Ocracoke in the Winter; Greenland in the Spring!
A few days ago I happened to be down at the dock fitting new mast hoops on the Wilma Lee when I looked out through the ditch and saw a rather unusual sight. A salty looking, ocean-going sailboat was motoring in from across the sound. Had it been mid-summer or even mid-April I wouldn't have given it a second thought, but mid-January?! I realized right away that whoever was aboard that vessel would have a story worthy of “The Shipping News” – my long overdue contribution to the Current and, while I was too tied up with my project to drop everything and seek them out, I decided to keep a weather eye out.
Then, sure enough, as I was tooling through town on my golf cart this afternoon, there they were. This time of year they weren't hard to pick out of the crowd. I'd already seen the island's other two non-residents earlier in the day and the young couple I saw strolling through town not only had serious looking cameras but the distinct “rolling gait” of seasoned sailors. All three of us laughed when I greeted them with the question whose answer was so blatantly obvious: “Are y'all off the sailboat?”
Introductions were made and they kindly agreed to give me time to finish my errand, grab note pad and camera, and sit down later for an interview. When I finally tracked them down again, they were walking past Books to be Red so we sat down on Leslie's back steps and proceeded.
When I tell you the name of the captain and of his boat some will think I'm making this up: Capt. Drake Roberts. Both first and last names invoke ancient sea rovers (c'mon, even the scurviest lubbers have heard of Sir Francis or Black Bart or the Dread Pirate Roberts!). His boat is the Paragon but he'd never heard of the locally famous 1830's Ocracoke schooner by that name – the one Capt. Horatio Williams managed to keep out of the Civil War by sinking in the Roanoke River. His smiling first mate is Monique Davis. (Probably fewer readers will be reminded of Howell Davis, a piratical contemporary of Bartholomew Roberts.)
A native of Boston, Drake has been living aboard sailboats since 1999. He found the Paragon, his 1976 Westsail 42', in Oriental, NC six years ago and is very happy with her. He's sailed her as far north as Nova Scotia and as far south as Venezuela with stops in Bermuda and various other island ports.
Between his various long cruises, he's tended to use Oriental as a home base, bringing the boat back there for occasional modifications and repairs. It was in fact from there that he and Monique sailed most recently to Ocracoke. She had never been here and they're planning to use this as a departure point come the Ides of March when they plan to pass through Oregon Inlet, head north to NYC, Newport, Boston, Halifax and Newfoundland on their way to Greenland, Iceland and finally to Kinsale, Ireland which is as far as they've planned their itinerary at this point. They're even more precise than this sounds: f'rinstance they plan to spend 3 days here on that cruise, two weeks in New York, 30 days cruising the coasts of Greenland and exactly 19 days in Iceland.
Drake met Monique in St. Maarten in the spring of 2010. Prior to that, he'd done a good bit of single handing. He told me about a particular adventure he had in 2009 when he was single handing the Paragon to from New York to Bermuda. After riding out a 3-day noreaster, he picked up a distress call on the VHF radio from a 51' steel sailing vessel which had sustained rudder damage in the gale and lost use of its engine. By the time Drake reached them, they had been adrift for 36 hours. He towed them for 150 miles toward Bermuda. Then, with only 20 miles to go, they encountered contrary winds and rough seas which somehow caused the two vessels to collide, resulting in damage to both. He was then able to arrange for a 150' vessel to take over the rescue after which he proceeded to Bermuda where he slept for 3 days.
If you'd like to learn more about this harrowing tale you can. It turns out Drake makes videos of just about everything he does and posts them on youtube. In fact that's how he finances his lifestyle – selling ads on his site. Check it out: www.youtube.com/drakeparagon.
It was a pleasure chatting with this fascinating couple and I look forward to seeing them again when they return to Ocracoke in mid-March. By then I should be about due for a new installment on this “try-weekly” column. Stay tuned!
