Laura Dekker departs Wed, Aug 4, 09:00
Laura Dekker posted this yesterday:
It’s so great that I can officially set sail and that will be on Wednesday, August 4 at 9:00 AM. Finally I sail away at sea, in the company of my father for the trip to Portugal.
The date of departure from Portugal is not yet known. But I will keep you informed. On the picture you can see my schoolbooks that are all ready for my journey.
Laura.
Abby Sunderland had posted this a few days earlier:
The main reason for this blog today is Laura Dekker. Most of you have probably heard about the young 14 year old Dutch girl that wanted to sail around the world alone. She’s been through a lot lately with the Dutch courts keeping her from going. I heard this morning that they are now allowing her to go.
I admire Laura’s spirit – it would be hard not to for anyone who has followed her story. I’d just like to wish Laura the best of luck and a word of advice from a sixteen year old sailor(though I doubt she needs it) have fun! Live life the best you can. There’s no time like now so take all the opportunities you get.
Abby
I sent Jessica Watson’s team this today:
I have followed and posted many times on Jessica since the beginning and have always supported her, even to the staged entry to the harbour.
Now there is a danger that she is going to lose kudos with the public over her ungracious reaction to Laura Dekker. Surprised that Abby Sunderland specially posted in support of Ms Dekker but Jessica only said [and only when specifically asked] that she didn’t know the girl.
That’s doubly bad because Laura’s site has always praised Jessica and runs both Jesse’s and Abby’s website links. Ms Dekker looks up to both of them.
I feel there’s some PR needs doing here.
The answer she gave the press that she didn’t know Laura Dekker and the only advice she could give [when pressed by the interviewer] was that she prepared well, does not look good, IMHO.
How important is it that sportspeople acknowledge others and acknowledge their public and fellow participants? Do you do a Rooney and attack your fans after you’ve bottled it, do you ignore them or do you rely on the PR team you’re paying [after all, you're only 17 in this case] and cover the bases you need to cover?
If it was just a 100 metre sprint race, then fans might not come into it much but when it’s a showpiece for the world and there are to be sponsorship deals and book sales later, one would think it was an important issue to cover all bases, even if you weren’t particularly interested yourself.
Filed under: Leisure, travel & sport, Society & human issues
What you say is true but Jessica may be being diplomatic and not wanting to encourage Laura (for the best reasons). It seems to me Jessica was 110% prepared for her trip with 6,000 ocean miles on the clock whilst last year Laura was only 80% prepared with much less experience. Whilst I now support Laura, it’s a different matter for a renowed figure such as Jessica to do so.
That’s fair comment, Stephen – she may well feel, per her team, that Laura’s preparation seems a bit underdone and the girl just too young. If anyone would know about that, it would be Jessica. Her saying that she didn’t know much about Laura might be a case of trying not to be drawn into supporting an upcoming disaster, particularly after the Abby Sunderland debacle.
Unfortunately, it also looks a bit like sour grapes – that this upcoming trip might severely indent the book sales and Jessica being the centre of attention. I don’t believe it is so – in my mind, Jessica is a big-hearted person who showed what she was made of – and yet the reaction to Laura was quite curt and abrupt.
Perhaps she needs to prepare a statement about it which both covers her and shows support for a fellow sailor. Perhaps she feels she already did that in the interview.
The first part is certainly right. The court did her a favour in demanding those fourteen points and 15 years is not 13 years. However, on the experience side, Laura has had just as much, if not more than Jessica. She’s actually done many solo runs at sea. Preparation wise – it looks better now, for sure, to what it was earlier and it’s also good that her father goes with her on the Portugal leg. The short hops seem good too.
Someone wrote of a young girl being in port alone in some of those countries. Presumably the parents [father?] will be there at those ports? If not, that worries me more than the actual sailing. Why do we all seem to care so much? Well, we do, don’t we?