Learning to navigate
Bernard Moitessier was born on April 10, 1925 in Hanoi in Indochina, now Vietnam. He discovered sailing during his summer vacations in the Gulf of Siam, having fun on board dugout canoes with his brothers, sailing on board the Cerf Volant, his father's sailing boat. He also discovered life in contact with nature, sharing the daily life of the village fishermen. The latter initiate him to navigation without instruments.
In 1951, he embarked with Pierre Deshumeurs on a junk named Snark, in tribute to Jack London. He had little experience at the time and intended to learn during the voyage. Intended to reach Australia, the two companions spent their time pumping out the water that kept filling the boat. Forced to turn back in Indonesia, they returned to Indochina.
Bernard Moitessier bought a new junk - Marie Thérèse - and left Indochina on board to initially reach Madagascar. On board, his only instruments were a sextant and a compass. He was shipwrecked in the Chagos Islands, south of India, and was repatriated to Mauritius where he remained for 3 years.
He had many jobs - lecturer, fisherman, charcoal maker - before building a new wooden boat, Maria Theresa II.
In 1995, the sailor left Mauritius for South Africa. Until 1958, he sailed from island to island and gained experience during his various stopovers, which led him to the West Indies. While at sea, too tired to fight sleep, he was shipwrecked on the island of Saint Vincent.
Joshua's Construction
He returned to Paris in 1958, penniless, and wrote his first book, narrating his sea adventures, "Vagabond des Mers" which he published in 1960. The sales of his story allowed him to launch the construction of a new sailing boat. This one will be a steel ketch, the mythical Joshua The sailor chose the name in honor of Joshua Slocum, author of the first solo round-the-world race.
He also met Françoise Terras-Jung, a family friend, whom he married in 1961. At the same time, Bernard Moitessier had his red-hulled sailing boat built and launched in April 1962. For a year, the navigator took on board trainees discovering sailing.
The couple left the port of Marseille in 1963, heading for Polynesia, with stopovers in the Canary Islands, the West Indies and then the Galapagos Islands via the Panama Canal. In total, the voyage lasted 126 days and gave rise to a new book "Cape Horn under sail" which they borrowed on their return journey.
A world tour that will never end
Two years later, Bernard Moitessier embarked on the Golden Globe, a solo round-the-world voyage through the three capes, without assistance and without stopovers. He left Plymouth on August 22, 1968 and was quickly won over by the freedom of being at sea aboard Joshua. As he was announced as the future winner of the race, the navigator who had just rounded the Cape of Good Hope for the second time sent the following message:
"I continue nonstop to the Pacific Islands because I am happy at sea and perhaps also to save my soul." This sentence will remain engraved in all memories.
He then continued his "long route", crossed the Indian Ocean again, passed Cape Leeuwin a second time before reaching Tahiti on June 21, 1969, after 10 months without setting foot on land.
This adventure will give rise to a new mythical book " The Long Road "published in 1971, which will rock generations of sailors.
A new sailboat and a return to France
In Tahiti, he met Ileana Draghici, who gave him a son in 1971. After several years spent on the island, he decided to rearm Joshua and went back to New Zealand, then to Israel, before settling in 1975 with his family on the atoll of Ahé.
In 1980, the couple moved to California, where Joshua was the victim of a hurricane in 1982, on the Mexican coast. The boat will be restored and given to young people. It was then bought in 1990 by the Musée de la Marine in La Rochelle.
The sailor built his last boat in the United States, the Tamata, a steel cutter launched in 1983, on board which he first sailed to Hawaii and then to Tahiti, where he lived for several years. Diagnosed with prostate cancer, the sailor returned to the suburbs of Paris and moved in with his new partner. He returned from time to time on board Tamata to sail between the atolls. In 1993, after 8 years of difficult writing, he published Tamata et l'alliance.
Bernard Moitessier's life ended on June 16, 1994, as a result of cancer. He rests since then in Le Bono.
