Bear Grylls (63 page)

We refuelled as planned, while Mick put a call through to the Fleet Weather Centre. He reported back to say they had given us the all clear and were predicting westerly winds; that meant that
the wind would be blowing from almost directly behind us right the way through to the Faroes. It was ideal. We would push straight on.

As we skirted round the last few remaining islands, the ice-capped plateau of southern Iceland appeared on the port side: huge, majestic and cold. We were soon surging through the gentle swell,
trying to relax and settle into the familiar rota once more. As Iceland slipped away behind us, we just lapped up the natural beauty all around.

A school of dolphins appeared in our wake, cheerfully playing in the waves, and all kinds of birds seemed to fly overhead, as if to satisfy their curiosity about what such a small yellow boat
was doing out here in these seas. This was what we had waited 2,500 miles for, and each of us savoured every precious moment.

But we still felt cautious. We had been here before, and if we had learned anything from this ocean, it was that the sea must always be respected, never taken for granted, always feared.

The sea knows no rules. It is a law unto itself, and it moves at will. It’s this incredible force that is always heaving beneath you. Sometimes it can be magnificent; sometimes it can be
brutal. But either way, it doesn’t care. It just is. And when you begin to think you understand it, and have it taped, that’s the time when it rises up in defiance. Even when it is
calm, as it was when we were surging on towards the Faroe Islands, you can still sense the huge, silent force beneath you, and you fear what that force can do.

As I sat there and stared across the vast grey ocean, I sensed a strange kind of paradox. As individuals, we spend a short time on this planet. We exist, and try to follow our dreams and live
with meaning, but the sea is different. It is so much greater than us, timeless, unending, relentless, and it just churns on, always evolving. In many ways, this makes it the supreme arena. And
yet, even as we experienced this huge ocean, with its capacity for rage and ruthlessness, even as we felt so vulnerable to its whims, I somehow felt a part of it as well.

Why is it that storms are so often followed by periods of intense calm and quiet? Is this just coincidence, or is this the living ocean speaking to us, feeding us a small part of its vibrant
life force? Surely it is touching our souls and desires, ever drawing us in, testing us.

Our frail dreams and survival instincts are also part of this natural world. We are human, after all, born from nature. We may not always feel welcome, but we are a part of the ocean as well. We
have a small place here. Maybe that’s what God intended: that in these quiet moments we should understand we are not utterly insignificant, but are in fact special. We belong, and we each
have a home in this vast corner called ‘nature’.

Perched on the prow of the boat, alone with these thoughts, heading south-east, I had time to reflect and to feel. I realized then that maybe I have two homes: one back in England, with Shara
and Jesse, where we are together, holding one another, warm and safe; and the other out here in this wilderness, feeling tiny among the elements, but living, and free. Maybe it is these two parts,
these two homes, that make up the person I am.

All of a sudden
I was brought back to the here and now by the sound of laughter from the console area. I could see Andy trying to teach Charlie magnetic variations in
northern hemispherical navigation. Charlie was looking confused.

Andy had always been very correct in using maritime terms: ‘for’ard’ and ‘aft’, ‘windward’ and ‘leeward’, ‘sheet’ and
‘knot’. But throughout the expedition, Charlie never got this.

‘What’s wrong with “forward”, “back”, “left” and “right” and “rope” and “mph”?’ he would insist, and now
he finally cracked.

‘Let me teach you about boats, the Manchester way,’ Charlie continued with a wry smile, and he started stomping around the boat, using Andy’s fuel-marker pencil to scrawl
‘front’, ‘back’, ‘left’ and ‘right’ all over the appropriate tubes.

Andy was cringing with despair. It was very funny.

Conditions remained calm as night fell and, for the first time any of us could remember, we were able to sit back and enjoy the most stunning of sunsets, as inch by inch the bright orange glow
was consumed by the distant crimson and cobalt blue horizon. We sat and watched, lost in our thoughts and also in our memories.

Even on the night watches we sat transfixed, mesmerized by the simple beauty of the night under clear northern skies.

We had always expected the nights to be much lighter than usual during the expedition, but we seemed to have been followed by heavy clouds and most nights had been pitch dark. Now it was clear
and we gazed up at the shooting stars and the full moon and marvelled at the phosphorus under the RIB’s bow. Charlie and I were on watch together from 1 a.m. to 2 a.m. and for the first time,
this ‘graveyard’ shift was an hour of sheer pleasure.

As dawn broke, we emerged into a few gentle squalls of rain, which softly pebbled the surface of the flat sea. Mick and I lay in the sardine tin in the rain, chatting about army days and
holidays, and what we were going to do when we got home. It was the best of times. Even the soft rain was a joy.

We were less than a mile from the Faroes when they finally materialized through the cloud. Rough landscapes of hills and craggy rocks were interspersed with lush green pastures all around and we
soon passed a huge, natural cave, worn in the cliff face by the relentless battering of the sea. It was remarkable, large enough to enclose a decent-sized house. We moved inside and sat quietly,
all alone, silenced by nature’s creation.

