From Trieste to Hong Kong on a Grand Soleil 50: good wind Fabrizio and Matt!

Fabrizio Pizzioli (left in photo) and Matt Wakeling set sail this morning: from Trieste, Italy, on their Grand Soleil 50 Nemesis, they want to arrive in Hong Kong, after 8,500 miles, 20 countries and three months of sailing.

Twenty countries, 8,500 miles, three months of pure sailing. There are no marketing motives or ulterior motives behind the adventure that Triestine Fabrizio Pizzioli and Australian-American Matt Wakeling decided to embark on, other than the pleasure of sailing and testing themselves on an unusual route. The two are leaving Trieste today for Hong Kong (a “known” destination for the two 40-year-olds met in China and lived there for about a decade).

Their adventure companion Nemesis, a Grand Soleil 50 (14.90 x 4.58 m): not a spartan ocean boat, but a performance cruiser equipped with every comfort.

THE PATH.
From Trieste, the two will point their bows to Corfu, then to Patras and the Isthmus of Corinth, and then sail to the Suez Canal. From Port Said (Egypt) they will make their way to Djibouti by sailing into the Red Sea, and then head for the coast of India. “The route is certainly little traveled,” Pizzioli, a past neuroscientist and present owner of a tailoring atelier, told us, “for eight boats sailing west from India, only one from Suez sails up the Indian Ocean.” A treacherous trade, we add: these are seas where acts of piracy are not uncommon.

THE SCINTILLA
Fabrizio and Matt don’t have much experience with sailboats: The idea for this sailing, which they titled “We Sail The Silk Road,” suddenly flashed when they went out in a small dinghy and turned off the engine off the coast of Rovinj, Croatia, and discovered the feeling of peace that only the sea can give. “As for sailing in the Indian Ocean, we will get help from an experienced Scottish skipper who will board with us.”

A FULLY EQUIPPED BOAT
As written above, the boat is best equipped for long sailing: “We have an integrated system of navigation instruments: the ‘core’ is B&G’s Triton system, with Vulcan 7 multifunctionals on which we have installed Navionics cartography. We also have AIS and Radar,” to see and be seen in seas rather beaten by trade routes.

“We have a 60-liter Schenker watermaker, a Fischer Panda diesel generator for onboard power, and a Cruising hydrogenerator from Watt & Sea. We have not installed wind generators because we expect to sail a lot, nor have we installed solar panels.” The sails are by Supreme Sails, a Slovenian sailmaker that also designed those used by Dan Lenard for his instrument-free Atlantic crossing. Supplies? “We will bring with us rice, oil, pasta, some fishing rods for trolling.”

We will follow Fabrizio and Matt’s navigation periodically: for now, bottoms up guys!

E.R.

SEE THE GALLERY

HERE THE WEBSITE OF WE SAIL THE SILK ROAD