SY Touche!🧭✨

• Captain Tinsley | Crew of SY Touche • Season 1 • Episode 41

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SY Touche Route:  https://forecast.predictwind.com/tracking/display/Touche/?
Sailors and adventurers Judy, from Denmark, and Håkon Jacobsen, from Norway, share their extraordinary journey aboard their 2002 Island Packet 380 yacht, Touché, as they navigate the icy waters of Svalbard and the wild expanses of Patagonia. Their love for adventure and sailing brought them together on a serendipitous boat trip and eventually led them to relocate to Denmark. Listeners will be transported through their vivid tales of Arctic exploration, where they ventured 80 degrees north thanks to the Gulf Stream, facing the daunting North Sea and experiencing the phenomenon of continuous daylight.

Join us in uncovering the meticulous preparations for such bold voyages, including how they adapted their yacht with a heater and a cockpit enclosure to brave the cold, and hear an amusing anecdote about using a simple stick to navigate icy waters. Judy and Håkon's stories reveal the challenges and rewards of Arctic sailing, including dramatic interactions with coast guards and their inventive remedies for seasickness. The couple’s adventures take them from the political intricacies of the Falkland Islands to the vibrant cultures of the Caribbean and South America, painting a picture of endurance and adaptability in the face of extreme conditions.

Embark on a thrilling ride as we explore the couple's captivating experiences in some of the world's most remote destinations, from the beauty of Cape Horn to the treacherous Drake Passage. Judy and Håkon's insights offer a glimpse into the rich landscapes and cultures they encountered, from anchoring safely in Rio de Janeiro to navigating the historical waters of the Galapagos. Their tales of exploration, combined with their passion for sailing and a cautious respect for the elements, highlight a unique spirit of adventure that will inspire every listener to embrace the unknown.

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SALTY ABANDON: Cap'n Tinsley, Orange Beach, AL:
Oct 2020 to Present - 1998 Island Packet 320;
Nov 2015-Oct 2020; 1988 Island Packet 27
Feb-Oct 2015 - 1982 Catalina 25

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Capn Tinsley:

Good afternoon everybody. This is Captain Tinsley with Salty Abandon, and welcome back to the Salty Podcast, where it's always a great day to talk about sailing. This is episode 41, and before we begin into it, please smash that like button, subscribe, and feel free to ask a question or make a comment in the live chat on YouTube or Facebook. In this special episode, I'm thrilled to chat with Danish sailors, Judy and Haåkon Jacobsen, owners of a 2002 Island Packet 380 sailing yacht Touché. They have sailed all over the world, but we're going to focus on two destinations Patagonia in South America and Svalbard in the Arctic Ocean, which is literally one extreme to the other. So, without further delay, let's welcome Judy and Håkon. Okay, give me one second. I've had some technical difficulties here. All right, we got through it. Welcome. Thank you, I'm going it. Welcome. Thank you, I'm going to add your name on there. So, all right, it's H-O.

Judith Jacobson:

H-A-A-K-O-N.

Capn Tinsley:

K-O-N. Okay, see, if this is correct. Yep, okay, yes, hayden, actually spelled it out like it sounds to help me out. So well, welcome. I appreciate you guys coming on, and okay, so just tell us a little bit where you're from. You're Danish.

Judith Jacobson:

I'm Danish, but Håkon is Norwegian. Okay, and we live in Denmark. And yeah, we lived in Denmark for 27 or 28 years, something like that.

Capn Tinsley:

Okay, and how did Håkon get to Denmark?

Judith Jacobson:

Well, we met on a sailing boat as crew on a boat that was going to be sailed from France to Oslo in Norway, and didn't know each other before we got on the boat. Got to know each other pretty well on the boat and three months later we bought our first boat together.

Capn Tinsley:

Okay, and when was that?

Judith Jacobson:

That was in together, okay.

Capn Tinsley:

And when was that.

Judith Jacobson:

That was in 95.

Capn Tinsley:

Okay, all right. And what was that boat?

Judith Jacobson:

That was a Halberazi 26, so 26 foot.

Capn Tinsley:

Okay.

Judith Jacobson:

The one we sailed on was Gypsy something.

Capn Tinsley:

Okay, and so I'm pulling up some pictures here so we can show what your current boat is. And I had to um, like I said, I had some technical difficulties, so I got to pull that back up and I'm about to get it up here. All right, here we go so this is it's coming.

Judith Jacobson:

Let me just insert. Actually, when we bought that first boat, hovind was still living in Norway and I was living in Denmark, and a year later we married and a year after that we actually moved in together.

Capn Tinsley:

Oh, okay, all right, well, congratulations.

Judith Jacobson:

That's a beautiful touche.

Capn Tinsley:

Yes, touche, and this is a 2002 Island Packet 380.

Judith Jacobson:

That's correct.

Capn Tinsley:

Okay, and I believe this is your boat here on the right.

Judith Jacobson:

No, on the left, On the left, right here. Yeah, we have that sort of light In that picture. It looks light blue.

Capn Tinsley:

Okay.

Judith Jacobson:

Yeah.

Capn Tinsley:

And this is you right here, that's correct.

Judith Jacobson:

Okay, yeah, 380 in.

Capn Tinsley:

Scotland, and I thought I saw something on your Facebook about what's the name of that boat.

Judith Jacobson:

Jenny B.

Capn Tinsley:

Okay, all right. And is this your boat in Svalbard, in Svalbard? Okay, all right, let's talk about that. That is amazing. Okay, all right, let's talk about that. That is amazing, okay. So we're going to talk about how you sailed up into the Arctic Ocean.

Judith Jacobson:

Yeah, so in that picture it looks like we're almost anchored up next to the glacier, but we're not. We're like 500 meters away from it, as you should be. But it was just. It's so clear the air up there, so that's why. So, anyways, we we were sailing up after we'd had the boat for some years and have been sailing in scotland. We sailed up along the norwegian coast and all the way up to tromsø and then we crossed the Bering Sea and Island Spirit says hello.

Capn Tinsley:

Hello From Mexico.

Judith Jacobson:

So we sailed up to the Bering Sea, and then we it's about 500 nautical miles, 450, and then we get to the southern edge of Svalbard okay, I'm going to pull up.

Capn Tinsley:

I did have it queued up, but you know what happened. I'm going to pull up Google Maps because it is pretty amazing how far up north this is, and I had never heard of it a lot of people haven't. I'm sure you're not surprised by that.

Judith Jacobson:

No.

Capn Tinsley:

Is that the top of the globe?

Judith Jacobson:

Yeah, it is. We went all the way up to 80 degrees north, which is only 600 nautical miles from the North Pole.

Capn Tinsley:

Amazing.

Judith Jacobson:

And the reason we can do that is because of the Gulf Stream. So because a little bit of the Gulf Stream the same Gulf Stream that goes by Florida, and a little bit of that goes up along the Norwegian coast and up to Svalbard, and that's why you can even sail up there.

Capn Tinsley:

Okay, it's just been a challenging. Challenging technically here. It's just nothing like. Nothing like being live and having some things go wrong. Okay, let's see if we can get this a clear picture here. Okay, that is Iceland, right there. Okay, let's see if we can get this a clear picture here. Okay, that is Iceland, right there. Okay, let's go to Denmark. And what part of Denmark Are you? On this coast or that coast?

Judith Jacobson:

No, the coast next to Sweden. You see where it says Copenhagen To your right Over here. Yeah, that's it. A little bit north of that we live okay, wow, okay, so you came out here uh, actually, no, the boat has never been in denmark. We bought it in england, okay long scotland, and then sailed over to norway across the north sea.

Capn Tinsley:

Yeah, of course, and then all the way up norway and then sail towards Norway Across the North Sea.

Judith Jacobson:

Yeah, of course, and then all the way up Norway.

Capn Tinsley:

All the way up here.