By the time we pulled into the small port of Thorshavn, it was raining heavily. The harbour was surrounded by rows of small houses, most of which were grass-roofed. Some of them were perched
precariously on the cliffs.

A lady from the local sailing club came bounding down to greet us.

‘Welcome to the Faroes,’ she declared. ‘Chloë has just called from London.’

Right to the end, our base team were on the ball.

‘We have arranged for you to use the sailing club as a base to rest. Please treat it as your home. I hope that it is going to be all right for you.’

It was perfect. We could hang out our kit, drink cups of tea, and doze on the floor.

We ate well in the local bar, made the necessary phone calls to the base team and the weather centre and, before long, the five of us were settling down for a few hours’ sleep in the
sailing club’s small upstairs room.

Within moments of the light going out, Charlie was snoring.

‘I’m not sure which is worse,’ Nige muttered in the darkness, lying awake on the floor, ‘Charlie’s nostrils or the roar of a 450-horsepower Caterpillar
engine.’

He had a point.

It was strange.
I had spent most of the past few weeks doing everything possible within my grasp to reach the final destination of this expedition safely, and yet, now
that we were only 275 miles from the north coast of Scotland, I found myself feeling almost sad that the end was so near.

We woke just before 3 a.m. and I became aware that we were probably pulling on all our kit and dry-suits for the last time. I looked around. The crew were quiet.

‘OK, guys, I need your concentration for twelve more hours,’ I told everyone as we stood in the cold night air, preparing to slip our mooring on the quayside for the last time.
‘Twelve more hours, that’s all. Let’s just keep this boat pointing due south, steer a good course and make sure we don’t make any stupid mistakes. If we just stay focused
and do what we do so well together, then we will reach Scotland.’

We all knew what needed to be done.

‘One last effort,’ said Mick quietly.

There was a relief in us all, waiting just on the other side of the door. We were so close to achieving our target. But there was also a sense of loss that the spirit that had carried us through
so many dangerous situations could not last for ever.

Of course, the five of us would stay in touch and see one another whenever we could, and we would regularly look back and laugh, and feel proud of what we had done; yet the reality was that as
soon as we touched British soil, the precious magic we all felt so intensely would begin to disappear.

That is just how it is.

‘I’d love to helm this first bit, if that’s all right?’ Charlie asked. The night was glorious, and he took the wheel.

There was scarcely a breath of wind on the water, and the moon was reflected on the still harbour water around us. We untied the ropes and quietly left the Faroes.

We had decided to leave at 3 a.m. because the early departure meant we would reach Scotland in daylight, and therefore would actually be able to see the end of our expedition. Which would be
nice!

In fact, we had originally planned to leave even earlier but Force Six and Seven winds had been blowing through the area to our south and our meteorologist, Mike Town, suggested we should wait
until they had passed. We hoped they now had. Still determined to minimize any risks, we waited until the hour he suggested.

The few flickering lights of Thorshavn, the small town in the Faroes, were soon receding into the distance. We were yet again leaving behind people who had been incredibly kind and generous.
What was it about these maritime communities that always made their reception of us so warm? It had become such a feature of this expedition: arriving in isolated communities as total strangers,
and leaving as friends.

While we had been refuelling the previous evening, people had approached the boat freely, chatting, many of them just wanting to touch the tubes and wish us well; and in Thorshavn, as in so many
other remote places we had been, they had wished us ‘calm seas and God’s speed’.

But above everything, they all seemed to have time . . . time for us, time for themselves, time just to be.

That is what I hunger for: space, the time just to sit and be. The freedom from the rush, the little moments, the ones that we so often overlook and miss, even forget exist.

In supposedly more developed parts of the world, we have so little patience. We want it all, and we want it now. We rush from one thing to the next. We have no time for what really matters, and
our lives become a blur. How often do I struggle to remember what I did yesterday, let alone last week? That’s terrible, really.

‘So are you busy at the moment?’ We hear it the whole time, as if to be busy is something we should strive for. A friendly everyday question, but it speaks volumes. I think we are
all so busy that we lose touch with who we really are.

‘The heart of a man is like deep water,’ I once read. No wonder so many of us struggle with our identity. We are too busy to find it, too busy to listen to those deep waters.

Those men and women in Labrador who told us to stay in port had tried to warn us and protect us from the northerly winds we eventually ran into. But we had rushed ahead.

Perhaps I should have listened more.

On two occasions on the expedition, in St Mary’s and then again in Nanortalik, we had rushed, and so nearly fallen.

We were powering
ahead by the time dawn burst over the eastern horizon, reaching 22 knots in a following sea. It was just before 5 a.m. We were homeward bound and
gradually starting to believe we would make it. I took the Dictaphone and carefully made my way to the foredeck . . .

My hour at the helm followed soon afterwards, and for most of the time my eyes seemed to dart from the seas ahead to the dial that indicated the number of nautical miles remaining on the leg,
and I was lucky enough to be watching the dial when it ticked down from 100 to 99 miles. Charlie took the helm after me, and he seemed to be making good progress when Nige leaned forward and stared
intently at the small screen on the console. The small arrow indicated the direction in which we were moving, and it was pointing 180 degrees the wrong way.