Bristol Green Capital: “Bristol is proud to be waving good bye to resident Elsa Hammond as she sets sail for the biggest adventure of her life… We wish her the best of luck on her oarsome adventure!”
Yesterday was exhausting, but also exhilarating.
As part of a recent initiative by George Ferguson the Mayor of Bristol, one Sunday in every month sees a number of streets in Bristol city centre closed to traffic, to be enjoyed instead by pedestrians and cyclists. As well as it being fantastic to be able to walk freely on usually traffic-heavy streets, there are also a lot of great stalls, activities and initiatives to enjoy between 10am and 4pm. Last month Steve and I checked out Make Sundays Special, and spent a happy few hours wandering around the streets in the sun, eating ice cream, listening to music and talking to all sorts of people. This month we were down there running one of the events ourselves…
It has recently been confirmed that the Mayor will be supporting my Pacific Solo Row – in particular he will be a VIP presence at a couple of my events throughout the year! Make Sundays Special is one of his popular new initiatives – one that focuses on people, community and sustainability for a day, rather than allowing cars to dominate the city centre – and it was a privilege to be able to be a part of the third Sunday that this has run.
Armed with a fantastic new banner, donations boxes, bowls of sweets and two rowing machines, we headed down into the city centre early yesterday morning to set up. The aim of the day as to spread the word about the challenge and the charity, to raise some money, and to have fun – all of which we achieved. We set up two rowing machines, and set people the challenge of rowing 200 metres as fast as they could. There were some very close races, as friends and family battled it out against each other to be the fastest. There was even a set of twins who finished with only a second between them. It wasn’t only about the fit, strong and fast though – as it was such a short distance the 200m Pacific Challenge appealed to everyone, from three-year olds to grannies. Even the security guards couldn’t resist having a go!
We chose 200m both as an achievable distance for everyone, and also because it is about 1/20,000th of the distance that I will be rowing across the Pacific. As I watched everyone completing their row, I kept thinking ‘Well, I’ll only have to do that about 20,000 times… pulling a heavy boat laden with all my food and equipment…through storms and currents and hot sun…should be a piece of cake! ;)’
Winners of the various prizes and categories will be announced later on this week, with prizes ranging from VIP tickets to the launch party to a VVIP tour of the boat for the under-14s.
We’re already starting to think about the next one – what we’d do differently, how much easier it would be with a few more people to help out (food and toilet breaks would have been good), what prizes we’ll offer next time, etc.
Thank you to the University of Bristol Sports Centre for the loan of the rowing machines, and to everyone who came down to Baldwin Street to take part and to chat to us. It was great to meet so many enthusiastic and interested people!
I ran a half marathon yesterday.
It was surprisingly ok, although now I’m hobbling around with a sore right ankle, a sore left knee, and a purple toe.
My goal was simply to get to the finish line, ideally without stopping running. I’ve had a cough and chest infection for the last week, so wasn’t sure what to expect, but in the end I made it to the finish in 2:17:51. Not the fastest time in the world, but one that I’m very happy with for the moment as part of my wider training.
There were a couple of difficult miles towards the end, but otherwise it wasn’t at all the horrible experience that I’d been imagining. Maybe my other training was kicking in. (It can’t have been my running experience, as I’ve never run more than five miles before… should I admit that?)
Onwards and upwards now, towards more difficult and more painful training!
Oh, and look away if you don’t like unsightly pictures (with apologies for the quality):
In other news:
I’m starting my Yachtmaster Offshore Theory course on Friday (one of the compulsory courses for the row) – I’ll update on how it goes throughout the autumn.
I’m back at my desk in Bristol after some adventures in Scotland, gaining more experience of the sea, of boats, and of pushing my boundaries.
I spent some time on a 38ft yacht sailing around the north-west of Scotland with seven other people. It was pretty windy with some nice chunky waves: on our first day out at sea half the crew was seasick. I was one of the lucky ones, although admittedly I did feel queasy at moments, particularly after struggling with all my layers, foul weather gear and lifejacket in the pitching and heaving little toilet down below. As I was repeatedly thrown against the walls while attempting to flush the loo (put the lever to the right and pump everything away, push it over to the left and pump fifteen times to flush, put it back to the right and pump to once again empty everything), I was quietly grateful that I’ll have a nice simple ‘bucket and chuck it’ system when I’m rowing. As long as I don’t ‘chuck it’ into the wind I should be fine!
I did enjoy the wind and the waves though – the sense of being alive out there is very acute. I also found myself wildlife spotting, and was ridiculously excited to recognise a gannet. Reminder to self to take relevant bird and marine life books with me on the row.
Getting some sailing experience was a really useful part of my preparation for the row, and I’m looking on it as important training. My boat will be less than two thirds the length of the yacht, and I will be on her for around three months in a huge variety of unpredictable conditions. I won’t have the comfort of having people around, but nor will I have anyone else to worry about while I’m out there. Much of what I learnt in Scotland will be consolidated on the RYA courses that will be forming part of my training this autumn.
