The Weekend Sailor (2016) - full transcript

- I was
very much enthused by

Sir Francis Chichester
because when he went

around the world, he
aimed at trying to beat

the average time of
the clipper ships

out to Australia and back again.

Therefore the idea began to
have something which wasn't only

a thousand miles or
six hundred miles,

but something which
could really test people.

And I thought, "Let us
start a new sport entirely,

"and have a 'round
the world yacht race."

- As soon
as this was announced,



powerful sailing nations
put together teams

of their most outstanding
navel officers,

the most adventurous and
competitive sailors in the world

signed up for the race.

Lasting about nine months,
this round the world regatta

is the most prestigious
trans-ocean yacht race there is.

30 years later it would
become the Volvo Ocean Race.

- Ramon searched
the continent for the perfect

boat, but didn't
like anything he saw.

While returning to Mexico,
he read that a Swan yacht

had won a regatta from
Bermuda to Newport Island.

- The Swan
65, a sturdy yacht.

Perfect in every detail.

Capable of sailing both
short and long distances.



A two-masted ketch, the Swan
65 can hold up to five sails

at the same time, picking up
impressive power and speed.

Now he had the perfect yacht,

but he also needed
the perfect crew.

He only had three
members, his son, Enrique,

his trusted employee Cantis,

and his wife, Paquita.

- He also
enlisted his two nephews.

- But
it was not enough,

he needed expert sailors
to complete the crew.

- I saw a huge yacht
in the Belgium harbor.

I asked the harbor master,
"What sort of a boat is that?"

He said, "This is
a Mexican Swan 65,

"and they're going
to sail with it

"the Round the World Race."

I said, "It's not true, really?"

"Yes," he said.

"Crazy people of
course, Mexicans."

Yachting at that time
was very nationalistic.

They went for English
boat or French boat.

They couldn't use
any foreigners.

There was no Dutch boats
in this race and I decided

I want to sail this race.

And I think it was not
possible, in that time,

to get together a Mexican
crew able to drive that boat

to its limits so I knocked
on the boat and I said,

"Here am I, I want to join you."

- I was building the sails
for the boat and so I

asked one of my friends, I said,
"What are these sails for?"

Big sails, a lot of
them going to Finland.

And he said, "This crazy
Mexican guy's gonna do

"the Round the Rorld Race.

"You should call him up and go."

And so I thought, you know,
that's not a bad idea.

So I called up and said,

"I'm building your
sails, I wanna go."

He said, "You're on."

- The boat was put together,
shall we say, through the mail.

Everything was done
through letters.

So I found out who
the organizers were

and I wrote away to them.

And that's how it started.

- I joined the yacht
not knowing anyone

and just in case
things didn't happen,

I had enough money in
my pocket to go home

from Cape Town, South Africa,

that was going to
be the first stop.

- I got a call three
weeks before the race.

So I frantically took a
leave of absence from my job.

I didn't know
anybody on the boat.

- My name is Dalrymple-Smith
but everyone calls me Butch.

When we did the race,
I was 40 years younger.

We were all young kids.

- These people have no safety,
no communication, nothing.

And still they jumped on
this kind of adventures,

and even his wife jumped
on that adventure,

not really knowing what
she was jumping into.

I think it's fantastic.

I think they're more
adventurous than anyone actually

because very few people
are willing to live today

without communication.

If you ask people to
leave their phones,

they get frustrated.

- When I first got to England,

I was walking down the street,

literally from the bus station,

just a big ol' mustache, long
hair, and this car comes by

with a bunch of guys
hanging out of it,

screaming in Mexican,
whatever they were screaming,

I don't remember.

And they go screeching
to a stop, they go,

"You must be Keith."

"Yeah."

"Get in, we're
goin' for dinner."

I was 22 and all I thought
about were all these places.

All the cool places I got to go.

England, Cape Town, Sydney,
and Rio, never been there.

Never really thought about
the 45 days in between.

- The race
consisted of four legs.