Judith Jacobson:

Yep.

Capn Tinsley:

Then here it is. I mean, just look at that, wow, so here's Greenland, here's Iceland, and here it is. Yep that is, it's the top of the world.

Judith Jacobson:

It is.

Capn Tinsley:

Lots of ice, lots of snow.

Judith Jacobson:

Yep Lots of polar bears, lots of walrus and not too many sailboats.

Capn Tinsley:

I guess not. So I'm kind of a warm weather sailor and I'm just thinking what is going on? That you, that you want to go up there?

Judith Jacobson:

because it's it's incredibly beautiful and I I don't know, I just have a thing with ice and snow. I just really really like it. I think you know some people they like to go to the Caribbean and they they love the palm trees and the sandy beaches and I do think they're nice and I do enjoy the warm water, but there's nothing that makes my heartbeat like seeing snow and ice and glaciers and stuff like that.

Capn Tinsley:

Okay, well, you're a true Scandinavian. Yes Is that fair to say.

Judith Jacobson:

Yeah, also I like places that are not too overrun.

Capn Tinsley:

Okay, well, I think this is definitely because I zoomed in and tried to find places and there are cities on here, but they look kind of small, like towns, right.

Judith Jacobson:

Yes, there's only one, real well, two small towns. One is longyearbyen, which is sort of the main town, the two thousand people living and where's that it's fuller down. Yeah, in there to the right. Now up a little bit, up, up, up up.

Capn Tinsley:

Now up a little bit, Up, up, up up.

Judith Jacobson:

Up here. Yeah, you're close, you're close.

Capn Tinsley:

On the Bursley Coast, the fjord there.

Judith Jacobson:

The fjord. Now you went too far, so now it's in the middle of your picture.

Capn Tinsley:

Okay.

Judith Jacobson:

Where that fjord is Up a little bit. No, here, right in here yeah right in there. Sort of yeah, yeah, right in here, yeah, right in there. Sort of yeah, right in there. That's Longyearbyen, 2,000 people live there. They say 2,000 people live there, 3,000 polar bears and 4,000 snow scooters. So what do these people do? It used to be.

Capn Tinsley:

Now it's mostly tourism wow, okay, all right, let's just read a couple comments here, because you've got a lot of fans that are that are coming in here. I think I read you used to own a malo or malo malo would be good yeah, would be good to know how I selected.

Judith Jacobson:

We selected the IP380. Well, the Marlowe was a 31 and a half foot boat and we kind of thought it was a little bit too small to cross the Atlantic and maybe to go up north, and so we wanted something a little bit bigger and we specifically wanted a long keel boat, a full keel, and we wanted something newer than that marley, because that was pretty old, that was from 78 or something like that right. So we wanted something that was newer and there aren't very many newer boat that has a full keel. It was one of them and once we found that, uh, then we decided to go look for it and we actually decided on ip370, uh. But then when we were around looking, we also looked at the 380, the touche, and we fell head over heels and we just had to get that boat and was that the name of the?

Judith Jacobson:

boat touche was the name of the boat and I like, we like the name, so we kept it okay um, the way it went was that, uh, we had decided we were going to not buy a new boat until we had sold the old one. Absolutely no buying until we sold the old one. But we can look at it right, you see how that is going. Oh, you didn't sell it, no, we went on. And then he was like, wow, we were both thinking how do I tell the other that we, and then the, the broker. He said to us, he said well, so what do you think? And we're trying to play cool. Yeah, it's okay, we need to go back to the hotel and think about it.

Capn Tinsley:

Let's chat about it.

Judith Jacobson:

Yeah, and then then he said that's okay, but I just want you to know that there's somebody coming tomorrow to look at it. We'll take it.

Capn Tinsley:

I'm a real estate agent, so I know how that works.

Judith Jacobson:

Actually, we met a guy next day who came and was really sore that we got it ahead of him.

Capn Tinsley:

So it was true, okay, it was true. So Richard Kaufman says hello from Rock Hall, panacea 380-123. Yeah, and of course, hayden and Radine, ice Ice, ice. Maybe they meant Ice Ice Baby, judith, and say your name again Håkon, håkon. Okay, I got it.

Judith Jacobson:

Are so brave we are very careful. We investigate very carefully before we go. We read all about it, we look at maps, we talk to other sailors who have been there Get the local knowledge.

Judith Jacobson:

Yeah, we don't just jump into it. I mean, we do research. But what did happen with Svalbard was that we went up there and was there for five, six weeks that's about as long as you can be because then the ice starts coming in. And when we came back to Tromsø I said we got to go there again and we went one more time the next year.

Capn Tinsley:

So Håkon, how do you feel about it? It's very exciting going up there. You like it as much as she does. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, oh, you guys are perfect for each other. Yeah, okay, let's see. Okay, svalbard is way up north, north of Norway, yep, above Norway. And then Hayden says how are you so brave to go to such remote areas?

Judith Jacobson:

So, like I'm saying, we're not really brave, maybe we're just crazy actually.

Capn Tinsley:

Maybe Sailors are a little bit crazy.

Judith Jacobson:

I think it's brave to go across the Indian Ocean, which I would find very boring.

Capn Tinsley:

I find that very brave, especially in the northern Indian.

Judith Jacobson:

Ocean. Oh yeah, I wouldn't even go near that. The only thing that was well, one of the things that was very brave about going to Svalbard is there are a lot of polar bears and you have to watch out for them. And they say for every polar bear, you see, there'll be many polar bears seeing you and you don't want to cross a polar bear.

Capn Tinsley:

Oh right, okay, I don't know anything about polar bears. Are they dangerous? They're like regular bears.

Judith Jacobson:

They're very dangerous. You have to carry a gun all the time. Yeah, you have to carry a rifle with you at all times to go ashore. Okay, so that you can defend yourself, but you're not allowed to shoot it unless you're actually in danger. Okay, and you will be in danger. If he sees you, he'll think nice food. If he sees you in your boat, he'll think, oh food, that's all packaged Okay.

Capn Tinsley:

So Jesse says thanks for the background. Your ventures are so impressive. And mark lawrence, greetings from tides in 380, 132 in yorktown, virginia.

Judith Jacobson:

Yes, you've got lots of fans so we, we, we, uh, I don't think we're brave, it's just that we like these places enough that we will actually go there. I admire that, if that makes sense.

Capn Tinsley:

Yeah, I get a lot, you know, I sail by myself most of the time and I just love that, you know. And people say, oh, you go by yourself, and I realize how many people can't be by themselves. But I guess we're kind of a different breed sailors are, but you guys definitely are. All right, I did come up with a few questions. So you told us your route and what inspired you to sail there. How did you prepare your, your Island Packet 380 for harsh Arctic conditions?

Judith Jacobson:

That was kind of funny because, um, what we did was we installed the heater and we made, had a cockpit, um cockpit enclosure made so that we had so we could close the enclosure, and that was about it. Um, and I, I can sort of tell you a really funny story when we were in Miami in 15, we were doing a, I was doing a talk at the boat show and we were doing a seminar where what's his name? Again, hayden knows, hayden, what's the name of that guy? Speak up.

Capn Tinsley:

Hayden. What's the name of the guy he up Hayden? What's the name of the guy he was in Miami right, famous guy.

Judith Jacobson:

The one who writes all the books about where to go in the world and all this.

Capn Tinsley:

Okay. He'll know who that is. He'll know who it is. He'll chime in here any second.

Judith Jacobson:

Anyway. So we have me and this famous guy, which is totally famous. I'm like shit, I'm going to be on the board with him. And then this couple and so people asked us what we had done with the boats. And of course, cornell, jimmy Cornell, you can't go anywhere into the north unless you have an aluminum boat. You have to have an aluminum boat, otherwise it's not possible. And the other couple they said they had a wooden boat and they actually put some, they encased it in carbon against the ice. Kevlar, kevlar, yeah. And then when they got to us we said, well, we put in a heater.