Unfortunately, I had to leave the trip a little earlier than expected, meaning that my booked train tickets were useless; getting home became an extension of the adventure. I was dropped ashore on some rocks, and had to climb up them and over some rough fields before I found anything resembling a road. Although I was less prepared than I’d like to be on finding myself alone in the middle of nowhere, and had no idea how long it would take to get back, I felt a huge surge of freedom and excitement as I struck out on my own to attempt to find a way back. After scrambling, walking, and then climbing a couple of fences, I caught sight of a car and asked for directions to the nearest A-road. The driver very kindly gave me a lift to the next hamlet – her husband was in the process of hiking the coast of Scotland and she was supporting him, so had a little time to spare. From there I had some extraordinary luck with lifts – a couple on their way back from holiday, a Dutch businessman, and two lorry drivers. All of them were really friendly, kind, and interesting to talk to, and I made it back to the centre of Bristol in record time – less than fourteen hours from the very north of Scotland! By the time I got back I was exhausted, having barely stopped on the way down at all, but also strangely exhilarated. I hadn’t really hitched on my own before, and certainly not at night; the whirlwind journey back pushed my boundaries just as much as the bumpy sailing of the preceding days, and stretching those boundaries is half of what I need to do right now.
I’m amassing a huge amount of advice from past ocean rowers and adventurers – some of it taken from books, some from blogs, and much from one-to-one meetings and conversations. One of the biggest pieces of advice I’ve had on how to make sure that my row is a success is to keep pushing my boundaries and keep putting myself in uncomfortable situations. What I go through on the row is sure to be more painful, more extreme, scarier and bigger than anything I have yet faced, but the greater the pool of experience I have to draw on, the greater the reasons to believe in myself when things get difficult.
On that note, I’m running a half-marathon tomorrow. I’m not a runner in any sense, but am also sure that it will give me yet another piece of useful experience to add to the collection! Stay tuned for news of how I do (also for photos from sailing, and exciting news on the soon-to-arrive swanky new website!).
Huge thanks to recent individual sponsors: Oliver Hammond, Catherine Redford, and Lucie Mussett. Every donation is greatly appreciated, and is a step towards the Pacific. J
It’s been a busy couple of weeks, moving quickly from my first ever sighting of an ocean rowing boat to looking at one that I’m considering buying.
New website, promotional video and sponsorship brochure are all on their way, ready for a big sponsorship push in September. Things are feeling exciting and very, very busy.
To get some good photos for sponsorship (and to show that I’m actually training), last week saw me setting a 3.30 am alarm for a dawn photoshoot, joined by the heroic Steve and Guthrie. We took an ergo (indoor rowing machine) around Bristol, stopping at various points to get a good variety of shots. First stop: a floating pontoon, covered in duck poo, that rocked if I rowed too fast. Whilst waiting for sunrise, we took lots of dawn photos, watching the sky get pinker and pinker and the water lighten as night slipped away. Unfortunately, we had miscalculated the precise spot that the sun would be rising from, so ended up missing it, as it was blocked by some big trees.
The next waterfront photo spot was great though, giving us some really lovely, sunny, orangey-tinted pictures. After that we rattled around Bristol, making sure to get some good landmarks behind me as I rowed.
We dropped the ergo back off at the University of Bristol gym (they had kindly lent it to me overnight), and dropped the car back off before 8.30. Then we went home for a second breakfast!
Yesterday Steve and I took another road trip – this time to go and look at a boat in Essex! It felt a bit mad to be going so far, and to be boat-shopping at all, but was also really good to see the boat I’ve been considering taking across the Pacific with me. More news and details to follow if she does become ‘the one’, but in the meantime, here I am checking her out.
Elsa was featured in her home town’s newspaper.
University of Bristol: Three months alone in the ocean as Elsa aims for record-breaking row.
Women Sport Report: Alone in the Pacific-Solo woman to row 2,400 miles from California to Hawaii.
Today I saw an ocean rowing boat for the first time.* I also explored her and lay down inside the cabin.
Having read so many ocean rowing books (recently ‘Rowing it Alone’ by Debra Veal, ‘Sally’s Odd at Sea’ by Sally Kettle, ‘Rowing the Atlantic’ by Roz Savage, and ‘A Dip in the Ocean’ by Sarah Outen), and looking at so many pictures and videos of ocean rowing, I’ve had a good idea of what the boats actually look like. For a while now I’ve been having dreams about being out on the ocean, but in the last few weeks they’ve started to be more detailed in terms of the boat and equipment. Today when I lay down in the cabin of the boat, I didn’t feel at all out of place. I felt like I’d already been there a few nights ago.
It was really nice to find that I loved being on the boat and in the cabin. I’m going to be there for a good three months, alone and with nowhere else to go, so I’ll be getting very familiar with my surroundings. I was really struck by how small she was, even though I already knew what to expect – this is something that I’ve heard other people remark on too. Imagining that little boat out in the middle of a huge ocean is certainly thought-provoking!
A couple of pictures from today:
* Thanks to Inspirational Friends, two lovely women I met today who will be rowing the Atlantic together this winter.
Elsa Hammond 