The first, from
Portsmouth to Cape Town.

The second from
Cape Town to Sydney.

The third from Sydney
to Rio de Janeiro.

And the fourth from Rio
de Janeiro to Portsmouth.

27,000 nautical miles,
50,000 kilometers.

- They can die, they
will meet storms.

Anything can happen and
they're gonna sail all the way

around the world and one of
them will win but all of them

will go through the
same difficulties.

There's no fate, there's no
director who scripts the show.

If you start to get scared
you should never do this race.

- On the morning
of the 7th of September, 1973,

the Sayula II was
christened and blessed

by two Irish priests
that Ramon had sent for.

Holy water was sprinkled
on the yacht and crew.

The launch was a spectacular
event which involved

not only Ramon's
family and friends,

but also the press and
several race officials.

- They sort of said,
"They are Mexican.

"What the hell are you
doing in a race like that?

"That is nothing for you."

- The famous journalist
came up to me and he said,

"What are you doing
on a Mexican boat?

"Surely you can't
expect to win."

And I just said to him,

"I never start a race
without intending to win it."

And he sort of
laughed and, yeah.

He said, "How do you
feel about safety?"

And I said, "Well, I
thought that, in fact,

"if all the boats were
accounted for by the end,

"it would be
considered a success."

I think the fact that people
were likely to die on the race

was understood.

- Before departing,
Ramon asked his crew

how they felt about their
chances in the race.

- 17 yachts from
seven nations are setting out

on the world's
longest ocean race.

Seven months and 27,000
miles of hard sailing.

- Pen Duik VI,
hot favorite of the experts.

Built with massive French
government support,

she's pioneering a ruthless
new type of aluminium

ocean racer with
incredible strength

and a keel made of the
precious metal uranium.

Eric Tabarly, the greatest
name in French yachting,

takes the tiller himself,
with so much at stake.

- Great Britain II,

Chay Blyth's superb new yacht

built of fiberglass/foam
sandwich, is the scratch boat,

setting an enormous genoa
that needs a keen lookout

stationed in the bow.

- Perhaps the most
well-known personality was

Sir Chay Blyth, skipper
of Great Britain II,

with a crew of paratroopers.

In 1968, with little experience,

he took part in the
controversial Sunday Times

Golden Globe Race.

In 1971, he became the
first man in history

to go around the world
westward, nonstop, solo.

- When he started his
career with British Steel,

and then with Great Britain
II, it was I who went around

to see a person called
Union Jack Hayward,

who was multi-millionaire.

I tried to get him to sponsor
the race, but he said,

"No Anthony, I'm not
going to sponsor the race,

"but I'm going to
sponsor Chay Blyth."

- My attitude toward the
Whitbread Round the World

Yacht Race was very much
an attitude of winning.

- The most well-organized,
by far, was Adventure.

They had worked their
boat up for months,

and they were head and
shoulders above any competitor.

- 19 yachts
competed in the race,

six from France, five from
the UK, three from Italy,

two from Poland, one
from West Germany,

one from South Africa, and
the Sayula from Mexico.

Each yacht carried the country's
most experienced yachtsmen,

as well as new young
sailors who had become

the future stars
of yacht racing.

- When I first got to England,
I didn't know what my job

was going to be on the boat,
I just figured I'd be sailing.

But then Ramon said you're
gonna be watch captain,

as well as a sail maker.

And then I become the guy
who, anytime anybody had

a question about what to
do, what sails to have up,

anything like that,
they'd call me.

- I don't like to sail
on the wind, anyway.

I like reaching, but
I asked Keith how fast

the boat would go on the wind,

how fast it would go reaching,

and how fast it
would go running,

and going straight there
would be on the wind,

and it would be
the closest route.

But the reaching around the
high around would be farther,

but we would be going faster.

- We had several very
experienced sailors,

we had some people who
were absolute novices,

and I was somewhere in between.

- Ramon asked me what I
could do on board so I said,

"Well I did three years of
medicine at University."

