Seefalke is a long-ended 1930s classic, built to the old 50 Square Metre rule for the Luftwaffe by Abeking & Rasmussen, one of the finest yards of the golden age of yachting. In 1945 she and a number of her sisters were famously ‘liberated’ from their home berths in Kiel by the British armed forces and sailed back to the UK for training.
Their subsequent history is varied and colourful, but none can beat Seefalke for sheer derring-do. Bought in a parlous state by Lynn Roach, a young Welshman from Barry, she was restored and prepared for a single-handed transatlantic voyage in 1995, still without an engine.
Lynn’s book Living in the Lap of the Gods is such a cover-to-cover page-turner that it was hard to choose a section to share. But here we join Lynn and Seefalke approaching the Chesapeake Bay in November. He has just suffered a shocker of a storm which rolled him twice, dismasted him and left him pumping for his life. Any of us would go big on the drama, but not Lynn. This time-served toolmaker seems to take whatever the ocean tosses his way in his easy stride.
I was blessed with light winds, a flat sea, and the sun was out. This was a good day