Capn Tinsley:

And you didn't, so you didn't do any of these things that they were saying no, and you just made sure that you didn't hit any icebergs, right that we tried to make sure we didn't hit any icebergs. Did you hit any?

Judith Jacobson:

We had a very long stick that when we got too close to them we would push them away.

Capn Tinsley:

Okay, long stick that when we got too close to them we would push them away. Okay, so we got um mike whack, who who's local here in orange beach. He says modifications to the diesel. Uh, no, no. And how? How cold did it get there?

Judith Jacobson:

down to about uh, five c Celsius. I would say Maybe one day we had just around freezing, so 32 Fahrenheit, but actually most days we had like maybe to from, I'm guessing, a little 38 and then to 84 or something. No, not to 84 often. We had one day with 84. But most days would be 15 degrees Celsius. Do you remember what that is Fahrenheit? I forget, but anyway. So it's like that cool day, but it was actually nice and we had a lot of sunny weather.

Capn Tinsley:

We had a lot of.

Judith Jacobson:

Yeah, you've got to remember this. The sun is up 24 hours a day.

Capn Tinsley:

I saw that.

Judith Jacobson:

You don't. For two and a half months we didn't see a sunset. So what's that like? Did you get tired? Uh, in the beginning we would have dinners at 1 am in the morning. We sort of tried to get into the time of it and we did okay.

Capn Tinsley:

Jimmy Cornell and Beth Leonard. And Mike says does the diesel engine have glow plugs? No, so you didn't do anything special with the diesel. There you go, mike. It's just a good engine. Yeah, yeah, it is. It is a good engine. Oh, ray Dean's chiming in now.

Judith Jacobson:

Yeah, thank you, jimmy.

Capn Tinsley:

Cornell, okay, so.

Judith Jacobson:

Yeah, so all we did was install a heater and put in that enclosure. We actually did that when we were going to Scotland, because Scotland can get pretty cold too.

Capn Tinsley:

Right, okay.

Judith Jacobson:

Yeah.

Capn Tinsley:

All right. So was the North Sea rough. Yeah, my relatives went on it years ago and they talked about everybody got sick except for my grandmother.

Judith Jacobson:

Well, I got seasick, but Håkon, he's pretty strong. I get seasick sometimes and the first time we went to Svalbard I got seasick. But Håkon, he's pretty strong. I get seasick sometimes and the first time we went to Svalbard I got seasick. The second time we went we had almost no wind all the way up there.

Capn Tinsley:

It's really weird. Okay Now, if you take a Dramamine ahead of time, does that help you?

Judith Jacobson:

No, the only thing that really helps me is the patch.

Capn Tinsley:

Okay, alright, there you go. Kevlar reinforced is what Radine's saying.

Judith Jacobson:

Do you know how I found out how the patch helps? When we were going back the first time, we got in some really crappy waves. We had wind over tide and um, so I was seasick. My niece, who was with us at the time, was seasick. Hogan was not seasick, so we decided to go into a bare island it's called um I gotta look for so that's actually about two thirds of the way up there, so we go in there.

Judith Jacobson:

There's this anchorage, which is beautiful. It was like a mill pond and we had been out in I'm not exaggerating seven yard, seven meter waves, really big waves.

Capn Tinsley:

Oh, that's like 21 feet yeah.

Judith Jacobson:

So anyway. So then we get, get, get a call from the coast guard and they want to know if we're okay. Well, first they know we don't know who we are and we're like, yeah, you can see that on ais, but anyways we tell them who we are.

Judith Jacobson:

And they ask me if we're okay and we say, yeah, we're fine, we were seasick, but now we are in this wonderful anchoration, we are not seasick anymore and so um. So they kept asking well, can we help you with something or do you need something? Do you have enough food? You have enough water? And I'm like, yeah, we have enough food, because two of us didn't eat very much the first 24, not with those waves, oh goodness so then they keep asking so.

Judith Jacobson:

So actually we have a small problem. Our heater stopped working and so we actually only had like 36 fahrenheit in the cabin. I said, but we are fine, we have lots of blankets, we have lots of clothes, but that's the only thing that we're. Oh, you know, if you don't mind, we could maybe send a technician or maybe we can fix it for you. And I'm like yeah, go ahead, come on. Yeah, so three guys from this boat comes over to us and they brought a doctor with them, because I'd sent two of us for seasick. Now that doctor was more seasick than we were. He just sat staring out in the horizon going, yeah, okay, are you okay? He wasn't even looking at us, oh no.

Judith Jacobson:

And so a technician who actually did fix the heater so we got a little bit more heat out of it, and then the doctor told us about the patch. So that's how we found out, and it turned out that out where they were lying, they were waiting for some researchers to bring their stuff out to the boat, and where they were, where they were, that boat was rolling horribly, so they really wanted to help us in there in a nice mill pond.

Capn Tinsley:

Oh sure, well, my experience with the patch it's the only time I got sick was using a patch. I think I was using too much. Like you said, you split yours, yeah.

Judith Jacobson:

You think?

Capn Tinsley:

that's the way to go. You're a doctor, right?

Judith Jacobson:

No, I have a PhD, I'm not a doctor. Okay.

Capn Tinsley:

I'm a PhD in statistics. Oh, okay, well, that's a good skill.

Judith Jacobson:

Yeah. So the one thing he said was we should be careful about that. We might have hallucinations.

Capn Tinsley:

I've heard that might have hallucinations. I've heard that someone that was on my boat talked about that they could. Somebody was, and it was the dinghy engine on the rail and they thought it was a little person going like this.

Judith Jacobson:

I was reading a book that wasn't there ah, oh my gosh, anybody starts acting strange, like they're seeing things. Take the patch off. So for the rest of the trip, when anybody said anything remotely dumb, we would say oh, get the patch off, get the patch rip that thing off.

Capn Tinsley:

Okay, all right, let me go. Let me pull up the pictures again. All right, here we go. Okay, do you remember where this was exactly?

Judith Jacobson:

yeah, that's Fritjof glacier okay now here's a story for the real sales. When we were there the second time, our toilet hose was completely blocked oh no yeah, oh no, so it was okay. Are we going to be sitting in a bucket on the rest of the way back to the mainland, or we actually managed to fix it a little bit?

Capn Tinsley:

Oh, you guys are pretty handy. You have to be. Yes, that's why I don't go to remote places, because I'm not a mechanic.

Judith Jacobson:

We're not mechanics. We can do some things. Let's see what videos Okay so this is Svalbard.

Capn Tinsley:

I know I'm not saying it right.

Judith Jacobson:

Oh, yeah, yeah.

Capn Tinsley:

This is a video. I did put a link to this video in the description in case anybody wants to go back, but it was really cold when you were there. I mean, it looks cold here, but is this about what it looked like when you were there?

Judith Jacobson:

Oh yeah, totally, Totally.

Capn Tinsley:

So yeah, that looks like a prison. What is that?

Judith Jacobson:

There is a Russian town up there called berensburg. I think there's like 400 800 people living and that looks like just like you would think russia looks with very I see grab buildings, but that is actually in in longyearbyen, this one, that's one of the hotels. There's hotels and everything and restaurants and a supermarket you just have to think about a down payment if you're gonna buy milk, because that's very expensive a down payment.

Capn Tinsley:

Okay, so they I think that, um, yeah, was it you that said that tourism is is really big there yeah, because they're not doing so much with coals anymore.

Judith Jacobson:

so now it's tourism and research. Yeah, research, yeah, and they don't want you to take the gun that you have to carry with you when you're going everywhere no-transcript. So there'll usually be lockers in the beginning of the store where you can put your gun.

Capn Tinsley:

Oh, okay, all right, so let me bring that off.

Judith Jacobson:

Okay, let me see I do it. It's probably the only place in the world where you can bring a gun into a bank.