And he said, "Right, you're
the medical officer."

- A navigator and
radio operator so I

have a telegraph license
so I took weather reports

so we knew where
to go on the yacht.

- Poncho and Roberto, Enrique,
they could sail the boat

but they were short of
experience handling sails

and all those sort of things

which are very
important of course.

But they managed to
pickup very, very quickly,

to drive the boat
to do sail handling.

Within no time they were
really good yachtsmen.

- Every day is different
but the regular days that

you do your watches,
we had the system of

six, six watches during the day

and four, four, four,
during the night.

But you get so used
to it, to the system.

- There was a wide variety
of experience on board.

There weren't a lot
of prima donnas.

- Cantis was doing the cooking,

with a lot of Mexican cheese.

When I came back,

I wanted my food here
also with his cheese.

I was so used to it then.

- Except for Cantis the
cook and Ray the navigator,

I think everybody did
more or less, everything.

Driving the boat,
changing the sails,

we were all multi-functional
on the boat.

- The bigger boats
were often underfunded

and Ramon selected a boat
that he could actually

campaign properly.

All the kit was top quality.

We had the best sails,
we had good winches.

- He did everything first-class.

We were sailing in luxury.

- He was assertive but
in a very low-key way.

He had a wonderful style.

- I think he got
mad at me two times,

and both times it had to
do with the housekeeping.

Like he always said,
"I like order."

He got angry but then five
minutes later he would ask me

if I want a drink.

- Most ocean race
yachts are dry.

You don't drink alcohol on
the boat during the race.

But we were allowed to drink
when we came off waters.

One glass of red wine or a
beer which is very special.

This was a good idea because
you relax a little bit.

One glass of wine
is doing a lot.

You sleep well, and so on.

- As they
crossed the horse latitude,

the last portion of the
trade wins blew itself out

for the Sayula and the
wind fell to force one.

The horse latitudes
are located about

30 degrees north and
south of the equator.

Sometimes called
the Calms of Cancer,

or the Calms of Capricorn,

the horse latitudes are
named after Spanish ships

transporting horses
to the West Indies.

Boats would get trapped
in these calm waters,

prolonging the voyage and
causing water shortages.

The crew would be left with
no choice but to throw horses,

and other livestock,
overboard to survive.

With a broken mast, Eric
Tabarly's Pen Duik VI

is to abandon course
and go directly

to Rio de Janeiro for repair.

She receives a new mast
from the French Navy by air,

which will allow her
to continue on her way.

Bernie Hosking, a crew
member of Chay Blyth's

Great Britain II,
fell into the water.

But fortunately the others
managed to rescue him.

- But on that occasion
you haven't got time

because you're the
captain, you're the leader.

So you've got to get on
and organize the chaps.

Get the guys back on board.

- A barometer
measures atmospheric pressure,

a sudden drop means
a storm is coming.

- We were caught
with a big squall,

probably about 30-40 knots.

We can usually see these winds,

but we were just caught
unaware with all our sail up,

and that was very hairy
getting to all down.

Mizzen spinnakers
cracking like bull whips.

- There were no sat navs
or GPS' at this time.

You had to use the
sun and the stars.

And Ray and the navigator
on Adventure had one thing

the other boats didn't,
they could read Morse Code

at 22 words a minute, and
construct weather maps.

And that was vital
in the first leg.

And as the results show,
Adventure first, Sayula second.

- Against
all expectations,

the Mexican boat
was only two days

behind the English
Navy's Adventure,

which proudly occupied first
place in corrected time.

- You know, the fast that
we were doing pretty well

surprised me a little
bit, because we had,

the crew wasn't,

okay strike that one.

I mean we didn't have the
best crew in the race.

Cape Town was fun and
one of the good memories

about Cape Town was we
climbed Table Mountain,

which is this flat
mountain in Cape Town.

To get down, we went down
this ravine, or gully,

and it was all loose rocks,
and we almost had to run down.

