“The Dream”
Was it born or did it evolve?
Unfortunately I do not know exactly where or how the dream started, I know only that in one form or another there was always a desire to see beyond the horizon. That line, where sea met sky, fascinated me from a very early age and I would conjure up my own private pictures of wonderful places beyond. I remember, as a child, just like any other, loving being on the beach beside the sea. I loved the family holidays we had, and yet, the usual child-like games of sandcastles and digging holes to fill with buckets of seawater, soon bored me. I do recall many a private moment, sat or stood, in my own little world, just staring at that magic line. What really was beyond?
Pete’s Magic Line
Strangely enough, in my very early years I had very little to do with boats. It was not until the age of about eight or nine, when my father realized one of his childhood dreams by buying his own boat, that the flame in me was ignited. He bought an old 30ft Gibbs motor cruiser called “Christine”. From that day on I was hooked. Interestingly whilst loving the time we would spend aboard her, it was the other boats where “Christine” was moored that really took my interest. They had masts and sails. My enthusiasm grew and I was fortunate enough to spend many hours, sailing on a 28ft Alan Buchanan yacht with the owner, who would try to satisfy my thirst for knowledge, as he taught me all I could absorb.
In one of the boatyard sheds, lay what I believe might have been the source of “The Dream”. It sat propped in a corner, just waiting to be restored to its original glory. It was an 18ft long keeled – as most boats were in those days – wooden sloop. I would spend hours in that shed, my imagination running riot. No boat of any size sailed more, or further, than little boat did in my mind, always with me at the helm, under blue skies and before a fair wind.
As I went through my early teenage years, I spent as much time as I could with boats, but they were my pastime. The son, of a printer whose job was his life, my future was mapped out. When I finally left school , just as had my brother, I was to follow an apprenticeship directed by my Dad in the printing trade. One day all that was to change.
At the time, I was at a boarding school in Bideford, North Devon, in those days still quite a thriving coastal trade port. This particular day, along with a friend I was invited aboard one of the coastal ships to be shown around. I was fascinated. For two hours I bombarded the crew with questions of what life at sea was like. As I left that ship I knew, my future, no longer lay within the confines of a factory’s walls surrounded by the aroma of printing ink, it was to be out in the open, at sea, but not on coastal trade but Deep Sea.
Sail Training Ship Halcyon
At the age of sixteen I gained a place at the School of Navigation, Southampton. It was part of the University and considered just about the top pre-sea training school, I felt so priveleged to have gained a place there. During the years course, whilst learning the rudiments of navigation, most of all I relished the training we received aboard the various craft from “Hawke”, the 20ft motor launch, through the sailing gigs to “Halcyon”, the School’s sail training ship, a magnificent yacht that still today ploughs the oceans, though in a very different guise. These times were magic and my thirst for experience and knowledge insatiable. I relished the seamanship lessons we had from an elderly Dutch Bosun, for whom I had the greatest respect, as he taught us how to splice ropes and wires, maintain the rigging and generally the trade of a seaman. One incident whilst under his instruction lives with me to this day. Whilst teaching us wire rope splicing he announced, “ I am ‘vasting’ my time. Most of you, before you have served ten years, will let some young dolly bird move your brains from your head to between your legs, and leave the sea”. Not me, I thought Bosun, I’m not giving this up for anyone.
Diomed and Antilochus, two of the numerous ships on which I served
On completing the course at Southampton, I joined Alfred Holt & Co. – The Blue Funnel Line, firstly as an apprentice and later when I had obtained all my Certificates of Competency, I rose through the ranks as 4th, 3rd and finally 2nd Mate. I loved my life at sea and never really imagined any other, until I joined M/V Antilochus. Two days prior to sailing deep sea, a few of us went along to the Dance hall – it wasn’t discos in those days – above Reece’s in Liverpool. Yes Bosun, sadly you were spot on!
Her Majesty’s Cable Ship Monarch
Whilst I like to think Margaret did just a little bit more than cause me an “organ transplant”, sure enough we were married, I left Blue Funnel, tried an interim stage of working aboard Her Majesty’s Cable Ships, before finally walking the beat in Bedford as a rookie Police Constable. For the next ten years of our lives the sea and boats played no part in my life, except the occasional seaside holiday with the kids. Then, one year whilst enjoying such a holiday, we stood on a cliff top near Fowey in Cornwall, watching the boats sailing below us. Suddenly I felt that deep aching desire all over again. “How about us buying a little boat” I said to the family. After serious discussions, a few months later we were the proud owners of “Breakaway” a West Wight Potter at the immense cost of £350.
Breakaway Cloud Nine Venture Free
As the years progressed we moved on to “Cloud Nine” – a leisure 17, “Venture Free” – a Newbridge Venturer, “Wandering Star” – a Nicholson 32 (fulfilling an ambition I had held since the age of 21) and finally our present wonderful boat, the ultimate cruiser “Market Lady” a Vancouver 32.
Wandering Star certainly played an important roll in formation of “The Dream”. Margaret and I had been on a package holiday in Portugal, when we all but bought a small derelict cottage there as a holiday home. At the last moment we thought, ‘Why buy something that is static? If we sold “Venture Free” and our house, we could buy a bigger boat and smaller house, then we could go wherever with our holiday home’.
Although “ Star” was sadly not the boat with which we were to commence our dream, she was such a fantastic sea boat that it was she that gave Margaret the confidence.
Nicholson 32, “Wandering Star”
Having sold “Star”, with much emotion – as stated, it had been a thirty year old wish of Pete’s to one day own a “Nic 32” – the introduction to “The Dream” remarkably started aboard “Free Spirit” where for two and a half years we cruised the English canals. Having sold her in 2003, we bought “Market Lady”, and the rest is history.
The boat to fulfil “The Dream”, A Vancouver 32 “Market Lady”
Has “The Dream” really turned out to be such? For me, beyond any doubt, even more than I dared hope. The reason is quite simple. When we set out I know that Margaret had reservations. I know that it was not so much her “Dream” as mine. The last thing I wanted was Margaret doing something she hated just to keep me happy.
“The Dream” was to cruise the Med and return home after three years. Now, here we are still out there, eight years later and present plans could keep us cruising three or more years at least, probably longer.
Are we likely to cruise further than the Med? I doubt it, Margaret has no desire to cross Oceans. Does this disappoint me? Definitely not. Certainly from time to time the thoughts of Pacific Islands, young topless girls in grass skirts, has a kind of appeal to an “Old Dreamer” who never grew up, but come on, in our travels we have met so many lone sailor,s whose wives would not sail with them, staying at home altogether, or at best, meeting in the next port. I believe a dream is never wholly realized unless you can share the experience with someone special. My meeting Margaret might have changed my life all those years ago, causing me to turn my back on a life I loved, but the woman for whom I gave it all up, has been with me every inch of the way on this dream, most importantly to me, at her own wish.
What could be more rewarding than to really know, that whatever it was in the beginning, now,
“My Dream” is “Our Dream”
where ever it began.
Pete Wheeldon
