Day 137

Fedor via the satphone: “It’s early morning, May 9th. It’s WWII Victory Day. My best wishes are to the veterans of my country who fought in World War II. I salute to my father, Konyukhov Philip Mikhailovich, who considers May 9th one of the most important dates in his life. My father was born in 1916. He was drafted as a young soldier as soon as the war began. At some point during the war, he was put in command of a machine-gun squad. They reached Berlin. After the war, father went back home to work as a fisherman on the Sea of Azov. To this day he still lives in Ukraine, along the sea. He will be 98 in July. I pray that everything is well with him, and we’ll see each other this summer.

My friends and I built a chapel in honor of Saint Nicholas the Wonderworker. We built it in the village where my father lives. Despite his old age, he would come out to the construction site to greet us and maybe even give us his insights. It was special seeing him every day and listening to his input.     

Here on the ocean, I am having my own kind of battle. I’m grabbing for the easterly longitude with my might, teeth and nails. I know that as soon as I stop rowing, I’ll be taken back east, and my countdown to the last thousand miles would have to be postponed. Since I have already crossed the 1000 mile mark, I don’t want to lose a single mile. Mentally, it would be very defeating and physically exhausting.

The weather has been unfavorable to put it mildly. The wind is 10-15 knots, from south-west. I know that eventually the wind will become south-easterly, but it is not happening fast enough. The time passes so slowly. I long to see the land, but it is still so far away. I’m with you. Fedor.” 

The map of the Tourgoyak’s course: http://yb.tl/konyukhov2

The detailed map of the course: www.oceanrowing.com/Konyukhov/Pacific2013/dist_map.htm

Translated by Tatiana Koreski