Anybody that did that, they
couldn't walk for two days,

'cause we hadn't walked
anywhere for 45 days.

So our legs were
just like rubber.

It was, I laid in bed all day.

That was memory.

- While the
competitors repaired their boats

for the second leg, Ramon
faced a bigger challenge,

keeping his family
together aboard the Sayula.

- With his wife
gone, Ramon now had to deal with

his son, who had trouble
adapting to the small quarters.

- Ramon's business
would become the most

important of its kind in Mexico.

The crew said their final
goodbyes before departing

from Cape Town to Sydney.

They were about to
enter dangerous waters.

- And a clam
start as the fleet heads out

for the wild Southern sea.

- Wild winds, wet
weather, and cold temperatures

plague this part of the ocean,

known to sailors as
the Roaring Forties.

- I wouldn't sail through
the Roaring Forties again

for a million bucks.

- Called the Roaring
Forties because the wind

from the 40th parallel,
to the 50th parallel,

that's the span of
the Roaring Forties.

And it's because all these
depressions are moving across

this area of ocean
from West to East,

generating enormous winds like
30, 40, and 50 knot winds.

- We were sailing
on the spinnaker,

I was steering at the
time and suddenly this

southerly wind came in, it
was really a tremendous wind,

about 30 or 40 knots and
all I could do was just

spin the boat around
and we just took off

with this wind behind us.

I called all the hands on deck,

or somebody called
all the hands on deck,

and I remember Keith
coming up and saying,

"You're going very well,
why are you worried?

"And I said well,
the trouble is,

"we're trying to go
that way.

"And we're going this way."

- One thing that's
certain about bad weather on

the high seas, is that you
can't understand it until you've

lived through it yourself.

It can go on for hours,
or days, without stopping.

You can return to your
bunk and snuggle down,

hoping that when you
wake up, the strong wind

will have dropped and
the water will be calm,

but this doesn't always happen.

The sinister creaking of the
mast and the water splashing

over the deck, two typical
sounds which remind us

that at any moment,
we may be called upon

to go out there again.

- We were doing a spinnaker
change, and as part of that,

when you release
the old spinnaker,

you have to pull
it in by the sheet.

Well that was probably the
scariest moment in the race

for me because I happened
to be steering the boat.

Now Ramon was pulling
in on that sheet

and the sail filled
partially so it pulled back

quite substantially.

If he would let go, he wasn't
gonna fall onto the boat.

- I still hear his
voice, "Man overboard."

Because I was the first guy
on deck and I found Ramon

on the side of the boat,
hanging on the sheet.

- My brain was just going in
circles, trying to think about

what I was gonna
do if he let go,

because to turn a boat
around with a spinnaker up

is a very dangerous thing to do.

- You can at all with
a man with wet clothes,

with the speed of the boat.

And then we had an alert that
the boat made a movement,

what pushed, the
wave pushed Ramon up

so at that time we could
get him back on deck.

So I remember this
very well, yes.

- Obviously that was
everyone's worst nightmare.

- We got him back aboard,
thank God for that.

Offshore sailing, the way
we did it, you're fatigued.

It's hard to get rest when
you only have four hours off,

for example, between
some of the watches.

- You're almost continually
scared for a long period where

you're worried about things,

you're frightened
of gear failure,

you're frightened of somebody
falling over the side,

you're frightened of
all sorts of things,

but those sort of
things were a bit

more normal in those days.

Today, people are a little
bit more safety conscious

than we were at that time.

- From the 14th
to the 25th of November,

2,555 nautical
miles were covered.

An average of 232 miles per day.

Strong gales of wind force
six were felt on those days.

The Sayula II relentlessly
stuck to her course.

The days of the 20th
and 21st brought gentle

and refreshing winds, and in
the afternoon of the 25th,

the radio announced.

All yachts, all yachts,

on the night of November
24th, the 33 Export

lost its co-skipper
Dominique Guillet overboard.

He was not recovered.

