This is the story of a man in love with the sea. As a boy he grew up in a city that lived by, on and of the sea, and he was mesmerized by the ships and the wooden ‘kayikis’ that came from and sailed to distant shores, by the fishermen who went out on their wooden boats before the sunrise and came home with fish enough to feed the whole city, by the smell of salt water spray that flickered in front of the famous north wind, Boreas. He longed to be a part of this life that was engulfed with hardship, mystery and freedom. As a boy, he tried to build small wooden boats to sail on, rarely with success. As a young lad, he became a rower and an athlete, rowed across the Bosphorus and learned to race, to win at times and most importantly, to lose often. As a young man, he became a professional fisherman with his five meter, open wooden boat, and fished his living out of this difficult, stormy stretch of water with its treacherous currents and dense shipping traffic. Life took him on a different professional path, he became a physician, a surgeon dedicated to healing disability, working mostly with children. He never quit the sea, never could stay away for long from his first ever true love. He had many sailboats, each and every one precious to his heart. He shared his love of the sea with a woman who also adored the sea. At an early age when life forced them to retire, they bought their ultimate sailboat, cast off the lines that tied them to shore, and went off to realize a childhood dream of sailing around the World. Ever since, he and his wife live on their boat, travel around the World and sail the oceans.
This is not enough, however. He has a drive, a different dream that has been haunting him for many years. To sail to places he had always read about, in the wake of his heroes, in search a great adventure, of true seamanship, to sail to Cape Horn, to the Southern Ocean.
It is as if all his life before has been a preparation for this once in a lifetime adventure. Before the start, he will make use of all the knowledge accumulated over the years from his earlier masters, and with the support of his circle of friends, boatbuilders, metal workers, sailmakers, carpenters, electricians, chandlers, all of whom real sailors enchanted by the oceans, he will make sure that his boat is prepared to face the challenges of the GGR. The real difficulty will lie in the fact that he will be alone. He always sailed, rowed and fished with friends. He was taught that safety at sea was the first priority. Now he will be facing an indifferent ocean, in relentless winds, in the remotest places on earth all by himself. And at the finish, he will have lived the greatest adventure a human being can hope to achieve.
To realize a dream, to honor the brave and capable sailors who paved the way, from whose knowledge and experience rose all the technical developments that sailors today savor freely, to prove that the spirit of humanity will rise above all challenges no matter how bleak the future may seem, this will keep hope alive.