Across the Pacific

By Rob Windsor
I’m sitting on a plane from San Francisco to Boston now. 12 hours ago I finished a delivery from Hawaii to San Francisco on the Swan 42 Elusive with one of my favorite people, Pat O¹Connor. It took 14 days to go around 2400 miles, not too bad. This was my first time across the Pacific, which was pretty cool as well. The Pacific was very different than the Atlantic, which I didn’t expect. The water is cold and it was really cloudy for most of the trip. I had to wear full wet weather gear including a wooly hat for most of the trip!

The biggest thing that was different on this trip was that I didn’t see any wildlife at all until we were within 250 miles of the coast! No dolphins, no whales, no nothing. Pretty weird when in the Atlantic, which I have been across many times in both directions, you see something every day. I will tell you what I did see a lot of though, trash. So bad, I mean, I didn’t go on a watch without seeing some piece of something in the water. I’m not the most sentimental guy but, wow, it really upset me and it made think a lot about the world we live in.

Do you think I didn’t see any wildlife because of the trash or was I just unlucky? I’m a pretty lucky guy so…I’m going with the trash. In the middle of the ocean, I saw more trash in the water than I see in Long Island Sound on a weekend! That’s pretty awful.

I have been sailing in The Atlantic Cup for a few years now and I sailed under the 11th Hour Racing banner for a couple of events, so I understand about being environmentally pro active and I try to do my part. What I don’t get is how it got so bad? I took some pictures but they don’t do it justice. It’s so bad that I can’t get over it.

What do we do? Who can we call? Nobody, that’s the problem. Most people are home on land and never really see what’s going on out there except in video or photos. The ocean is my office, but it’s also my playground. Somewhere along the line it got dirty and it needs to be cleaned up.

I’m not sure we can get what’s out there out, but we can certainly not put anything else in. I mean, let’s stop with the single use water bottles. You know what I saw the most of? Laundry detergent bottles. Hundreds, and sometimes I exaggerate, but not this time. Hundreds in 14 days. Really sad. Let me know what to do, who to talk to, I’ll do it. Hope this hits home for somebody cause it sure did for me. – Get Involved.