- But the Roaring
Forties were about to show

the crew at the Sayula that
their main challenge was not

the human skill of their
Whitbread competitors,

but the forces of
nature on the open sea.

The Sayula II was moving
forward at great speed

on a high sea with
breaking waves.

- I was down below on the
starboard side of the board,

Butch was on the port side.

We were on a day off and I
was cleaning David Bowen's

camera which he loaned
me, nicely, so I

And there's a hatch right over
the settee or the dinette,

and it got black,

because there was wave
that came over and broke

right over the top of the boat.

And picked the boat
up and threw it down

and broke some windows.

- I was thrown up into
an upper bunk and then

the floorboards
came up on top of me

and then the water came in.

And Butch fell down there
and he started throwing

the floorboards off of
me so I could get out.

That's a pretty vivid memory.

I thought I was gonna drown.

- I could hear
this rush of water

and I thought, "Good
Lord, the mast has broken

"and has punched
hole in the hull."

But, I looked up and there
it was, the mast was in tact.

- And our bilge
pumps didn't work.

Because they were
full of balloons from

the thanksgiving party
the Mexicans gave us.

Butch commented as we were
throwing buckets of water

out the boat, he said,
"There's no better bilge pump

"than a frightened
man with a bucket."

- And I can remember everyone
working their sole cases out,

getting the water
out of the boat.

- But it was very cold,
it was southern ocean.

After six, seven hours, I
became stiff all over my body.

I couldn't move anymore.

- One doesn't normally
get knocked off a sailboat

and still be recovered,
and continue on sailing.

When you're in the
worst of the conditions,

you think to yourself, "Is
this really what I wanna do,

"and is this worth it?"

- We were fully instrumented.

Of course, most of that
went away after the capsize,

so for half of leg two, getting
up to Sydney, Australia,

we didn't have any
boat instruments.

- When they could
not be contacted by radio,

the crew were given up for
lost, they were presumed dead.

- After we determined that
we weren't going to sink,

Butch and I had
the evening watch

and we saw the most
spectacular display

of the Australis Aurora.

We call them Northern Lights
in the northern hemisphere,

but they're southern lights.

He had never seen
them in his life,

and of course I hadn't either.

He almost went down and woke
everybody up on the boat

to have them come up and look.

- The direct
route to the finishing line

was across the Bass Strait,

which separates Tasmania
from mainland Australia.

There are lots of cargo ships
and ferries in this area,

so Ray, using only a torch and
his knowledge of Morse Code,

informed a merchant ship
that she could advise the

Australian Navy that they were
alive and heading to Sydney.

- I know that they did
capsize in the Southern ocean,

and their radio was broken
I think in the capsize

and everything so they
arrived two weeks later

and nobody knew that
they had done this.

And then they have
to tell their story.

Fascinating.

And today we will
pick that story up

in the second it happened.

So we will have it on camera.

- And through another
stroke of just monumental luck,

we got a following wind,
which was so unusual

for that part of the world.

- Because
of this following wind,

the Sayula traveled
at great speeds.

Due to their damaged radio,

they had no idea where
they stood in the race.

- When we got to
Sydney, we found out

that we were in 1st
place in the race,

and that put Ramon in a very
difficult position because

after the capsize, I
remember him saying,

"We could never
continue in the race."

- The yachts
arrived in the Port of Sydney.

All suffering tremendous
adversity and damage

in the second leg.

As Ramon contemplated
retiring from the race,

he called home to his wife.

- And the news that he
was in first place overall

in the race, I think
tipped the scales,

so that he felt he
had no real choice

but to continue on in the race.

We lost considerable gear.

We broke some rigging,
and he was faced

with a monumental job of
trying to get the boat

back into sailing condition.

- The crew worked
hard and got the Sayula

repaired in time to
start the next leg.

The Adventure, true
to her relay strategy,

changed her crew once again.

New men, new
strength, to carry on.

Chay Blyth and Eric Tabarly
also finished their repairs

in time and continued
to push for the lead.

