THE RELUCTANT HEROINE

YACHTSWOMAN ELANA CONNOR sailed 3,000 miles around New Zealand in a figure-of-eight for foster youth

- Laura Hodgetts

After my first bluewater crossing from California to Hawaii, people thought that it was really cool that I had just got the sailing bug and got on a boat.

When I made the return journey, which can be a tricky passage, suddenly sailors in San Francisco started to take me seriously, like ‘OK, you did this, a lot of people ship their boats back to avoid making this crossing.’ By the time I left on a solo circumnavigation three years ago, in Windfola, a 1985 Sabre 34 mark I, women especially were telling me that I was inspiring to them.

I was a bit resistant to it at first, like I can’t imagine anybody thinking I’m a role model. I’m just a normal person, I make mistakes out there, I’m scared all the time, and I get seasick.

But after crossing the Pacific, on making landfall in French Polynesia, I had dinner with a family I’d met on a cruising net. At the end, the mum said: ‘Let’s take a picture, we’ve been waiting to meet you, Elana.’ Their daughter, who was maybe eight, asked why and the mum said: ‘Well you know that crossing we just did, with your dad and brother? She did it alone with her little dog.’ The little girl looked at me and she said: ‘But who was your captain?’

It made me feel like maybe there is room for more female role models who are just learning things and who break stuff. I’d like to demystify the idea that you need to have grown up your whole life fixing boats to take care of a boat.