CHAPTER 9
The North Sea
‘Nothing is impossible: the word itself says “I’m possible”.’
AUDREY HEPBURN
After Christmas, Frances handed in her notice at work.
Her Groundhog Day life had proved too much. ‘It was time,’ she said. ‘It actually got so bad at work that I just wanted a change.’ So instead of staying where she was and putting up with it, fearful of starting from scratch and worried that she would never find any clients, she and a few like-minded friends left and set up a new company on their own. ‘It felt as if I was on a treadmill, and I needed to break that.’
But setting up on her own only a year before the row was a huge gamble for Frances. ‘I have always had a really independent streak. I am not scared easily. Maybe it’s because my mother died when I was young, but I have always looked after myself; I have never been financially dependent on anyone. All the way through I have always earned enough so that if Mark ever left me or if he died, I would be okay. It is really important to me that I am self-sufficient. I have a lot of respect for Mark, giving up his job to look after our family, because I could not do it. I am dependent on him emotionally, but I just could not be financially.’
So she took the plunge along with her friends and colleagues Suzie, Martin and Simon. They set up Progeny Private Law in Leeds, a law firm specialising in private client work. And she crossed her fingers and hoped her self-confidence was not misplaced. ‘Maybe I’d drunk too much Yorkshire Rows Kool-Aid.’
She did, however, have a back-up plan. ‘I had been saving £150 a month into a bank account for the past five years – it was sort of my running-away money, although I had no intention of actually running away! So I thought if I only got paid half my wages while I was away rowing, then at least we had something we could dip into to help us out. Or, if all else failed, I had a tiny bit put away.’
Helen was also squirrelling away as much cash as she could to cover her leave of absence. She opened a ‘Rowing’ account and upped her hours at the NHS, working every day that was available. ‘Obviously I wasn’t going to get paid while I was away, so for that year I had no holiday whatsoever, and I agreed with work that I could basically work through the whole year, not take any holiday and then take it all when I left in November. It meant that I’d only lose maybe two months’ salary. Everyone else went on holiday, all three of them, to France and stayed with some friends of ours while I stayed at home, working. I just didn’t take any time off at all. Then, at the end of November, I was left with about eight weeks’ holiday. I told work that I would work all the extra time they had, and they said, “That’s fine, but if it becomes a health and safety problem then you have to stop.” They made me take two days off in the whole year. I’d be sitting at my desk and pretending not to yawn, going, “I feel so fine!” I worked solidly for 12 months.’
It’s no wonder, then, that Helen fell asleep in the middle of the Royal Yachting Association’s first aid course at the Railway Institute in York. One minute she was staring into space and the next her forehead was firmly planted on the desk and she was snuffling away very gently.
Although at the Survival at Sea course a few weeks later, it wasn’t quite so easy to slack off…
It was 8.30 a.m. on a cold February morning when we arrived at HOTA, a specialist training facility on an industrial estate in Hull – as Helen quipped, ironically,: ‘UK City of Culture 2017.’
At first we couldn’t find the room, so we ended up walking late into the classroom, to be met by rows of male faces. They varied in age, height and girth, but there was a heavy preponderance of tattoos. Some were bald, others were less follicly challenged, but they all stared at us as we walked in, as if to say, ‘You lot are in the wrong classroom.’ We sat down as quietly as we could and the teacher, another ex-Marine, started by going round the class, asking how many years’ experience we’d all had at sea, and when was the last time we’d done a Survival at Sea course.
The first to answer was a bald bloke at the front who’d been a rigger for 20 years. He’d done the course every three or four years, and didn’t know why on earth he had to be back here again. Then there was a bloke who worked on the ferries, and was only coming to tick a box so he could get back to work. And so it carried on around the room. Each of them saltier than a seadog, and each of them equally surly and only there begrudgingly. And then it came to us. Janette was first up.
‘So?’ asked the ex-Marine, sounding more than a little bored. ‘How much sea experience have you got?’