The third leg of the race
began with these top boats

neck in neck,
racing towards Rio.

The route from Sydney to
Rio de Janeiro would pass by

Cape Horn, the historical
trading route to

where clipper ships once
made use of the strong,

yet dangerous, westerly winds
for greater travel efficiency.

For this leg, Ramon
chose what was considered

the long route, staying
in the northern latitudes,

then swinging down
around Cape Horn.

- To hit an iceberg in a
sailboat would be catastrophic.

It's not so bad if you
can see the iceberg,

but they have things
that they call Growlers,

which is a large mass of ice
that's just barely submerged.

So you can't really see it,
especially with any wave action.

We were fortunate enough
not to see any ice

on the whole race.

Except for snow, which fell
on the deck many times.

- Strong
winds, dangerous

notoriously turn the
waters around Cape Horn

into a sailor's graveyard.

Countless ships and
sailors throughout time

have been lost in
the heavy conditions.

Not all the racers were
as fortunate as Sayula.

The Adventure chose
the most direct route

through the treacherous
Southern ocean.

- Well the sea is simply
cruel and you can't know

what it's going to do.

So sad with the loss of life,

but you have to expect
it in this sport.

You can't get away from it.

- Calling
all boats, we have tragic news,

we have lost two
other fine sailors.

Paul Waterhouse of the Tauranga,

and Bernie Hosking of
the Great Britain II.

Let us take a moment
of silence to salute

these fine young men.

- The Whitbread
favorite, Eric Tabarly,

was forced to retire his yacht,

after the Pen Duik VI broke
its second mast of the race.

There wasn't enough
time for the French Navy

to send a new one again by air.

- Thanks to Ramon's
navigation and planning,

Sayula stayed in the
higher latitudes,

and avoided disaster in
its approach to Cape Horn.

This difficult feat christened
even the most inexperienced

crew members of Sayula
II, as true sailors.

Ramon, now a true captain.

- When
you round the Horn,

you become part of an
exclusive club of sailors

who've taken on the ocean's
most extreme conditions.

Today, more people
climb mount Everest

than sail around Cape Horn.

- If you want
to be a really sailor,

you have to pass at least once
in your life the Cape Horn.

- They have a special
organization for anyone

who's sailed around Cape Horn.

That I rounded Cape
Horn, I'm a Cape Horn-er.

- After
rounding Cape Horn,

the waters calmed and
tropical weather set in.

- I saw this, what I looked
to be an American woman,

and I said, "Are you American?"

She said, "Yeah."

I said, "Well what
are you doing here?"

She goes, "Oh I fly
for x airlines."

And I said, "Well, would
you like to go sailing?

"We're a whole bunch
of sailors here,

"sailing around the world."

And she said, "Yeah."

I said, "Well all right, come
on down to the Rio de Janeiro,

"Iate Clube do Rio de Janeiro.

"Come on down at noon
and bring your friends."

And she said, "Okay."

The next day at
noon, she was there

with four of her friends.

We went sailing, we did
all the things you do.

The girls wound up staying
on the boat with us.

One day, the one
that I was with said,

"Well, we have to go home
tomorrow back to New York."

And I said, "Aw, too bad."

She said, "Well can I tell the
next crew that's coming down

about this?"

And I said, "Yes, please."

So we had stewardesses
rotating around from New York.

The last batch of girls, they
wanted to go to Ipanema Beach.

We said, "Well,
let's go to Ipanema."

And decided to go swimming so
we took all our clothes off

and went swimming.

We're all swimming around out
there, right off the beach,

having a great ole time and
I looked up on the beach

and there were some, you
call 'em Federales here,

I don't know what they're
called in Brazil but

they were, with
their machine guns,

picking up the girls' panties.

So I went up there and
I said to the guys,

"What's going on?"

And they said, "No nude
swimming on the beach."

So they let us all have our
clothes and they put us in jail.

One of the brighter
bulbs in the group said,

"Why don't we just put all of
our money in somebody's hand,

"and knock on the door,
and offer it to 'em?"