Capn Tinsley:

Wow, yeah, you can't even do that in the south here. Okay, so I read something in your social media we're going north until the butter hardens and we're going south until the butter melts.

Judith Jacobson:

so you like one extreme to the other well, yeah, we like where the butter is hot most yeah, it seems like you.

Capn Tinsley:

You went through the hot part and got to cold part again. Yeah, okay, um, but before we leave spa board um, okay, we talked about, uh, modifications. You didn't make any um, any cultural, physical, environment or check-in process, anything like that you want to talk about well, you have to have a permission to go there, you have to ask for permission.

Judith Jacobson:

You have to have a life raft on your boat. You have to have survival suits on your boat, you have to have the gun. Um, you have to have a gun when you, if you go ashore, if you stay out at sea, you don't need a gun, and you don't need a gun actually in Longyearbyen proper, but anywhere else you go ashore, you must bring a gun okay. I guess they're tired of bringing bodies back.

Capn Tinsley:

I don't know, possibly sounds like it any kind of cultural things that you want to talk about there?

Judith Jacobson:

it's. Well, that's actually a long story, but I mean Svalbard back in time in the 1500, when it was actually found by Dutch realists it's also called Spitsbergen. When it was found by them, they hunted the whales to extinction, basically. Once they didn't have any more whales, then they started trapping. Then people would go there, stay in a tiny little cabin for nine months a year, usually the dark time of the year, and go hunting. Back then you could hunt polar bears and hunt polar foxes and that kind of thing. And then after that came the coal mining. So it was always a very rough place, very tough place for a lot of rough guys and and then. But then during the time they had the calling, you know, the digging for coal. They also had wives coming up and so forth, and then they realized they needed to have a few things. So there's a church there, there's a cinema, there's kindergartens, there's schools, because nowadays it's families. That church there, there's a cinema, there's kindergartens, there's schools, because nowadays it's families that live there and is it Norwegian spoken there?

Judith Jacobson:

Norwegian and English Because there's so many different nationalities living there.

Capn Tinsley:

So it's a territory of Norway.

Judith Jacobson:

No, it's. Norway has sovereignty over it. That means that in 1922, was it? Yeah, I think it was in 22. They made the Svalbard Treaty both to decide who was to have sovereignty over them, because the Russians wanted it too, you know. So everybody who signed the Svalbard treaty can go, then live. You can go, then live. You're American. America signed the Svalbard treaty. People from Afghanistan can go, then live, because they signed the Svalbard treaty, people from Denmark, lots of countries, and the only thing is you have to be completely self-reliant. There's no, no social security whatsoever. There's a tiny little hospital, and if you, for instance, are pregnant, you're sent back to the mainland three months before due date so that you'll give birth back there.

Capn Tinsley:

I see they don't want any babies born there.

Judith Jacobson:

No, there has been a few born and you know Island Spirit, you should go there. You can fly up there and it's nice's fun.

Capn Tinsley:

Would you fly there, hayden and radine? Probably not all right, let's see. Uh, anything did you? Okay, we talked about that. Um, did any of those experiences influence your approach to future sales and other extreme locations? Did you go there before you went to Patagonia? Yes, we did.

Judith Jacobson:

And I think influenced in a way that we realized that if we could handle that, then we could also handle Patagonia.

Capn Tinsley:

Okay.

Judith Jacobson:

Patagonia was a wish for many years. We just had to get there.

Capn Tinsley:

And what? What was the big pull there?

Judith Jacobson:

Nature, glaciers, yeah, cape Horn, rounding the Cape Horn.

Capn Tinsley:

Is this in? Where was this? You got boarded.

Judith Jacobson:

US Coast Guard. Yeah, that's US Coast Guard. That was in down just before we went through Oregon Inlet.

Capn Tinsley:

Okay, just an impromptu inspection.

Judith Jacobson:

Yeah, they just decided to board us.

Capn Tinsley:

Everything went okay. Yeah, no problem yeah, I've been boarded once, and where's this?

Judith Jacobson:

that is um great picture yeah, it's me and my kayak. I have a kayak on board. Uh, I don't know if you can see that, that red I do, I can see it yeah so, uh, and that's that little island that you can sail all through just before you come to Waterig Wells I forget what it's called, but it's real neat. You can sail out right through it and right out to the other side.

Capn Tinsley:

You're talking about in South America, in Patagonia?

Judith Jacobson:

No, no, no, no, this is in the Caribbean. In the Caribbean oh what was In the Caribbean? What was the name of the island? It's just north of Waterick Wells.

Capn Tinsley:

Okay.

Judith Jacobson:

I'm sorry, I really don't remember the name right this moment.

Capn Tinsley:

Okay, I bet you Hayden jumps in on that. He will. And where's this?

Judith Jacobson:

That. I think that. I think I recognize it, but I'm trying to think where it is.

Capn Tinsley:

It's a beautiful place. We'll just go with that. Yeah, oh, and this is also the Caribbean.

Judith Jacobson:

That's near the glass window in Eleuther.

Capn Tinsley:

Okay.

Judith Jacobson:

And that is Touché and SV Texas in the same language.

Capn Tinsley:

And they're bringing you back?

Judith Jacobson:

Yeah, because we have a dinghy. We had some problem with the dinghy when we were there.

Capn Tinsley:

That's beautiful.

Judith Jacobson:

It sure is, and that's about, I think that's also there. That's Spanish Wells, most likely. Okay, and that's about.

Capn Tinsley:

I think that's also there. That's Spanish Wells, most likely.

Judith Jacobson:

Okay, and that's Dominican Republic.

Capn Tinsley:

Oh nice.

Judith Jacobson:

Yeah, a very nice place too, and I think this is when we were going to Galapagos. So everybody tells you that going to Galapagos is a piece of cake. It's downhill sailing and it's just wonderful. We had the wind on the nose the entire way, nearly the entire way, and we had so much rain I mean, it rained buckets and you were okay with that I mean, I like it better when it's sunshine, but I'm not okay.

Capn Tinsley:

So I had to see exactly where Patagonia is, so I found this picture.

Judith Jacobson:

We are only in the Chilean part. The Chilean part is a long, narrow one to the left.

Capn Tinsley:

Yeah, okay, so the Chile and then Argentina, and you went to this section over here.

Judith Jacobson:

Yeah, only the Chilean Chile and Argentinaina. They're not loving each other.

Capn Tinsley:

It's oh yeah, okay, well, and then I pulled up a picture.

Judith Jacobson:

Okay, this is your route yep, that's us going through the panama canal out to galapagos, and what you can see on that big picture is that it was zigzag, zigzag all the way to Galapagos. Then we had a fantastic sail from Galapagos to Easter Island, where it was just straight, and then, by some kind of sheer dumb luck, we got to stay three days on land in Easter Island Because it was actually closed, because it was still COVID.

Capn Tinsley:

Oh, okay, I did talk to some people that weren't able to land there, but they did bring out some water and some food. One trip.

Judith Jacobson:

A lot of people were not allowed to land there.

Judith Jacobson:

I don't know but, given the permission they asked us to maybe claim that we had uh, uh, to ask for humanitarian stay. And so, since I had a bad knee, I brought that up, not thinking that would be enough. And so we got to stay, but only for 72 hours, and they were very strict 72 hours and the hour they had been on our boat doing all the technical stuff that was included in the 72 hours. And then after that we had to promise that we would leave promptly, which was kind of a shame because we knew there was someone behind us that would have been nice to meet, but we had promised to leave after the three days. So we did. And then we went into chile, into Valdivia, and that was. It was an okay sail. It wasn't as nice as from Galapagos to East Ireland because we had a little storm on the way actually a couple, but it was okay.

Capn Tinsley:

Okay.

Judith Jacobson:

Now we're down near what they call the Roaring Forties.

