A SENSE OF PERSPECTIVE

SELLING UP AND SAILING FROM SCANDINAVIA TO THE BIG APPLE WAS A GAMBLE WORTH TAKING FOR CARSTEN AND VINNI BREUNING

Carsten and Vinni Breuning are a modern cruising couple. Like many who make the leap – and the many more who aspire to – they went to sea in retirement from a busy life. Carsten walked away from his work as CEO of companies in Denmark and the Netherlands while Vinni, seven years his junior and a trained nurse, gave up her job running the Danish regional hospitals in Zeeland. Their cruising experience was limited and neither of them had made a passage of significant length, but they bought Capri, a Jeanneau Sun Fast 40, and fitted her out for the ocean. They couldn’t know for sure they were going to like it, yet they sold their home and committed to the adventure of a circumnavigation.

The book they have co-written about the first part of this trip is Capri, Sailing Distant Seas. It takes the reader with commendable frankness from the dream back in Scandinavia to the Pacific end of the Panama Canal via the British Isles, an ARC+ rally, and a serious foray up the American coast as far as New York. Carsten grew up in Canada and his goal was to cruise there for the summer, but they learned rapidly that all plans at sea must flex with the times.

They’re the sort of people you wish to meet in a far-off anchorage and their book is a delight to read. For this extract I’ve not chosen an account of storm and tempest, but the last chapter in which the couple evaluate their experience so far and offer some honest answers.

As we come out of the canal, we have sailed almost 15,000 miles and lived as boat bums for two years. We’ve given up our careers, sold our house and belongings and sailed away from our families and friends. We’re a long way from the comfortable and secure life we had in Denmark. It is time to reflect on what we’ve done.