Edith Lemay and Sebastien Pelletier took their family on a voyage of a lifetime. Faced with the diagnosis that will make three of their four children blind when they reach adulthood, these fierce Canadian parents decided not to go into despair, but instead live life to the fullest on an around-the-world trip they would all remember.

But while the older kids, already familiar with many doctor visits, knew what it meant to lose vision, Edith Lemay suddenly realized that the youngest passenger of this unique journey didn’t fully understand it.

“It’s like keeping your eyes closed all the time, Laurent”, Edith said.

Miles away from his hometown of Montreal, the curious five-year-old had a billion questions troubling his little head. “How will I cross the street? How will I drive a car? Will my wife be blind, mommy?”

The river of question marks poured over Edith Lemay while she tried to gather both herself and facts in portraying the situation as non-problematic.

“I tried to answer as matter-of-factly as possible. ‘There is a solution’, I said. ‘It’s normal, it’s not a problem…’ But inside, I was crushed. It was a really hard moment for me”, Edith recalls.

Edith Lemay and Sebastien Pelletier – love at first sight?

Exactly eight decades before this conversation in the Mongolian outback, in the middle of the Second World War, another curious Quebecoise boy was asking a billion questions. The listening adult engaged in this 1942 conversation was Antoine de Saint-Exupéry.

If the French writer had not visited Montreal and met the inquisitive Canadian boy, maybe he would have never written the story about the little prince traveling the universe and addressing the topics of love and loss in a world where grown-ups fail to see the important things.

The fox was the one sharing the wisdom with the boy: “It is only with the heart that one can see rightly; what is essential is invisible to the eye.”

Edith Lemay (44) and Sebastien Pelletier (45) have been together for 14 years, even if their pathways crossed 24 years ago. They saw each other back at the university but remained invisible.

“We went to the same school, we knew the same people, but we didn’t really talk to each other. We were probably not at the same place in life, and pretty different”, Edith describes the times when she caught first glimpses of a man who would become her future husband.

It took an improbable online meeting ten years after college, to say the truly profound “I see you”, in a way that the Na’vi tribe greets each other on Avatar’s Pandora. “When we finally met, we were like soul mates.”

This was not just an unusual encounter between two souls who almost missed each other. After they started building their family, Edith and Sebastien would find out they were the source of a genetically-transferred disease that could activate only if both parents carried the gene.

“I have never heard of retinitis pigmentosa. Nobody had it in our families”, Edith Lemay says. “Both mum and dad need to have defective genes, so it is pretty rare. You really need to be unlucky to get it. Even if both of us have a gene, we statistically only have a 1-in-4 chance to transmit it. Well, it ended up being 3 out of 4.”

Due to retinitis pigmentosa, this rare genetic disorder that makes cells in the eye retina break down over time, Mia (11), Colin (7) and Laurent (5) will be slowly losing their vision as they become adults. Only Leo (9) was lucky enough to escape the genetic destiny.

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Filling the children’s visual memory

“When I have a problem and bad things happen in life, my way of coping is to spring into action. And the thing with this diagnosis is that there is nothing you can do. The doctor tells you ‘Well, your kids are going to be blind, but we can’t do anything about it, so see you in a year’. That was really hard for me”, Edith Lemay explains.

For a professional working in logistics, mainly in healthcare but also for the fantasy factory Cirque du Soleil, solving problems was an everyday challenge. Suddenly, she faced a process she was not able to improve.

“Before the pandemic, my job was to make things run smoother in Cirque du Soleil, a really great job. I would take a process that is not working well, and try to make it better. But the pandemic hit, and it almost closed down, so everybody lost their jobs”, Edith explains.

Luckily, her other half was in a better position at the time. Sebastien worked in finances, in management of a small company that got bought by a larger one, so he cashed in his shares. That amount of money was enough to pay for the trip around the world, in which they would follow the professional’s advice to “fill the visual memory” of their kids losing eyesight.

“For us, this money was a sign, just a nice big gift from life, telling us ‘you can go and live your dream’”, Edith says.