Capn Tinsley:

Oh boy.

Judith Jacobson:

Yeah.

Capn Tinsley:

I've heard about it, I've seen a video.

Judith Jacobson:

Hayden says DriveKey is the one where I kayaked all the way through in the Exhumas.

Capn Tinsley:

Okay, alright, we knew we'd come through. Okay, so you came down here and it looks like you made lots of different stops.

Judith Jacobson:

Yeah, first we, once we got down there we were now. Actually at that time we were only allowed into Chile because we had been to Easter Island, because Chile was also closed, and then after that we could go home for Christmas and then come back, and now we could sail our boat because our boat was already in Chile. So we did the northern part of Patagonia in our spring, their fall, and then we came back in their summer, our winter, to do the southern part, to go all the way down south.

Capn Tinsley:

Okay, and these are the five different sections of Patagonia. So there's a big desert section.

Judith Jacobson:

Yeah, and it's a cold desert. The desert section is all Argentina. We were only in the Chilean part.

Capn Tinsley:

Right, okay, okay. So there is a video here that kind of shows some. Let's see if I can get some. Well, I thought there was some here we go.

Judith Jacobson:

Here we go that's why we went there. That ice you saw there, that's why we went there yeah, I figured see the one that says g the penis. It means golfer the penis. That actually looks like the golf of pain, which it is, because when you pass there it's really rough. It can be very rough weather. We went to that glacier, saint r Raphael. We went there. Yeah, beautiful place.

Capn Tinsley:

You guys are, you guys, you guys are, you're perfect to interview because you're something different, but look at how beautiful it is.

Judith Jacobson:

That place is so beautiful.

Capn Tinsley:

And again this description. This link is in the description of this video. If you want to go back and watch, if anybody wants to go back and watch it, but this kind of shows.

Judith Jacobson:

Yeah, so this is the water in Chile, and what you see going out to the right, what you saw going out to the right, is the Strait of Magallan Down here.

Capn Tinsley:

Yeah, we didn't want to go out that way because there's a very strong current really very few anchorages and you don't get to go around cape horn okay, yeah, that's it's, but a lot of people choose to do that right no, actually, if they're saying they don't, because it's a really rough patch, it's much easier to sail through the beagle canal, in my opinion uh-huh yeah, around the around the horn? Well, you don't have to go around.

Judith Jacobson:

You don't have to go around the horn, you can you can go around the horn, it just seems like when you're close, why not?

Capn Tinsley:

uh to say you did it.

Judith Jacobson:

So I was told to ask you something specific about your hike to Cape Horn Lighthouse yeah, it's actually very rare that you get to go ashore because the water is there, and that's actually. I have a video from Cape Horn on YouTube that would be maybe more interesting.

Judith Jacobson:

I probably have that here okay I downloaded a few of your videos yeah, this, this is not it, so anyway. So so what we had to do was that one person had to stay on board that came to be hogan and then we had this argentinian woman with us who lives in in in quarter williams, and so her and I went ashore. That meant we had to take the dinghy in and, hoping, had to circle around. There's no place where you can anchor up so many when you kill too much everything and then so we went ashore and went up on top and went to go to the lighthouse and meet the lighthouse keeper, and that was just really, really special. We were there on the longest day of the year, which in that part of the world, is december 22nd, so it was actually how long was that day um, it was sort of dark between 11 pm and 2 am sort of dark sort of darker it's.

Judith Jacobson:

So let me ask you something when do you think Cape Horn is? If you took Cape Horn and flipped it up to the northern hemisphere, where do you think Cape Horn would be?

Capn Tinsley:

It's not that far from Antarctica right.

Judith Jacobson:

Yeah, but now you're flipping it up. No, it's not that far. It's only 500 nautical miles from india, right?

Capn Tinsley:

so imagine you flip it up on the northern hemisphere I'm trying to think is it the same distance as spalbard? Spalbard is it. Is that what you're going to say?

Judith Jacobson:

nope okay three kilometers north of where we live in copenhagen. Because because we don't. They don't have the Gulf Stream, so Antarctica is much bigger ice sheet uh-huh. I mean you can't even cross the Antarctic Circle, the Arctic Circle in Norway. Lots of people live north of that okay but when you come down and because of their, because of the Gulf Stream, but if you go down south, there's no golf stream and so people basically can't live below 56 degrees south.

Capn Tinsley:

Okay, I'm going to pull it up Because you're talking gibberish to me. I didn't mean so.

Judith Jacobson:

I didn't mean no, no, I'm just kidding, it's just so such a foreign topic to me. Yeah, I guess a lot of people I will tell you, as most people guess, like svalbard or greenland or something, nobody gets that it's that close to where we live. See, there you have Cape Horn. There you have that little tip of the Antarctic. See how far it is from that tip to the Bottom of the world, south Pole. I mean it's a long way.

Capn Tinsley:

Okay, all right, so you're saying that that distance is the same as where Denmark is to the North Pole? Is that what you're saying? That's what I'm saying. Ah, so okay.

Judith Jacobson:

And from Cape Horn to the South Pole, it's about the same.

Capn Tinsley:

Oh, okay. Yeah, I wouldn't want to go down there. I mean, okay, he said, zoom into their route again. Okay, I will in just a second. He wants to see your route again. Okay, he doesn't know what he's asking here. It's going to take me a second. Share screen window yes. Share screen Window yes. Slight delay here when we're live. Okay, let me see if I can get that. Okay, share there we go. Nope, that's not it.

Judith Jacobson:

Nope, let's not. It, that's just Cape Horn.

Capn Tinsley:

I'll work on it. Hayden, Keep talking. Talk about Cape Horn.

Judith Jacobson:

So, anyways, it was just really really special to come on shore and actually get to meet the lighthouse keeper, and then, after we did that, we were actually going to stay in some of these islands that are near cape horn and stay there overnight is this, these right here, these? Islands a little bit further down, closer to cape horn, closer to cape horn. Cape horn is on one little island.

Judith Jacobson:

There's a bunch of little islands there right yes, see, it's a lot of islands, so we wanted to go and stay in one of some of those anchorages, but when we looked at the weather, we could see that we might. If we did that, we might have to stay there the next week okay, you didn't want to get stuck yeah, the weather would be completely crap right there is a lot of wind down there.

Capn Tinsley:

That's what I hear.

Judith Jacobson:

The most wind we were in was 80 knots, but going to the Horn Sunday sail I mean going to the Horn was a beautiful, beautiful sail. We saw dolphins, we saw penguins, we saw whales. It was a gorgeous sail, did you?

Capn Tinsley:

come through here. Yeah, right through here, guys, I think your video wasn't that Porto Williams, porto Williams. Okay, hayden's paying attention here. So you came down here and then you came up. Did you go around this way?

Judith Jacobson:

Yeah, After that we went back to port of williams and stayed for a few more days because now it's christmas and we went for christmas and new years in port of williams, okay, and then we wanted to go to the falkland islands okay, and that's over this way yeah, I'm not sure we're. This is called the staten island, which is actually funny, and then out there is the falcon islands okay, yeah, and what was that like? And that's british very, very, very windy extremely more, more than cape horn oh yeah, we, Like I said, we had a Sunday sale to Cape Horn.

Judith Jacobson:

Up there we had 60 knots at one point and at one point we had 40 knots against us and three knots currents with us and that was pretty bad.

Capn Tinsley:

Okay. So even I'm saying were you scared? Everybody always asks me that.

Judith Jacobson:

Not scared. Our island packet is like. It's like a tank. We've never been scared in it. We've been uncomfortable, yes, but we've never been scared.

Capn Tinsley:

So, hayden, we kind of said this how far south were you? So? It was about 55 degrees south yeah, it wasn't as far north as you were, but it's still pretty far south.

Judith Jacobson:

Yeah, exactly.

Capn Tinsley:

So they didn't come and visit this over here.

