with 17-year-old Lena Kurbiel as her rowing buddy – a French athlete with two national titles under her belt in both rowing and sailing. The average crossing – from the harbour of Monterey to Hanalei Bay on Hawaii’s Kauái Island – is 62 days, but Liz and Lena managed it in 37, arriving on July 16 to a hero’s welcome from family, friends and supporters. The pair led for the first several weeks of the race, but fell back to third place by the end, with Lena setting a new record as the youngest woman to row the mid-Pacific. The trip had its highs and lows – Liz cracking a tooth at the end of the second week after taking an oar to the face was definitely not a happy moment, but an encounter with a massive whale that dwarfed their 7m boat certainly was. “It was the biggest I’ve ever seen,” said Liz, which is saying something given that she has sailed across most of the world’s oceans. “ Tic Tac would have been the same size as the dorsal fin.” At the finish line in Hawaii, Liz told a reporter that, “I was just remarking as I was rowing in that less than six months ago I was still finishing the Atlantic. So I’m pretty tired.” Despite her weariness however, Liz rested for barely a week before deciding to “finish the job” and row the remainder of the way across the Pacific, on her own.
Setting off on July 21, her aim is to end up in either Kokopo or somewhere along Australia’s east coast, but will make that call at the Equator depending on weather systems in the Coral Sea or her fatigue levels. “You have to be strong and mentally fit to survive out there on the ocean,” Liz told me seriously during our interview in May. “For the rowing, it’s better to stay very fit and very strong by staying on a healthy diet and doing some exercise – my boat is in the US, so I train in the gym.” I ask Liz if she has any advice for those who might be holding back in pursuing a sailing career due to a fear of the ocean. “I don’t think fear is bad,” she replies. “The ocean is to be respected – it can be a dangerous place and it’s a whole different world when you’re out there. My parents are into fishing so we were always on the water and they taught us important things like respecting the ocean. “So, have respect for the ocean, but if you get the opportunity, go! Go out on the water. You might fall in love, you might get hooked.” When asked when she knew for sure that sailing the seas was something she wanted to do, there is a pause of a few seconds before she answers, cheerfully once more. “I learned how to sail in PNG. If I didn’t get the opportunity to learn there and then, I wouldn’t be a sailor. It was really just a knock-on thing. If you are given the opportunity to do something, take it and learn as much as you can. It doesn’t take much out of your life, and you don’t know where it’s going to take you.” Left: This large seabird – a red- footed booby – kept Liz company (at a careful distance) after it hitched a ride with her somewhere in the Pacific in late July
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VOLUME 39 2024
29
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