At just 14 years old, Reija Treacy-Wolnik travelled alone from her Oakura home for a three month adventure that incorporated sailing across the Atlantic with her Grandad, Leszek Wolnik. Leaving New Zealand in October of last year, the pair recount the highlights and lowlights of the journey, and how the experience has forged a deeper bond between them.
It was a visit from her Grandad in January 2023 that sparked an adventure neither the Oakura teen (now 15) or her Irish Grandad (70) had anticipated.
“When Grandad came to visit New Zealand in January 2023 we hadn’t seen him since before Covid and I had missed him so much,” Reija recalls. He had been on sailing adventures for the last few years around his home country of Ireland and the Northern Seas and talked about plans to sail across the Atlantic.
Inspired, Reija asked him if I she could go with him on his Atlantic adventure.
“I’d just started sailing with the New Plymouth Yacht Club doing their Learn to Sail program and then doing their Opti sailing each week. I loved it!”
Leszek’s first instinct was to say ‘Yes’ but Reija’s parents, Sorcha and Shane, were pretty nervous as Leszek has Type 1 diabetes and Reija hadn’t been sailing for very long.
“They agreed I could go if there were four crew — Grandad as skipper, another experienced sailor, a woman for support and me,” says Reija.
Marija, a keen 33-year-old rock climber from Croatia with limited sailing experience, was the first to sign up.
“Reija’s parents wanted us to have an experienced fourth person in case I was injured or incapacitated,” Leszek recalls, “but we struggled to find someone.” He thought long and hard about whether it was an acceptable risk to head off with two novices, one aged only 14.
“I kept mulling over the many ways things that could go badly wrong and wondered if I could even face going home were the worst to happen. Logic and some good passages behind me told me I should be able to mitigate the risks and I realised that I could train our novice crew on passage and stage the voyage into natural phases, only proceeding to the next step if the crew were sufficiently capable and confident.”
It took a bit of convincing, but with a lot of reassurance and pleading, Mum and Dad said OK and flights were booked from New Zealand to Ireland.
“Even that was a big deal, flying so far by myself,” says Reija. “The first flight is 17 hours and the second one is 9 hours but when I got there I was so excited, I didn’t mind a little bit of jet lag.”
After a few days assembling the last of the gear, Reija and Leszek then flew to the boat in Lanzarote (in the Canary Islands), where Reija met Marija for the first time.
“We both love the beach and spent lots of time doing flips and handstands in the sea. Lanzarote was my favourite Island out of the Canary Islands because there were a lot of fun tourist attractions. I especially liked Cesar Manrique’s house which has some of the rooms in lava bubble caves. It was so cool.”
The boat, Mairin, is a 32 ft Vancouver, with a Yankee, Staysail and Main.
“It was just the right size for three of us, although later on in the trip, we had to swap bunks on night watch. This got to be a bit gross sometimes when it was very hot and humid, getting into a bunk with Grandad sweat after night watch — ewwww.”
After a day or so of boat maintenance and settling in, the novice crew started some basic learning about the boat and all the electronics.
“The training plan crux was to have both crew able to navigate and sail safely even if all electrics were lost and I wasn’t available,” says Leszek. “We took three weeks in the Canaries where Reija and Marija learnt to sail and manage the boat singlehanded, navigating on paper with just a Portland and a handheld GPS.
“We broke all procedures down into lists, detailing every step — raising the main had 21 steps and getting the boat ready for passage had over 40!”
They also learnt electronic navigation using iSailor on iPads, use of radar and AIS and knowing whether a ship would pass fore or aft using a hand bearing compass.
“We trained in dinghy handling, anchoring etc, all whilst enjoying the most delightful cruising,” recalls Leszek. “Throughout we had rigid rules regarding tethering — a godsend in some of the conditions we met — and had endless discussion and role-play on all aspects of safety and crisis management, ranging from different fire on board scenarios to abandoning the ship and grab bag contents.”
Of the training Reija says, “It was the first time I’d ever seen a B&G chart plotter or anything similar and it was so fascinating and felt super important to absorb. Grandad taught us to understand & to use it but not to rely on it. We learned how to do a passage using a paper chart, about sextants and also how to look at the stars and planets and how these would line up with parts of the boat when we were on course.”