They rented out their Montreal house for 9 months, and in March 2022, off they went. Namibia, Zambia, Tanzania, Turkey, Mongolia, Bali…

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Bucket list of things to do during the voyage

When traveling the world, many of us are chasing sights recommended by tour guides, those neverending lists of “things to see” here and there.

Lemay-Pelletier family initially also started with a well-planned itinerary. They had to leave in July 2020, cross Russia with the Trans-Siberian train, go to Mongolia, China… But then the pandemic happened, and they were redoing their plans countless times.

In the end, when the countries started opening up, they left without an itinerary. Africa seemed pretty open, and that’s where they started. Nowadays, they only plan a month ahead.

More than with things to see, this sight-losing family filled their itinerary with things to do, the activities they would like to experience during their trip.

Edith Lemay agreed to share her family’s voyage bucket list with Pipeaway’s readers.

Edith Lemay's family voyage bucket list
1. To go on a safari

2. See the Great Wall of China

3. Sleep on a train

4. See Pokemon

5. Swim with dolphins and/or whales

6. Do a multi-day trek

7. See a sunrise over a mountain

8. Learn to surf

9. See an Aurora Borealis

10. Bathe in a hot spring

11. Take the Trans-Siberian train

12. Eat with chopsticks

13. Ride a horse in Mongolia

14. Collect sunset photos

15. Make friends in other countries

16. Learn new languages

17. Sleep on a boat

18. Drink juice on a camel

19. Eat unknown fruits

20. Snorkel with tropical fish

21. Visit colorful markets

22. Visit a castle

23. Visit a boat museum

24. Go ziplining

25. Take a cruise on a river

26. See hot-air balloons in Cappadocia

27. Take a plane

28. Eat ice-cream

Already in the planning phase, the Canadian family obviously cherished the experience of being together, finding beauty in the most simple things.

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Beauty is everywhere

Are you happy with where your trip took you so far?

We soon realized that it doesn’t matter where we go, everywhere is beautiful. Every country has nice landscapes and beautiful places to see. We just want to travel and let the adventure surprise us.

One thing our kids will lose is that wide field of vision, so we are trying to stay in nature, in these big, nice, wide open spaces.

But also, what we realized, kids being kids, they really live in the moment. They don’t do this trip with their urgency to keep memories. They are just enjoying the moment. And often they show us beautiful things.

Like, we could take them to see some magnificent temple, and we want them to look at it, but they will see a cute stray cat, and for them, that’s going to be the most beautiful thing of their day.

And it’s okay. Because they also teach us, the beauty from their eyes, what they find beautiful, is just as important as what we think is beautiful.

Yes, puppies can be a real distraction when seeing the wonders of the world!

Exactly, puppies, or even beetles! When we were in Namibia, we visited these amazing sand dunes in Sossusvlei. Laurent was so fascinated with their little black beetles they call toktokkie. He played with these black bugs that walk on sand, and he thought it was the most interesting thing in the world.

At the end of the day, we asked him what he liked, and he said – toktokkie. Oh my god, we take you to these amazing places, we climb one of the highest sand dunes in the world, and what do you do? You care about toktokkie!

But you know, they show us the beauty of the world. Beauty can be anywhere. So we need to be open to how they see the world and learn from it.

The curse of the bright light

At the sand dunes, it must have been nice to enjoy the sunrise!

No, they didn’t enjoy it. We had to wake them up really early, actually before sunrise. A desert at night gets pretty cold. And climbing a sand dune is really hard. It was windy like crazy, you actually get sandblasted.

We got to the top of it, and I sat down thinking I would take these beautiful pictures of them looking at the sunrise, but actually, it was so windy they were covering and hiding. They didn’t even watch the sunrise, it was so uncomfortable due to the sand, but also light, as they are sensitive to bright light.

It was a bit stupid for me to think they would watch the sunrise, it wasn’t the best idea. But it made for funny pictures.

And they had lots of fun going down. They actually ran and rolled down in the sands, and loved it. But after the sunrise.

How much can your children see at this moment?

