My First Big Crossing

Croatia, March 2012

The weather is quite nice. Horrific Yugo winds that were delaying us on the Island of Vis for 2 extra nights are over. 

We get up early, make sandwiches, bottle of water with Mg in it, eat a big breakfast and set to cross to the 'neighboring island' Sušac, 40 km away.

The program for the crossing;
 2 hours paddling, 15 min break with a bite of Halva. 2 hours paddling, half an hour break with sandwiches and Mg drink. 2 hours paddling 15 min break and on to the island and around it.

Peter Bray crossed the Atlantic – a 4,800 km journey in 76 day.
Freya Hoffmeister on her 13,790 km journey around Australia, crossed  the Gulf of Carpentaria-575 km in 8 days.

I'm only heading for a 40 km crossing and not alone, but it's my first big crossing and to me it feels quite a challenge.

While getting into the rhythm of paddling my mind wanders. I can see my paddling buddy ahead of me and I know that he is there in case anything goes wrong 

The Island of Vis disappears behind us and Sušac is still out of sight.

In my mind I start comparing big crossings into crossing another sea.

The sea of life. 

We don`t always start our journey seeing the place we are aiming for. Sometimes we think we see, sometimes something else catches our attention and might take us on a detour.  And so we move on, but time itself cannot get us anywhere. It must be us that move ourselves, we must paddle. 

At times, the paddling is more important than the accurate direction.

Sometimes we cross the sea of life alone, sometimes we feel alone although there is someone there for us. But even at times that we feel very much together, it is up to our own strength and not anyone else's.

In the end it's what we choose to do with the time, it's what we do with our minds.

Every now and then we need to check if we are still on target.
Looking back never helps. If anything it takes us off track, out of focus, and gives us a hell of a pain in the neck.