Around Fuerteventura, Reija started learning and practising single-handed sailing going out on a few day trips.
“I couldn’t believe how much I progressed over that first week, learning to tack and gybe single-handedly and follow a plotted course. I learned all about preventers, the pole and rigging changes. Over those days, we could see what we needed to improve on before our crossing to the Cape Verdes.”
‘The Dayskipper’s Handbook’ became Reija’s Bible.
“It had so much information and was so interesting. I learned the forces of the winds, how to read them, the different parts of the boat and what our boat had that was different to others.
“Our boat, Mairin, is a cutter so has a different set up and rigging, which means I feel like if I go to sail on other boats I have a good understanding. I learnt to use the cars on the genoa track and on the traveller so that I know how to use lots of different set ups.”
Marija & Reija sailed and navigated the 750 nm. passage from El Hierro to Mindelo without Leszek’s help. “They learnt to balance the sails so well that their new course to steer using the Windpilot vane was never out by more than ten degrees over the 24 hours between GPS fixes,” Leszek says.
For Reija it was fun. “Like a game, charting it manually like in the olden days and then checking and staying on course.”
“It was a good introduction to the open sea,” says Marija, “with 4m swells for the full seven days. Nights got colder, and waves were filling the cockpit. Except for dealing with nausea and messy patterns of sleep we did not have much struggle or a tough time so entertained ourselves with crafts, games, singing, daily boat chores and culinary adventures as each member took turns preparing meals.
“Conversations on the deck became a forum for exchanging stories, blending our different pasts and the present into shared experience.”
“We had solo 4 hour watches for all our nights,” Leszek adds, “building confidence and I did my best to eliminate crew anxiety by ruthless conservatism in sail management. Our first night out of El Hierro we had 20 knots gusting 25 and a 4 metre swell but the crew were comfortable and relaxed with just a triple reefed main which had us loping along at a gentle 4 knots. We increased sail each night incrementally as the winds increased to 30 knots and they learnt to work the wind vane in the dark by feeling the chain links. They were composed and resilient despite running repairs the first two nights.”
“We felt very prepared with our sails and training,” says Reija. “This is what I had imagined the trip was going to be like, maybe because of all the sailing movies we had watched. I had prepared for this kind of wild weather and extreme sailing and loved getting into my offshore gear and getting soaked. I loved being on night watch and being responsible for our safety and our course — it felt natural and exciting. Down below things were pretty tricky over those seven days — our food fell on the floor every single time we cooked and sleeping was hard as we kept getting slammed against the walls as the boat was rolling and tipping. I didn’t mind these things as it felt like part of the adventure.”
They were all immensely proud when they arrived in Mindelo, where they had a few days to explore, rest and provision the boat. They swam underwater with large turtles and Reija had her hair braided ready for the big crossing.
“We left Mindelo on the 17th of November and the first week we had extremely light winds which gave us opportunities to heave to and go swimming! Utterly spiritual in 5000 metres of azure blue water,” says Leszek.
Over the next couple of days they watched the barometer and downloaded the weather twice a day. They could see a huge wind hole ahead and started to worry about gas, water and food — a lot of the fresh food had rotted much more quickly than expected. They made the decision to move south to try and avoid getting stuck out there for 40 days.
At the halfway point across the Atlantic they had a party and spread some of Leszek’s brother Mark’s ashes. Mark had succumbed to cancer earlier in the year.
The winds started to pick up the second week and the rest of the passage was a literal blast with winds increasing on Night 18 with sustained gusts up to 35 knots, Leszek recalls. The wind rose steadily and during the last week on one of Reija’s night watches, the wind reached Force 8 gusts.
“I had been learning about the Beaufort scale and was excited to wake Grandad up to tell him and ask him if we should take down the mainsail? I was a bit scared about taking down the big sail in those winds but luckily, the wind dropped so we managed to just stay on the third reef.
“Being in the force 8 winds was one of the funnest experiences and I really valued that I got to experience really big waves with that much wind.”
On the Atlantic crossing, the crew proved themselves to be tough, self-contained and resilient, says Leszek, even when Marija succumbed to a major infection. “It took all of my Medical Care at Sea training as well as Telemedical Advice and Support from Athlone Castle MRCC, to get her well.
“She came within 24 hours of needing evacuation and only took one watch off during her illness, making a spectacular recovery.”
