Around Europe without money:
Sailing almost around Europe with a homemade kayak catamaran – and with even a rule to have any money: This is Andreas Gabriel’s object. The man from Tönning will put to sea at the end of april 2011* at Tönning and struggle along the North sea, Rhine, Main and Danube on to the Black Sea (plans to go through the Baltic Sea, Vistula, Bug and Dnepr had to be canceled. The reason: non visa for Russia). From the Black Sea he passes through the Bosporus and the Dardanelles into the Mediterranean to Greece and via the Adriatic Sea to Italy. There, he sails up the coast to France and Spain, where a trip is planned across to Mallorca. Back on the mainland, he passes the Straits of Gibraltar, the Portuguese coast and the Bay of Biscay, reaches France to pass
Aquapac Gabriel Sponsoring the English Channel along Belgium and the Netherlands towards the home port of Tönning. Andreas will have sailed 15,000 km when he reaches home. How long it’s going to take? He does not know yet, “If everything else fails I’ll winter somewhere in Greece and return in 2012.”
“Will I get so much sympathy, kindness, self-esteem and confidence as experienced in 2008?” the adventurer who then “sailed” from Skagen to Marseille on a self-designed sailing bike, wonders.
Andreas Gabriel has also designed the now used catamaran himself and built it since the spring of 2010 with his own hands. There are no templates for many of the technical details. They had to be self-designed and implemented by him: For example how to connect two kayaks so precisely and accurately to one another that they run exactly parallel, or, how the mast and sails are anchored stable and firm.
In October, he launched his boat for the first time to water. With success: The maiden voyage went smoothly. The winter months of 2010/2011 will be used to hone final details of the boat and its route. Andreas Gabriel: “I will start as soon as the weather allows it in 2011.”
Aquapac Andreas Gabriel
The emotions:
“Will I eat a real Italian pizza for the first time? Will the Spanish galleys finish me off? Or will I withstand the Bay of Biscay, where so many sailors failed before me? This is only a small part of the questions that haunt me.” And Andreas Gabriel adds: “But there is one thing that these thoughts are unable to damage: The image of me returning safely to my home port Tönning.” Whether he’s afraid? He does not know: “Rather respect. It’s more like a feeling in my stomach like before a math test for which you have not learned.”
The Sponsor:
Aquapac will sponsor Andreas Gabriel. The waterproof bags will ensure that his electronic devices such as GPS, mobile phone or radio as well as maps and parts of his personal equipment are protected from water, wind and waves, from sand and dust.
In any case, we keep our fingers crossed!
His website http://www.der-mit-dem-wind-faehrt.de/. Ha scritto anche un libro sulla sua impresa.