So we put together
whatever money we had,

which wasn't a whole lot,

knocked on the door,
opened the door,

handed the guy the money,
and he goes, "Okay.

"Off you go."

And then we had to walk home.

- On
the 19th of March,

Ramon had one objective in mind,

to catch up with the Adventure,
where ever she might be.

Keith suggested
tacking eastward,

but other members of the
crew thought this was a

losing battle, and the best
thing would be to go northward,

and stay in the path
of the Great Circle.

But the final decision
was always made by Ramon,

and this time he
gambled on Keith.

The Sayula II headed eastwards.

- Ramon always
had the last word,

which I think is
a very good thing.

And he did this on
a very pleasant way.

It was special to
be on that boat.

- We were alone obviously
for most of the race,

so it was our own
motivation that kept

the boat going at top speed.

I think also we had a
reputation of being a crew

that enjoyed their pleasures
and were very relaxed.

But we were still pushing
the boat quite hard.

- But the
non-stop passage through the

strong waves of the Atlantic,
known as the northeast trades,

left it's mark on the Swan.

- The crew
members found themselves

facing a dilemma.

If they sailed at full force,

the mast could end up unusable,
and they would not only

lose the leg, but
the whole race.

On the other hand, if
they sail too carefully,

they would lose any
advantage over the Adventure.

After surviving
storms and huge waves,

and even falling overboard,
Ramon Carlin's heart

was set on one thing only.

- I remember in one
three-day period,

we changed sails
at least 150 times.

So that means that we
were changing the sails

about once every half hour,

over three days.

So we were pushing quite hard.

- We had no radio communication
because our radios

hadn't been tuned properly,

and as we came up
to the finish line,

Ramon could see the
tension building,

and he went 'round to everybody

and he said, "I am very
pleased with all the work

"you have done, no matter where
we come, I will be pleased."

- We finished on
Easter Sunday, 1974,

at four o'clock, tee time.

- I couldn't have believed
what sort of a finish

we were going to have.

Crossed the finishing
line, dropped the sails,

and I looked up, and
there must have been

three or four thousand people.

I'd never seen such
a crowd before.

- This victory made
Ramon Carlin the winner of

the first Whitbread
Round the World Race,

and the first Mexican
to win a multi-staged

international sporting cup.

- The personality is what
makes this people special.

I think the best people in
this sport, in this event,

they care about you, you
are not where you come from.

And they're very strong on
that, they look through all the

fancy clothes and the
language and the countries

and the backgrounds
and the money.

They look at who you are,

because they know that's
what's gonna matter.

- And Prince Philip was there

to present the prize.

It was a great party.

We were all dressed up
with our Mexican hats.

They were fantastic
and looked just great.

- What he lacked
from experience, he

Tireless work and his
tireless planning.

He made the crew an
extension of his family,

and he won over our trust,
our loyalty, and I believe,

our love.

- He managed straight
from the beginning to get

this crew together,
to get the right boat.

But we sailed all the way
around the world with the same,

nearly same crew.

This is okay.

- He's just a wonderful person.

Kind and generous with
the people on the boat,

and very well organized.

And that's why we won.

I just love him.

I hate to see that he's 90.

- After the prize-giving
when everyone

had to leave and go
their separate ways,

I couldn't even face
actually having to say

goodbye to people.

It was all very difficult
because we'd lived together,

we'd lived through so much.

- That was the high
adventure of my life and

I'm just so thrilled to
have been able to do it.

- I can tell you the most
dangerous part of the whole trip

was taking a taxi across
downtown Rio de Janeiro.

- And even when I was cleaning
toilets on merchant ships

I liked it better than
being a school teacher.

- To finish first,

you first must finish.

- I feel like quitting
at every port.

- I haven't lived
on land since 1973.

I don't feel the
need to live on land.

- The Sayula crew
were not a cruise.

Well the difference was
that we've all lived,

we've been Round the World Race.