Sir Robin Knox-Johnston racing alone around the world – again

Our good friend and former owner of AURORA, Sir Robin Knox-Johnston, is getting ready to race single handed around the world. He was the first person to sail single handed and non stop around the world in 1969 on his 33 ft wooden ketch Suhaili. His record voyage then was 312 days and is described in Robins excellent book “A world of my own”. Since then Robin has participated in many ocean races, including the Whitbread, and in 1994 co-skippered Enza with Sir Peter Blake to set a new record for circumnavigation.

We first met Robin here in Isafjordur last summer when he arrived on his sailboat ANTIOPE (now AURORA). He then had to abort an attempt to reach Kangerdlugssuaq fjord in Greenland and climb the Cathedral mountain together with his friend and mountaineering legend Sir Chris Bonington because of very thick sea ice. This trip is described on Bonington’s website. This meeting resulted in us buying the yacht and kickstarted the Borea Adventures business.

Sir Robin will compete in the VELUX 5 OCEANS race on his Open 60 racing yacht “Gray Power”. This race which is run by Clipper Ventures, begins on October 22nd and covers 3 gruelling legs from Bilbao (Spain) to Fremantle (Australia) to Norfolk (USA) and back to Bilbao. This time Robin is looking at finishing his race in 112 days.

We will of course be cheering for our man and are confident that he will beat the younger men. Afterall he is only 67 years old..!!

See further info on Clipper Ventures site and in this article from Daily Telegraph.