‘None,’ replied Janette.
‘Okay…’ He looked puzzled, and the whole room turned around to look at us again. ‘Why are you doing the course?’
‘Because we are rowing an ocean and we need to have the certificate,’ she mumbled.
‘You’re what?’
‘We’re rowing an ocean…’
‘You’re doing what?’ He looked at each of us in turn as if he had not seen a more deluded group of females in his life.
‘We are rowing the Atlantic and we need to get this certificate to be able to do it.’
‘Seriously?’ he asked.
‘Have you ever been to sea, love?’ piped up the rigger at the front. Everyone laughed.
‘Yeah, yeah,’ said Janette. ‘I have been out on a boat.’ Everyone laughed again.
‘It’s a rough old sea, you know, the Atlantic,’ he continued.
‘We’ve been practising a lot on the river,’ retorted Niki, much to the amusement of everyone.
The first part of the morning was not that useful for a team on an Atlantic crossing. There was a lot of explaining about muster points, and how to call people to a muster station, which of course we had no idea about, and which the ferry boys could answer in their sleep. We went on to learn about seasickness and the rules of engagement on the sea – who gives way to whom. Eventually there was a break for coffee and some less than enticing biscuits, during which time we were approached by about five or six blokes, checking that our story was true and not just a ruse to cover the fact that we were chambermaids on cruise ships or something much less auspicious.
‘You’re really brave,’ said one bloke, chewing a Rich Tea.
‘I can’t believe you’re doing it,’ added another.
‘You’re fucking mad,’ said a third.
There was a lot of swearing that day. They were a group who seemed to specialise in fruity language, which only got worse when we had to throw ourselves into a giant cold tank of water.
We spent the best part of the afternoon simulating various crises at sea. The first step was to practise getting on the sea survival suits, which sounds a lot easier than it actually was. Yellow and made of heavy rubber-coated material, they are loaded with zips and clips and are nigh-on impossible to slip into in a panic. And then we had to jump into the ‘sea’, just as someone switched off the lights.
Janette is not very keen on deep water, especially if it’s a freezing cold tank being stirred up by a spirited wave machine. So she held her nose as she leapt in, only to be barked at by the instructor who said she’d held her nose incorrectly. But Janette didn’t care; she was more worried about actually drowning. ‘It was really hard work, treading water in a heavy suit, while they chucked water at you in the dark. I couldn’t get my breath. I thought, “I am not going to get through this.”’
Once we were all in the water, we had to inflate the life raft, flip it over and form a human chain to get everyone into the boat. There were about 15 of us all bobbing around in the water, being sprayed in the face, shouting at each other, while trying to haul one another into the boat. ‘Some of the bigger blokes were finding it hard to cope,’ said Janette. ‘They were really struggling. They were wearing all this gear and I guessed some of them possibly hadn’t done any exercise since the last time they were on the course! It is very hard work trying to get into a life raft when you’ve got a bit of a gut and your shoes are full of water!’
A
lthough Niki and Frances seemed to love the whole experience, as we all stood huffing and puffing and drenched by the side of the tank, attempting to take off the sodden wet-weather gear, Frances had a suggestion.
‘I think they should do this for children’s parties. It would be a great laugh.’
Fortunately, the rigger standing next to her couldn’t deck her; he only had enough breath left in him for a wheezy, stifled laugh.
Come 6 p.m. we all had our certificates as we staggered out of the building. An afternoon of jumping in and out of a tank and trying to scramble onto a raft was absolutely shattering. Judging by the way we collapsed into the car to drive back to York, we all needed to do some serious fitness training. Clearly, the weekly CrossFit classes that we were attending were not cutting it.
And we still had so much more money to raise. We were desperate to increase our profile, so we were thrilled when Helen managed to get a small amount of publicity on BBC Radio York. Naturally we were introduced to the listening public to the tune of ‘Rock the Boat’, but we were just pleased to be there. Jonathan Cowap, the presenter of the show, was charming and asked Frances and Janette loads of questions, and all we could think, as they laughed and chattered their way through the interview, was: ‘We’ve put it out there now. We are going to have to row this ocean. There is no way we’re getting out of it now.’
