In the shelter of the southern tip of the Dominican Republic, Anne Le Chantoux serves as Mate on board the Race for Water vessel. She takes the advantages of the stop to share her impressions of the trip, and the many “firsts” that she’s experienced during the initial phase of Race for Water’s world tour.
The Race for Water Odyssey is a major first for me. I’ve been serving as Mate on this incredible ship since April 9. Race for Water represents different things to different people: to some, it’s a technological challenge; to others, it’s an ecological imperative. To me, it’s a personal challenge; before I joined Race for Water, I had never spent more than one night at sea.
Today, the submarine base in Lorient, France where we began the Odyssey feels very far away. All the miles we’ve sailed, the people we’ve met, the things I’ve learned about how to handle the boat, all the adventures we’ve had. So many things have happened that I barely know where to start. Some parts of the trip seem just plain boring, like all the customs procedures at the beginning and end of each stopover. They literally take hours that we could be spending on other things. But other parts of the trip are incredible, like talking to the kids who visit Race for Water, or meeting Michel Betancourt, our auto rickshaw driver in Cuba.
Every stopover is an adventure, and we try to experience it fully and intensely. There’s no time to just hang out; our schedule is crazy, with every crew member learning to do things “outside the job description,” and taking on new roles. My title is Mate, but I’ve also become a cook, scientist, interpreter, and more. On board, there are no high-status or low-status jobs.
Unfortunately, the only constant between all of the stopovers is plastics pollution; we see it wherever we go. While it was more apparent in Cuba than in Bermuda, it’s always there. It makes me sad to see all of this pollution that inevitably ends up in the oceans.
We are waiting to get back on the road to the Dominican Republic, and now I’ve started wondering what that stopover has in store for us?”
Anne