After 20 days, it was Reija who first spotted land one evening.
“I was watching the sun dip down and then land suddenly appeared. I climbed down to wake Grandad and we all celebrated, dancing and singing. I sent my Mum a text on the satellite phone and she told me she was crying. She was so happy we had nearly made it.”
Guadalupe was the end point of the voyage — Leszek has future plans to take Mairin through the Panama Canal and onto the Pacific Islands.
LEARNINGS
One of the hardest things on the trip was the lack of space and time by yourself, Reija reflects.
“If you needed a break from the others we would say ‘’Im going to the shops’ which is what we named the bow. You could go and hang out there for a while by yourself and the others would give you space. Grandad also put up a hammock for me and the first day it was up, I spent hours in it just reading and feeling so happy, rocking over the water in my own little cocoon.”
Reija also had trouble sleeping on the boat.
“I felt exhausted and worn out but also kind of wired. Grandad gave me Phenergan one time to help me sleep which is an antihistamine with sedative effects but it just made my body and arms really heavy and tired but my mind was still really active and awake. Lack of sleep and that weird tiredness was one of the hardest things on the journey.
“Being 14, I really wanted to feel independent and able to be respected as part of the crew. At times I did feel like a passenger or that I wasn’t equal and that was hard to deal with mentally and emotionally. Like if something was happening on the boat and my job was always to helm and not the harder things, even if I was able or felt I’d be just as good.
“Sometimes it was hard the way Grandad worried about me. Like when he was worried about Marija when she was sick, he also worried about how that would affect me.
“I’ve changed so much from my trip. Mentally I can withstand some really rough and tough conditions. Now I feel like I can face my feelings more. I’m also more aware. My sister was always telling me to ‘read the room’ before I say stuff but I never really understood what that meant and was terrible at it. Now I understand.
“The best thing about the whole trip was my relationship with my Grandad. Even though we’ve always been close, because we’ve lived apart for 10 years, there’s always been a bit of a difference than if you live in the same place. We got so close on this trip and I felt like he looked after me so well. I got to know him in a way that I never would or could have known him without living in such a small space in those conditions. He is obviously totally independent but I think at times he needed me just as much as I needed him and I really liked being able to be there for him to spread his brother’s ashes and to dance and sing to David Bowie with him. That was our anthem for the trip, Space Oddity – Ground Control to Major Tom. It was the perfect song for our Atlantic adventure.
“Having the opportunity to go on this trip, away from my immediate family has been amazing. I think everyone at this age should do something away from their family, even for a week, just to see what it’s like to be away from the way things are at home.”
Leszek admits that he too learnt a huge amount on this passage, especially about listening and communication skills.
“The three of us have such diverse ages and life experiences but found we could navigate through some very difficult and tense interpersonal situations by being honest, sharing emotions and listening to each other. Reija initiated ‘team meetings’ which proved very successful and which allowed us to remain curious, open and supportive of each other whilst discussing the things we were grateful for as well as those that were troubling or indeed traumatic.”
Marija adds, “Age, initially a potential divide, soon became a source of strength as the crew discovered that each generation held a unique piece of the puzzle that gave this journey various wealth of experiences and perspectives.”
Leszek has so much praise for the two members of his novice crew.
“They sang and danced their way through the entire Beaufort Scale up to a sustained Force 8 and the stronger the wind, the higher the seas and the bigger the challenge the more their eyes shone. They went from not knowing what the Beaufort Scale was to having such a fine feeling for sail balance that they made reefing decisions based on boat response not wind strength. They got off the boat on morning 20 in Guadelupe and cartwheeled up the pontoon in joyous celebration!”
“Overcoming the challenges fostered a deep sense of accomplishment and imparted invaluable skills that extend far beyond the realm of sailing,” sums up Marija. “The journey became a transformative experience, turning novices into capable sailors who have conquered the vastness of the Atlantic and, in doing so, discovered the depths of their own resilience and adaptability. As we neared our destination, we found ourselves bound not only by the shared triumph of crossing the Atlantic but also by the bonds of the uncharted territories within ourselves and each other, and in the process, we discovered the beauty of unity in diversity. The crew, once a group of strangers, emerged from the experience as a tight-knit family, forever bound by the memories of their Transatlantic Odyssey.”