Apart from money, of course, what we also desperately needed was some ocean-rowing experience. It is all very well pootling up and down to Poppleton on a Saturday and being blown across Hornsea Mere once a week, but what we really needed was to get Rose out on the sea, put her through her paces and work out exactly what we didn’t know.
So when Charlie invited us back down to Burnham-on-Crouch, to what was grandly titled the European Off-shore Ocean Rowing Series, we leapt at the chance. We packed up Rose, our Lycra onesies and our overnight bags and headed back down to the familiar salubrious pub on the quay. Helen and Frances, being the pyjama-wearing silent sleepers, checked in together, opposite Janette and Niki, the naked snorers, and Niki set up her laser security system before we headed off out for dinner at the Yacht Club, where Charlie had gathered together all the teams who were going to be racing the next day.
Walking in, a glass of warm white wine in hand, we recognised some of the rowers from the Rannoch open day where we’d ingratiated ourselves by cleaning up in the raffle. But there were others who’d come from much further afield. Team Beyond – Philip and Daley – had flown in from America, and Greg Maud, an adventurer (who we later found out could nail the theme from Frozen) had come all the way from South Africa. Charlie’s nephew, Angus, was competing as part of Ocean Reunion (with an as-yet undiscovered fondness for peanut butter served in a bag) along with a group of old friends – Joe, Jack and Gus – all from Uppingham School. But the beefiest, butchest specimens by far were a group of five, who included Jason Fox, an ex-SAS Marine who was then on the Channel 4 TV show SAS. They were called Team Essence. Essence of pure testosterone. They towered over us and were rippling with muscles. It was hard to believe that we could possibly be in the same race. (Amazingly, we were to meet all of these teams again in La Gomera, except Team Essence who were not allowed to enter the Talisker Challenge as they were not a quad but a group of five.)
The following day, everyone crammed into Charlie’s office to listen to him explain the rules of the three different races.
This first race was short, like an obstacle course, round and round the harbour where you had to hit various buoys and waypoints in a certain order to win. It would be a test of the agility and handling of the boat. Having had very little experience with Rose in open water, we didn’t fancy ourselves for that one. Or indeed for any of the other two races, which were a three- to four-hour row around a buoy and back, and a much longer eight-hour push the following day.
On the first race, the obstacle course, we all refused to be at the helm. We had all had a go the last time we were on the estuary and none of us had acquitted ourselves with any sort of aplomb. The least awful of all of us was Janette but she was loath to do it, as she really wanted to row. But needs must and there was no one else, and no choice. ‘Them three were bloody useless,’ said Janette. ‘I wasn’t great, but at least I had a feel for the wind and the waves, so I ended up doing the steering for the whole bloody weekend.’
With Janette at the helm, we headed off, determined to prove ourselves against such stiff competition. But sadly it was not to be. Despite a whole supermarket shelf of fizzy water stashed in the bottom of the boat, we were still blown about on the waves like some sort of rogue inflatable. If we weren’t bumping into other boats, we were colliding with buoys. There was one moment towards the end of the race when Janette was actually convinced a buoy was moving.
‘It’s coming towards us!’ she yelled. ‘Why isn’t it chained to something? What’s happening? It’s actually moving!’
Of course, we were the ones moving, and eventually we crashed slap bang into the thing. But there was not very much we could do; the wind was up and Janette had not yet worked out how to handle the boat.
