We all watched, laughing, as Janette wriggled and struggled, snaking her hips from side to side, as she tried to edge the teeny tiny shorts over her knees. But they refused to budge and stood firm.
‘Mmm,’ said Frances, looking her slowly up and down. ‘This is going to be quite a long trip.’
The next day we said farewell to our families. The tears flowed, the hugs were tight and the goodbyes were painful.
Niki, whose children are the youngest, was perhaps the most upset. It was obvious by her abject silence and the firm grip she had on Gareth’s hand that she was trying extremely hard to keep it together. Her teeth were gritted and the smile on her face was tight to the point of rictus.
‘If I speak, I will cry,’ she said very quietly to her husband as they slowly walked towards the ferry.
Aiden and Corby were also none too keen to leave. They’d loved the boats and the sunshine, and spending Christmas without their mum was going to be hard. Christmas really was their thing. Their magic time of year. Niki was queen of Christmas and now she wasn’t going to be there. ‘Bye, Mum. See you after Christmas. Good luck,’ they said, hugging Niki as tightly as they could. Having kept it together over breakfast and smiling as brightly as she could all the way to the ferry, this proved too much for Niki. The tears started to roll. Try as she might, she could not stop them.
‘It won’t be long,’ Gareth whispered in her ear. ‘We’ll be thinking of you all the time. And just think of how it will feel in Antigua. We’ll be waiting for you.’
They hugged one last time before they boarded the ferry. Niki waved cheerfully as the tears poured down her cheeks.
Meanwhile, Helen was desperately trying to be bright and jolly, endlessly talking extremely quickly about anything at all other than the row, and trying to say positive things to Henry and Lucy.
‘Don’t forget your GCSEs,’ she said to Lucy. ‘Keep working hard. It’s only seven months to go. They’ll fly by. You can do it. You can nail them, smash them… And you –’ She turned to Henry. ‘You can enjoy school and make me proud. I am already proud… even more proud… if it’s possible to be prouder…’
And with one final kiss to Richard and the children, Helen wished them all a Happy Christmas as she waved them onto the boat.
Frances’s boys were much less keen on making a fuss. After some strong, brave hugging, she simply kissed Jay, Jack and Mark and waved them goodbye as everyone boarded the ferry back to Tenerife.
It was an odd feeling as our families left. The sadness was balanced by fear and the excitement of what was about to happen. All the waiting, the focus and the hard work was about to come to fruition and we were ready to go. We wanted to get out there and get on with it. It was then, when we got back to the marina, that we discovered the race had been cancelled. Not cancelled as such, but delayed, and delayed by a whole five days. It was a huge shock, but there was nothing to be done. The southerly winds were too strong – they’d blow us all back into the Canaries, or worse, and we wouldn’t stand a chance of getting to Antigua no matter how hard we rowed. The harbour master and the race officials were adamant we would have to wait for a better weather window before they would allow us to leave. We might have been desperate to get going, but the ocean clearly had other plans.
Most of the crews took it quite well – nearly every other race before us had suffered some sort of delay, so it was not unexpected. Except we, of course, had not quite thought that possibility through and found ourselves turfed out of our ‘deluxe’ Spanish apartment with only a plastic bag of toothpaste and pants to our name. Fortunately, Janette had a plan. As her family was staying on a little longer, she’d managed to find a hotel up the hill. The Parador – a five-star, no less – where they viewed us with deep suspicion as we shuffled into their smart reception area, wearing nothing but our rowing vests and black Lycra shorts, swinging our carrier bags.
The delay sadly meant that Janette had to say goodbye to her family too before the start of the race. They had their flights booked to leave on Tuesday after we were supposed to have set off. There was talk of Ben, Safiya and James staying on, but in the end it was decided that they, too, should leave. The start was currently five days delayed, but it could change. There was no point in them waiting in limbo, especially this close to Christmas. So they said their goodbyes, with Janette keeping it as light as possible.
‘Good luck, Mum,’ said Safiya, with a wave.
‘Watch out for the sharks!’ joked James. Janette hates sharks, so much so that she almost never swims on holiday.
‘No! I’m not setting foot in that ocean!’
‘Don’t take too long,’ smiled Ben.
‘I won’t!’ laughed Janette.
‘Row hard and you’ll get there sooner!’ he suggested.
‘Never thought of that!’ quipped Janette.
‘Bye!’ they waved.
‘Bye!’ she waved.
Janette carried on smiling and waving as they boarded the ferry, before walking around the corner and collapsing against the wall of the ticket office, where she promptly burst into tears.
So now we were alone. Just us and Rose. Occasionally a giant cruise ship would dock in the harbour and we’d hear people shouting.
‘Look, that’s them! The Yorkshire Rows. There they are. With their tiny little boat.’
It seems our little stint on the telly with James Cracknell had been a bit of a hit back home.
‘Good luck!’ they’d yell, waving at us. ‘We’re thinking of you!’
It was wonderful to think that we had some support out there. We were, after all, trying to raise money for charity, so any interest we gained along the way was incredibly helpful. But it was an odd time, sitting around and making jobs for ourselves, waiting to hear when we were going to set off.
So the arrival of Wayne and Tracy was a welcome relief. Close friends of Janette’s, they had been on a trip of a lifetime to go and see the Northern Lights in Iceland for the past 10 days. They had never flown before and were first-time owners of a passport. They had been gutted not to be able to see Janette off in the first place, as they were away. However, having read about the delayed start to the race, they decided to change planes in London (they were clearly ‘liking the flying thing’) and come to La Gomera. None of us believed they would make it until we saw Tracy tottering down the pontoon towards us, waving frantically, still wearing her Northern Lights outfit.
‘Yoo-hoo!’ she yelled, picking her way past the boats in her fur boots and heavy jacket, with lots of blonde hair. ‘Here we are!’ She was followed by Wayne, who, a few years younger than Tracy, was also dressed for the frozen wastes of Iceland. ‘We’re here!’ he grinned. ‘We had to come and see you off!’
And they did. Come race day they were the ones waving and shouting goodbye as we slowly edged our way out of the port.
SHIP’S LOG:
‘Prepare and prepare again. Whatever you do in life, throw yourself into it, learn everything you can and be ready for the ride of your life. Believe in yourself and believe in the special people around you, because they believe in you.’
(JANETTE/SKIPPER)
‘The sky is not my limit … I am.’
T. F. HODGE
20 December 2015, San Sebastián Marina, La Gomera
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