Judith Jacobson:

No, we wanted to go to Antarctica. That was originally our plan, but we realized when we got down there that, only being two on board, and also maybe the heater was not that good, right, very cold down there, and the drake passage is one of the worst passages in the world um, so we decided that maybe we could do it, but we didn't want to take the chance. We didn't you?

Capn Tinsley:

guys are. You guys are awesome, but not that crazy, and do you have family worrying about you?

Judith Jacobson:

No no.

Capn Tinsley:

No kids.

Judith Jacobson:

Yes, I have a son, but he wouldn't worry about me.

Capn Tinsley:

Okay, he just thinks you're superwoman. No, it's a different story. Okay, all right, I won't ask so after the Falklands.

Judith Jacobson:

See, after we go to the Falklands, we can't go to Argentina because they think the Falklands should be theirs and it's not Okay. So we sailed up to Uruguay. That was an 1100 mile trip. Wow, Up to yeah, up to Uruguay. Not Montevideo, but close to Montevideo. Wow, Up to yeah, up to Uruguay.

Capn Tinsley:

Not Montevideo, but close to Montevideo. Okay, so that was one long way to avoid going to Argentina. Now. So you didn't go to Argentina, so just a little bit about, about Chile and Patagonia. What, what can you? What can you tell us that people should know? What should people know about it? About for boating and for going on shore, the whole bit.

Judith Jacobson:

Okay, some places it's very hard to go ashore because so few people go there. I will say I don't know if you can see this, I'm going to try to hold this up. Okay hold this up, okay, this is called the bible, the blue bible, the italian bible. This book, as you can see, is very thick. Right, it's written by two italians and that's a pilot book for um, for patagonia, and you need to have that. You must have that. What's the name of the book? Again, patagonia and Tierra del Fuego nautical guide.

Judith Jacobson:

Tierra del Fuego okay which means land of fire. Okay, it got that name when Joshua Slocum. He sailed through alone around the world. There were a lot of fires on land that he saw all the time from the Indians who lived there and so therefore he called it Land of Fire. So you must have that to sail there.

Judith Jacobson:

And that has just about every anchorage described how to get here. And when you in an anchorage there, what you do is you find a place among some trees that are very narrow, then you back in, put your anchor down and then you take up to four ropes across two different, you know two different points of shore, so that you're really tied in. You know like both, two in the back and two in the front. And that's what you have to do, because you get these willy walls, which is when the wind comes down off the hills and if they hit your boat, I mean were in a very, very well protected anchorage and we actually did have those 80 knots and so at one point it was like, okay, hold on to your food, because you guys are tough.

Capn Tinsley:

Yeah, I mean, you're equally tough. I think so. How well matched are you guys? You are very safe. You're equally tough, I think so. How well matched are you guys? You are very safe and you are all the lines on that.

Judith Jacobson:

Yeah, you can't go anywhere In addition to the anchor.

Capn Tinsley:

You guys are tough.

Judith Jacobson:

You are. It was nice. I mean, it was annoying that your food is almost landing in your lap.

Capn Tinsley:

So it's beautiful, it's cold.

Judith Jacobson:

And it's very, very, very remote. We sailed for two and a half months and we met two other sailboats, oh my gosh, and we met only some people in a very small village called Porto Iden. Right a little bit after we went across Golfo de Penas and then we went to Golfo de Paine the pain of golf, the Golfo Paine and then we did sidetrack, we went sort of off track and went into Puerto Natales, which is an actual town. I don't know where that is, but yeah, it would be too hard to point okay yeah, you can look it up.

Judith Jacobson:

So Puerto Natales is very close to a national park. Excuse me, I have hiccups very close to a national park. Excuse me, I have hiccups Very close to a national park called Torres del Paine and we wanted to see that, so that's why we sailed. It was 80 miles in and 80 miles back out to the fjords again.

Capn Tinsley:

Okay, so these two anchorages that you gave me are those in Patagonia, yes, and you wouldn't find them on google. Okay, well, what's the closest town? Because people want to know what were the closest um piece of land um, you, you, honestly, you can't find it in google. What you have to do is you can well, is it up here or is it down here, or is it way down, way down uh, one is um, yes, yeah, I want to point, but I can't do that and take your arrow up and to the left, left, left, left, left, more left, more left, left, left, more left, more left, more left, more left.

Judith Jacobson:

That's one of them around there. Stop Around there. Somewhere that's a beautiful anchorage called Caleta Midnight. What's it called Caleta Midnight Zero? That was a beautiful place.

Capn Tinsley:

Is this all pretty calm right in here Sometimes? That was a beautiful place. Is this all pretty calm right in here sometimes? And what? What did you love about it?

Judith Jacobson:

if you go a little bit south there, try to go slowly a little bit south, see that um, and then go a little bit left. Stay where you are, go a little bit left in there, see how protected that is in there yes so something like that. It's not that, but something like that and these, uh, these are big mountains yeah, there's no one most of the time okay, so this must have been beautiful oh, it was gorgeous.

Judith Jacobson:

so if people go in and look at our um map on on, uh, predict wind. I actually made little notes for every place so you can actually find a note about Caleta Midnight's shadow.

Capn Tinsley:

Okay, I did download a video that you had on there. I don't know if that it did have PredictWin at the beginning of the video. Is that what you're talking about, or is that something different?

Judith Jacobson:

No, I think that's just my track. I'm talking about the track that we have on Predicament.

Capn Tinsley:

Okay, All right. Well, so how long did you stay in Patagonia? Like this whole part, this whole section?

Judith Jacobson:

So we started in Port-au-Mont on October 8th, and we arrived Port-au-Williams on December 13th.

Capn Tinsley:

Okay.

Judith Jacobson:

And then we actually went on land and we rented a car and drove around on the island and saw a little bit of that and walked up to in the mountains and just sort of relaxed a bit, had beautiful weather, relaxed a bit, had beautiful weather, and then we were waiting for a weather window to go to the Horn and then when we came back from that we went back and waited for a weather window for the Falkland Islands.

Capn Tinsley:

Okay, and we got a couple of questions here. How about charts for Chile? Are they valid?

Judith Jacobson:

We used navionics on our ipad and I know some people think we are even more nuts for that, but that's all we used and it was accurate. It was beautiful, it was fine. The depth were weird sometimes sometimes it was off a little bit, but you could tell. I mean, you only sail in the daytime, you're not allowed to sail at night, so you sail in the daytime and, um, so you can see everything, and so you can also see.

Judith Jacobson:

Okay, yeah, the map may say that I can go all the way over there, but there's actually land there, so you don't go there yeah, and one place it was only because we talked to ourselves, because the map said that it was like half a meter deep, which is like half a yard, but then when we went there it was 11 meters and that's what other sailors had told us. Oh yeah, you can go.

Capn Tinsley:

That's a big difference.

Judith Jacobson:

Don't worry about it.

Capn Tinsley:

Yeah, okay and okay. Hayden says 1,100 miles. Oh my God, no way yeah.

Judith Jacobson:

Auckland Islands. Okay, hayden says 1,100 miles. Oh my God, no way. Yeah, that was from Portland Islands to Uruguay.

Capn Tinsley:

Oh, that was 1,100 miles, yeah, okay. So he says beyond tough, brave, brave, brave. And they are Vikings, we are Literally, we can't help it, we are Vikings.

Judith Jacobson:

Hey, my grandfather was from Norway, so I got a little Viking in me too now you can go to Patagonia. I think I'll go by plane, if you can do that you can actually go by cruise ship, but it's not as much.

Capn Tinsley:

I've never taken a cruise ship. I'm not a big fan, but is that the only way you can get there? If you don't take your own book you?

Judith Jacobson:

can fly. You can actually fly to porto williams, okay, because that's how people they'll. They fly there to get to antarctica, yeah quite often okay in argentina, okay, and then you can also portamont, and there's actually a ferry that goes all the way from Portamont and down to Punt Arenas, which is when you go out the canal, and I think it also goes down to Port Williams. So there's a ferry.