The second race thankfully required a little more rowing and a little less steering, although there was a certain amount of orienteering required. This was the three- to four-hour row up the estuary, around one buoy and back again. The first leg of the journey was difficult as it was against the tide and we really had to push ourselves to get anywhere, but after the morning’s debacle, we were keen to show that we weren’t just a bunch of housewives playing around on the water. Janette found the right buoy using her splendid map-reading skills and by the time we turned, we were not very far behind the rest of the other crews. However, on the way back something happened. Perhaps it was because Janette had finally worked out how to steer the boat. Or perhaps we got lucky riding the current, or maybe we just read the waves better. Or maybe it was because, in comparison to all the others, we could actually row. Two years of pootling to Poppleton may not make you the strongest rowers in the world, but it certainly gives you some technique. And we had enough technique to get past Team Beyond, the two American boys. Even more amazingly, Team Essence were still behind us. If we turned and looked over our shoulders we could see their huge burly frames pumping away on the oars. We were getting really excited. Janette was giving us a running commentary.
‘Come on, girls,’ she urged.
Suddenly we realised, ‘Bloody hell, we could smash this race.’ So Janette took up her Queen Boadicea position and started loudly encouraging us to row harder.
‘Come on, girls! We’ve got a chance! Give it all you’ve got! Give me 20 hard strokes – one, two, three…’
We mustered up every ounce of energy we had and rowed like we had never rowed before. We edged closer and closer. We could hear Team Essence huffing and puffing and straining at the oars.
‘Come on!’ yelled Janette. ‘One last effort!’
Every muscle was burning, our thighs were screaming, our hands were yelling, our lungs were on fire. We closed in and, as we edged past, we saw their exhausted, furious faces as they were suddenly left bouncing around in our wake! We’d done it! We’d got them. We could see the finish line. All we needed now was for Janette to get the boat swiftly around the last buoy, which she managed with grace and aplomb. Unbelievable! We’d done it! We’d won!
Well, it felt like we had as we collapsed, exhausted and panting, over our oars. In fact, we’d come second after Ocean Reunion, which was not bad, considering Angus not only helps his uncle build all the Rannoch boats, but also spends a lot of his time on this particular stretch of water. Second! Second! A group of middle-aged mums from Yorkshire! We were quietly, not-showing-it, tickled right-bright pink. We were not so useless after all!
And the reaction of Team Essence made our small victory even more pleasurable.
‘Well done, boys!’ exclaimed Niki as they rowed in to finish a few minutes later.
Her tone sounded a lot more patronising than she intended. An
d they were livid. They moored up, got off their boat, marched straight to their cars and, slamming their doors, drove off. They didn’t speak to anyone or make eye contact, and were only seen again when they turned up the next morning, teeth firmly gritted, focused on winning the next race.
It was a tough one – an eight-hour row into the North Sea and back. We were feeling pretty confident when we set out. Could we make them eat our wake for a second time? Perhaps that was too much to ask for. We matched them on the way out – not stroke for stroke, but not far off. However, the return trip was not so good. The water was choppy and Helen announced that she felt a little sick.
‘What, seasick?’ asked Niki, sliding back and forth in her seat. ‘D’you get carsick?’ Helen shook her head.
‘Seasick?’ repeated Janette from the helm. ‘That’s not very helpful when you’re planning to row an ocean.’
‘I’ll be fine,’ said Helen, with a firm nod.
‘I bloody hope so,’ said Janette, exuding little sympathy. ‘We can’t afford to carry dead weight.’
Not that we could ever really have caught the SAS boys again. We were rowing against the current, which is like trying to haul a giant spoon through treacle, and they were simply much stronger than us. In the end, they hammered us, frankly, which seemed to make their day and go some way to repairing their battered pride. But we didn’t mind; we’d had a fantastic couple of days and we’d had a laugh, taken our girl out on the water and hadn’t come last. In fact, we’d done okay.
‘D’you fancy rowing the North Sea? I’m organising some off-shore training races for this year’s transatlantic crews,’ Charlie asked as we were packing up Rose, preparing for the long, slow drive back up to York. We all stopped what we were doing.
‘The North Sea?’ asked Frances.
‘It would be good training for the Atlantic,’ he suggested.
‘It’ll be cold,’ said Helen.
‘You’d be the first women to do it…’
Four Mums in a Boat Page 12