Blog 2
“In media res” A wave crashes on the deck and spills over our already soaked bodies. The smell of salt water pervades the air. A ringing sound alerts us that something is wrong … again. In front of me, Brooke flings her oars in, throws open the stern cabin door in front of her, and hastily explains to Sophia that the blaring alarms are due to being blown off course by a very strong Northwest wind and steep, tall waves that are slamming into our starboard side. “I don’t know what to do”, she shouts over the howling wind and thud of waves hitting the boat’s hull, “and I really don’t want to resort to the para-anchor.” My raisining fingers grasp the oars, bracing myself in our erratically pitching boat. Heart racing, my legs deliver the power as I heave in an effort to compensate for the loss of Brooke’s stroke while she consults with Sophia.
While Brooke and I resume rowing as hard as we can, Sophia pulls out the satellite phone to consult the land team. We have a decision to make, one that will set the tone for the rest of the Pacific Row, and we have to make it fast.
It is the second full night of our Pacific Row, and the first time we are far enough offshore that we cannot see land. When the sun set, cloud cover stole what little light the stars offered. We are all tired from adapting to the 2-hour-on / 2-hour-off schedule, two of us are fighting long bouts of nausea, and we are disoriented from rowing in a body of water we can no longer see. We have one clear threshold from our weather router - keep your bearing above 180°, due South. On an ocean rowing boat, while the rowers face “backwards”, we see three screens that give us indications where we are moving and how fast. Dipping below 180° would risk pushing us too far East to recover our South-Westbound route to Hawaii. We see that we teeter the edge of our single instruction with each stroke.
Between the waves’ repetitive thumps on the boat, the high-pitched alarms, and time running out, it is hard to focus. Two members of our land team advise us to deploy our para-anchor, a parachute shaped device that when set out properly “anchors” a boat in rough conditions. I cautiously resist the notion that we should throw out the para-anchor. I hesitate to make a habit of using the para-anchor so readily as defense in difficult conditions. Plus, I am still seasick and determined not to unpack it unless we REALLY need to. In search of a different solution, we call our weather router, the legendary Dawn Wood, and she reminds us of our mission.
“You want to get to Hawaii as fast as possible, right?”
“Yeah”
“Then, you’re going to row with two people as hard as possible for as long as possible, without dipping below 180°. If that doesn’t work, you row with three people as hard as possible for as long as possible, without dipping below 180°. If that doesn’t work, then use the para-anchor.”
Re-energized by her resolve and belief that we could overcome this challenge, Sophia says, “Dawn, that’s exactly what we needed to hear. We are going to figure this out and we’ll call if there are any more emergencies. Thanks.”
Thus, we begin the night we now lovingly refer to as “The Night of Manic Rowing”. Imagine riding a mechanical bull at the top of a high dive, blind-folded, with buckets of water being thrown at you in irregular intervals from all possible directions. Our only consolation is the certainty that in approximately seven hours the sun would come up, and when it rises, we would see our surroundings. In short, it is wild. It is so wild that we lean into the delusion that we are having fun because we are, in fact, so scared.
In one of the midnight shifts, Sophia and I see a glowing figure in the water, weaving its way under the hull left and right, just beyond our stern. We have no idea what it is or if this figure is even real. Nonetheless, we playfully name it “Glo”, short for Glorious, because, as we reasoned, we are having a glorious time. We keep rowing.
Eventually, the sun rises, the waters calm, and we each emerge for our respective morning shifts relieved that we survived the night without the para-anchor and more confident in our abilities to navigate tough conditions together than ever. In the dawn’s light, a little bird circles our boat and after a laugh at the events of the night before, we jokingly name her “Rio”, also short for Glorious. After a few minutes with us, she flies off into the waves. Little do we know how much she would come to mean to us.
What’s in a Name? With our team selected, our first task was deciding what kind of team we wanted to be: who we are, what we represent, and how we want to operate. Simply put, what’s our “vibe”?
In a name, we wanted a unifying identity to represent the team and make us and our essence recognizable, while also allowing each member’s unique personality to shine through. The great Beryl Markham wrote in her memoir, “The cloud clears as you enter it,” when describing her reflection on leaving a beloved place and facing an uncertain future. The quote means that anxiety and uncertainty about the future ("the cloud") disappear once you take the courageous step to move forward into it. We recall this quote often, as the whole idea of crossing an ocean can feel like a huge cloud at times, and we chose to enter the cloud of team identity the best way we know how: with a Google Doc.
All of us - rowers and land team - brainstormed potential names and added them to our list for discussion. Our initial criteria was “anything that comes to mind”. This is a superb method for idea generation and a byproduct of this method is that some names were plainly and obviously not good. Creating this list was one of our earliest exercises in vulnerability: pitching ideas and trusting that your teammates would commend the participation over the product. Out at sea, we will see everything, and before we get to that point, we will learn every necessary detail about how each other operates. Defining the team identity was one of the first steps towards that understanding. It is a privilege to witness the creative process. Our initial list was 80 names long.
One of the first names I added to our list was “Seabirds”, after a song in a scene of a television show. The song was catchy enough and more importantly, it brought to mind Rio, our little bird from the Pacific. I thought of how brave she was to embark on an arduous journey, how each day brought uncertainty of what she would eat and what weather awaited her, how she wasn’t biologically designed to last on the open ocean indefinitely but something visceral had alerted her that she must find the path through to the other side. I thought about how in some strange way her journey mirrored our own, then and now.
Beryl Markham One character we learned about amid defining our team identity is Beryl Markham. An aviation pioneer, Beryl was somewhat of a seabird herself. In 1937, she became the first person (of any gender!) to fly solo non-stop across the Atlantic Ocean from East to West. Beryl even survived a frozen fuel line that resulted in a crash landing to complete her trans-Atlantic flight. One name we considered was Beryl’s Path. At the same time as deciding on a team name, we were using a very similar creative and iterative process to solidify our values and mission statement. Ultimately, we decided we didn’t want to name our journey after anyone else’s but rather find a way to honor their legacy while also making our own.
To quote Sophia:
Whether talking about Beryl Markham, Tracy Edwards and the crew of Maiden, Natalia Cohen, Victoria Evans, or Liz Wardley, we found ourselves finding inspiration in the extraordinary women who have made their mark on sea-fairing adventures. While we wanted to dream big and be bold, we also found ourselves searching for ways to incorporate history and show our respect for the people who paved the way. In effort to incorporate a sense of communion with these legends while building something of our own, ‘The Seabirds’ was sounding better and better.
What happened to Rio? For an ocean rower, seabirds have a literal meaning. Seabirds are often the only consistent companions, except for teammates, during life among the waves. A few days after her first fly by, Rio came back to us for another visit. She continued this trend - flying around our boat, then flying off into the waves - every couple of days until Day 30 of our 34 day row. As we rowed closer to the middle of nowhere, the birds we saw grew, and her small but mighty presence among them persisted. Seabirds’ steadfast presence can take on many meanings to many different people but one resonates with everyone: you are not alone.
After all our reflections and discussions and learning from each other, we decided that was the kind of team we want to be - one that leans on the power of togetherness. We want to be a team that seeks out inspiration and joy, like the little birds nearby, collecting positivity as kindling for our fire; a team that not only reminds you that you are not alone, but that you are celebrated and supported every step of the way. And of course, we want to go fast.
With these things in mind, our mission is: To celebrate and amplify each other’s strengths, empowering us to cross the Atlantic as fast as possible, with collaboration, courage, and curiosity. And we are The Seabirds.