Capn Tinsley:

I hear people get very seasick on it yeah, it's not like one of those that goes across the North Sea where they kind of hover Hover. Yeah, I thought my grandmother said that the ones they have now that go across the North Sea, they no.

Judith Jacobson:

I don't know what you're talking about.

Capn Tinsley:

Okay never mind Not good information, apparently.

Judith Jacobson:

Anyway, you don't have cruise ships either, but you can go with very small cruise ships with only a couple hundred people.

Capn Tinsley:

Okay, that's too many, I prefer my boat. Yeah, me too, so Uruguay, so tell us about that.

Judith Jacobson:

It was really just a stop on the way, because you only get three months in Brazil, which is the next country, which is a very, very long country with a very, very long coast.

Capn Tinsley:

So is Chile.

Judith Jacobson:

Yeah, but that's actually Brazil, I don't know. Yeah, it's long too, brazil, I don't know. Yeah, it's long too, but yeah. So we just used Uruguay as a short stop, really just to relax after the 1100. We had some deep bug on the way to Uruguay and we wanted to try and fix that and then we went when we were ready to go up along the Brazil coast, then we went there.

Capn Tinsley:

Okay, and so where did you go in brazil?

Judith Jacobson:

oh, um, we actually went more places than we thought we would because it turns out there's a group of brazilian sailors that are very interested in making it safe for cruisers. So they have friends all along the coast and you talk to them about where to go and they tell you no, don't go there, do go there, and we have a knowledge. So we actually, anchored up in the middle of rio de janeiro. Oh, I never, I didn't even think I was going to go in there because it's you know, there's so much crime. But they said if you go there and you stay with this guy and he'll look after your boat, if you're sure he'll take care of you, nobody will harm you because they know that he's there to take care of you and we were totally fine. So where?

Capn Tinsley:

were you in here?

Judith Jacobson:

in Rio de Janeiro yeah we just we are not really much for big towns, so we went up to see the Christ statue and we went up the Sugalove mountain there's the statue you know the statue of Jesus where he saw some god, oh yeah.

Capn Tinsley:

I'm sorry you can't see this, but I'm looking at this right here. Yeah, that one. Okay, so Is this where you were with your boat? I see some boats.

Judith Jacobson:

Right there, and a little to the right, a little to the right, right in that. See that beach there, right there, okay, I mean out by the boats, of course. But, that's just outside there. That could be our boat right there, okay.

Capn Tinsley:

And how long were you there, just?

Judith Jacobson:

a few days, and then we just stopped at different places along the coast and then we left the boat in Jacare. Jacare, which is, you know, brazil, is like a corner, so we went there and left the boat in that corner, went home and then came back and did an extra three months all the way up to um, the caribbean, well, first to first to French Guyana and then to Suriname and then to Tobago.

Capn Tinsley:

Okay, tobago, okay, right here.

Judith Jacobson:

Right there, yep. Tobago is out there, yep.

Capn Tinsley:

So what time of year was by the time you got here? What time of year was it?

Judith Jacobson:

That was in December. Then we went home for Christmas and came back in January.

Capn Tinsley:

Okay, you didn't stay long.

Judith Jacobson:

We always go home every so often because we have my son, that we want to go home and see. We have always only sailed part-time, part of the reason being that we are sailing in places where you can only sail in certain seasons, right, and part of the reason because we don't want to be too far from home and we want to see my son and, yeah, that type of thing.

Capn Tinsley:

And then did you sail up through the Caribbean. Then we sailed all the way up through the Caribbean. And at some point you must have run into Island Spirit.

Judith Jacobson:

Yeah, we did in St Martin.

Capn Tinsley:

Ah, okay.

Judith Jacobson:

But it's funny. We have been in Patagonia and we met two other boats, and now we're in the Caribbean and we meet, island packet after island packet after island packet.

Capn Tinsley:

It was a long time. Yeah, they're not as brave as you.

Judith Jacobson:

They're brave in different ways.

Capn Tinsley:

I'm sure, sure, sure, okay, so, um. So, how far did? Where's the boat?

Judith Jacobson:

now the boat now is in Virginia, in Deltaville, and not doing too good at the moment.

Capn Tinsley:

What happened? You had a fire.

Judith Jacobson:

We had a fire and we're still waiting for the fire specialist to come and say what caused the fire. So you were not there. Yes, we were, but we still don't know what caused it.

Capn Tinsley:

So we're up in the Chesapeake area.

Judith Jacobson:

Okay, so now we have to wait for this fire specialist to come and look at it, and then the insurance is going to do their stuff. Thankfully it was not lost. Thankfully it was on land, land and even thankfully.

Capn Tinsley:

Most of all is that we were not hurt right, yeah, so thankfully um and it was um, I guess I didn't bring put that picture in here, so you, um did you I? I know that I have lithium batteries and I know some people were asking about that.

Judith Jacobson:

Yeah, I see the pictures in the bottom row all to the left Bottom row.

Capn Tinsley:

There it is.

Judith Jacobson:

Yeah, but the thing is we can't really answer anything until the fire specialist has been there. All we can see is that there are wires that are melted and that it apparently happened where the batteries are.

Capn Tinsley:

Did you say you have lithium?

Judith Jacobson:

Yeah, lifepo Lithium. They don't burn by themselves, like batteries that are only lithium. They can burn by themselves. They can spontaneously combust. Lifeboat doesn't do that. Something has to come, and that's what they have to find out.

Capn Tinsley:

Okay, yeah, I've got lithium. I have lithionics. Yeah, yeah, so that was kind of scary looking for me when I saw that.

Judith Jacobson:

Oh, that was super, super, duper scary. I mean, the only good thing was if that had happened at sea, that boat had been at the bottom and hopefully we would have been in the raft.

Capn Tinsley:

Yeah, hopefully you could have put it out.

Judith Jacobson:

So that was scary as hell, to say the least. That's Touché and SV Texas. We sort of buddy-boated all the way from. I'm going to think where did we meet? Oh yeah, I know where we met. We met in the Bahamas, in that big town, georgetown.

Judith Jacobson:

Georgetown Chicken town, yeah, so they were going to lend us their spare outboard, which was great, because by then our outboard has broken, and so we had a pretty rough time getting there, had some really rough weather, and so we were a bit tired. So we get there and they say oh, by the way, we've decided that we should go to Eleuther because there's going to be a bunch of thunderstorms. I'm like, can we just sleep for hours?

Capn Tinsley:

oh yeah, and then we sailed on to Eleuther alright, so this is my kind of anchorage right here yeah, that's, that's Oak Rock Oak yeah that North Carolina yeah, I really like that area also the Outer Banks and all that.

Judith Jacobson:

That's a beautiful area, that other Oriental anchorage and that's where we went for the love. We went out through the Oregon Inlet.

Capn Tinsley:

Wow.

Judith Jacobson:

Instead of going. Originally we had actually wanted to go around Cape Hatteras, but we just kept getting northern winds and we kept getting thunderstorms and all kinds of not so fun stuff.

Capn Tinsley:

Yeah, what are your plans for the near future?

Judith Jacobson:

So when the boat is fixed, and next spring we want to go up to Maine and then after Maine we'll go to Nova Scotia and then to Newfoundland.

Capn Tinsley:

Okay, so you've got to get the boat back across.

Judith Jacobson:

No, no, no. Well, maybe we don't know that yet, but so far Nova Scotia and Newfoundland is on the same.

Capn Tinsley:

Canada.

Judith Jacobson:

Yeah, canada, yeah, okay. And guess why we want to go to Newfoundland.

Capn Tinsley:

Why.

Judith Jacobson:

There's a lot of big icebergs that come down from there. Oh.

