85 Year Old Rafts Across the Atlantic

From MSNBC:

PHILIPSBURG, St. Maarten — An 85-year-old British sailor who dreamed of crossing the Atlantic on a raft as a young boy has completed the journey in 66 days with three friends.

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The raft, named “An-Tiki” after Thor Heyerdahl’s famous Kon-Tiki raft, was loaded with food including oranges, avocados, potatoes, cabbages and a pumpkin. Once the store-bought bread was consumed, sailing master David Hildred began making it from scratch in a small oven.

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The raft was built with four water supply pipes nearly 40 feet long, and 14 cross pipes.

Seven pipes held the crew’s fresh water supply.

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Halfway across the Atlantic, Smith celebrated his 85th birthday with a chocolate cake that his doctor, Andrew Bainbridge, cooked on board.

Read the whole thing.

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1 Comment

  1. What an awesome adventure this would be! I have dreamed of doing something like this. I’m glad some people actually do these kinds of things, so that we can read about them and enjoy it vicariously.

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