Capn Tinsley:

Hayden Radine, do you believe this? So he wanted me to bring this back up, so there it is.

Judith Jacobson:

Yeah, but see, when you look at the real map online there are little dots and when you press the dots you can get the Right. Try to press one of the dots. I don't know if it's a live map you have or if it's not, it's a picture.

Capn Tinsley:

I downloaded it from Facebook. You can get the coordinates.

Judith Jacobson:

Uh, you can get the coordinates, you can get my, my writing. I'm like would would write something like uh, gloria sale, we're having a great time.

Capn Tinsley:

Okay.

Judith Jacobson:

Bumpy today, the wind is a little bit strong, and do they find?

Capn Tinsley:

that on your Facebook page? Is that where they find it?

Judith Jacobson:

No, no, I'll send you the link.

Capn Tinsley:

Okay.

Judith Jacobson:

It's a predict wind link. So if you look at that, we see where your little hand is. If you just go just a little bit down from that, see that little bend that is in that track Right here bit down from that.

Judith Jacobson:

See that little bend that is in that track. That's the first time. Yeah, we were trying to go around the storm there or to go get north of it, and so that's why it was quite bumpy. So at one point we're both just going up and checking every 20 minutes. We met no boats on that trick at all this whole way way.

Judith Jacobson:

None, not even one. And if you look at marine traffic, there's no boats there. But anyways, at that point we are both lying in settees in a saloon, and whoever is on watch goes up every 20 minutes and look out. And so Hogan is lying on the lee side, right, is it lee, or is it? Yeah, where where the boat goes down a little bit right, no, no, no, he was lying on the windy side, so so his bed was a little bit going like that. But we have lee cloth that he was lying behind. Fine, just like me. But so at one point there was a really big wave or something and the boat did a jump, and so he actually levitated, and because he levitated, our lee cloth we lie on them. That's how they stay put right. So now that he levitated, when he came down, he came down like askew, so he landed on the floor. After that he tied himself to the bunk yeah, did you hurt yourself?

Judith Jacobson:

no, it's not that far from the seats to the bunk my boat's similar, but a little smaller it's a 320 that's a nice vote.

Capn Tinsley:

Yes, well, gosh, this has been great. This is definitely the first time we've had this information on the salty podcast, so I really, really appreciate you guys coming on. Is there any questions that we have from the uh, your, all, your fans here, anybody? How many is on? Well, right now we've got about 10 watching at once and they're between Facebook and YouTube, all right.

Judith Jacobson:

So you interviewed Kirsten Neuschafer.

Capn Tinsley:

Yes.

Judith Jacobson:

Yeah, when she was doing her trip. She has a lot of friends in the Falkland Islands, so we actually left our boat there for a few months and flew home. Unfortunately, while we were home, she came by and went all. She couldn't stop because she's not allowed to do that. She went almost into the harbor and then out again, so we could actually have sailed with her up through the ocean.

Capn Tinsley:

Oh my gosh, she's amazing, isn't she? Oh, she is, yes, did you watch that interview?

Judith Jacobson:

Yeah, and I also watched. You know, when she was sailing, I was rooting for her and I was watching every day, you know, for news and stuff.

Capn Tinsley:

Yeah, I mean, she's just like you guys. I mean, that was the first race she. She chose that race to be her first race yeah, but she's not like us.

Capn Tinsley:

I mean, she's a whole different ball game oh yeah, I would never do what she's doing, never well, I think she's done with that, but I told her she needed to just get some modern equipment for that boat. She's having a hard time thinking about selling it. I'm like, don't you know? No, and just put some modern technology on it and just go around the world and go through the Panama Canal and just Stop in places, don't go and, yes, don't stop. And she says she wants to do that, she wants to stop, and I mean that's half the fun, right, there is meeting all the people and everything.

Judith Jacobson:

But see, understand how it's hard for her to sell the boat because we, just after the fire, we were worried that it would be written off, and just that thought about that boat that has gotten us everywhere we want to go being written off. That was not a nice thought.

Capn Tinsley:

No, I feel the same way about my boat. The only reason I got rid of my IP27 was because the insurance company did. I finally just gave up because Hayden goes just take the money and go get a bigger boat. And I was crying and everything and I'm glad I did.

Judith Jacobson:

What happened? Did you have a fire?

Capn Tinsley:

No, I had a hurricane.

Judith Jacobson:

Oh, hurricane yeah.

Capn Tinsley:

Yeah, I'm on the Alabama Gulf Coast. I don't know if you know where that is. Yes, we do. We stay away from the hurricane. Yeah, yeah, I'm on the Alabama Gulf Coast. I don't know if you know where that is. Yes, we do.

Judith Jacobson:

We stay away from the hurricane zone.

Capn Tinsley:

Yes, of course, but I live here.

Judith Jacobson:

You just had Helene right.

Capn Tinsley:

Helene came through. It luckily didn't hit. It was a little east of here, and then came another one. Milton and that didn't come here, and I'm hoping we can make it till November 1st with nothing coming here. But every time we say, then eventually we get one well, also, I'm thinking you guys all have November 1st.

Judith Jacobson:

Someday a hurricane is going to not know the date and come November 2nd.

Capn Tinsley:

There was like I think it was, I know, a couple of years ago we were like there were storms late, late in the season, maybe even after the 1st of November, and we were thinking, no, this has to end, no more, it was a heavy season. We were thinking no, this has to end, no more.

Judith Jacobson:

It was a heavy season so our insurance won't cover us. If we're inside the box until December 1st, not November 1st, december 1st they won't cover us. You go there before December 1st, tough luck. Well in Virginia you're kind of, but you're not in the Caribbean. No, we are covered, we are outside the box okay, okay.

Capn Tinsley:

So don't rule out November, right, and December 1st yeah. But wait, that's too long, I can't. I have to mentally say November 1st and then we'll worry about November later.

Judith Jacobson:

You've got to set the weather for the first week of November.

Capn Tinsley:

yeah, Let me just show you a picture of my boat real quick. Let's see if I can get this in front. I'm going to take you. Well, how do I do this? Okay, there's my boat. No, that's background. Here we go. Oh nice, say, I got all the stuff.

Judith Jacobson:

But it's a nice boat.

Capn Tinsley:

Oh yeah, it's a 1998. It's in really good condition.

Judith Jacobson:

It looks beautiful.

Capn Tinsley:

There it is. Yeah, do you have Starlink?

Judith Jacobson:

Yeah, now we do. We just got it when we were in Dominican Republic. Isn't that nice? I don't know if it's Starlink, because I'm not really sure. It got a lot of water inside the tube, so we'll see.

Capn Tinsley:

When did you get it?

Judith Jacobson:

We got it in March in the Dominican Republic.

Capn Tinsley:

Okay, did you get Gen 3?

Judith Jacobson:

Yeah.

Capn Tinsley:

Because now they're selling them here for $2.99 at West Marine, the Gen 3. I went ahead and updated to I had Gen 2.

Judith Jacobson:

Yeah, we'll see what happens, because I'm not sure where they survived the all the water that was. You know those, those fire people, they put a lot of water inside that boat oh yeah, that's where the water came from. Yeah and after that they'd roam all over Woo-hoo.

Capn Tinsley:

Right, okay, so December 2nd in Antigua, and then Richard Kaufman says so glad you're both safe after the fire. Hope to hear of Touche being back afloat soon. Hope you get to sail north in the spring. We may cross tracks at some point. Fair winds.

Judith Jacobson:

Thank you so much. I hope so too.

Capn Tinsley:

All right, so I'll be watching you guys. Thank you so much for coming on. I really appreciate it. It was uh, hayden and, and my husband, my husband follows you. He's Scott Myrick. I don't know if you've ever noticed him, you know? Yeah, that's my husband, so he's been watching you a long time. And with that I'd like to take us out by saying Salty, abandon out.

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