Their daytime vision is super good. Their field of vision is good. But at night, right now, they don’t have night vision. So whenever the light goes down, they can’t see, way before us. They get totally blind. So if at night you go out, and there is little light, they won’t be able to see anything.

Also, my daughter is really sensitive to bright light. So when she is in the sun, she always needs to wear a hat and cover her eyes. Whenever she goes from outside to inside, if it is really bright outside, it takes a long time for her eyes to adjust.

Can your children see the stars?

No. Just a few bright ones.

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The future crumbled in the blink of an eye

Mia was the first one to get the diagnosis. How did you find out about it?

It all started when she was about three years old. We realized something was wrong with her vision. During the night, she would get up and start bumping into furniture or walls.

Because it was our first kid, we didn’t really know it was a problem. But after a while, I realized something wasn’t adding up. I would hand her something in dim light, and she wasn’t able to see it while I was able to see it really well.

I took her to the optometrist and ophthalmologist for a check-up, but it’s not something we can see in the eyes in the early stage of the disease.

So they sent us to do some genetic testing. After the first panel of genetics, it came back and it was all negative. They didn’t know what she had.

But there was a research protocol at the time, so they did the whole genome for Mia, me, and Sebastien. It took almost two years before we received the results. Mia was seven when we got the diagnosis.

Finding out it’s not curable, did it push you to despair at first?

Our first reaction was disbelief and shock. When you have kids, you just have an idea of how their future’s going to look like, what our lives are going to look like. And all of a sudden, in a blink of an eye, you need to rethink all that. It is a grieving process.

So at first, you don’t believe it’s true, you think it’s a mistake. And then you get angry, you are looking for answers everywhere, get sad… But after a while, you just have to accept it. And it’s only when you accept it, you can move forward.

Elephant in the room

How did you move forward?

I started thinking about what could I do, and one thing I thought would be good for my daughter is to provide her with some tools to help her in the future. And I thought she could actually learn Braille at school, so she would already be able to read once she loses her vision.

But at school, the specialist told me that they didn’t have all the resources, that she was not blind enough, and her vision was too good to learn Braille properly so that the best thing for me to do would be to actually fill her visual memory.

And she said: “You know, put as much image in her head as you can. For example, you can look at elephants or giraffes in the books, so once she is blind, she’ll have an image to refer to.”

That’s when it clicked to me. Let’s go and show her elephants and giraffes in real life, that way she will really remember it!

And from that, Seb and I just decided that we might as well do it all in, just go to see the world and show them how beautiful the world is. We wanted to fill their visual memory with as many beautiful things as we could.

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Telling your daughter she is going to get blind

Parents often have to support fairytales of the global world we live in, from Santa Claus to the Tooth Fairy. How does it look when you have to present a truth that is not so bright to your children, as you obviously want them to be prepared for what would come?

The really hard thing about the diagnosis was not knowing whether I should tell her or not. I would ask people around me for advice. Some would say: “No, don’t tell her, she doesn’t have important symptoms, let her be a kid, and not worry about it”. Others said: “It’s better that she knows now, it’s easier”. It was really, really hard for me to make a decision on whether or not I would tell her.

But after a while, knowing my daughter, I decided it is best for her to know right away. I didn’t want to hide anything from her, and she resented me afterward. I knew she was strong enough to get that information.

I didn’t plan it, but at one lunchtime I was sitting with her and it came to the subject of disabilities. And I told her just like that, matter-of-factly: “You know the problem with your eyes, you know you will probably get blind once you are an adult”.

She thought about it for a moment, and then she said: “Oh, well, that’s not fun.” And that was the extent of her reaction.

Coping with the fact that our future might be more or less sightless would be hard for anyone, not only a 7-year-old!

At first, I thought that maybe she didn’t really understand what I was saying, but after a few days she got back to me and said: “Mommy, you know what, I think I have to keep my room clean because once I lose my vision, I need to be able to find my things, so they need to always be at the same place.” I realized that she was already thinking about the solution.

After that, I saw her a couple of times trying to get from one room in the house to the other, keeping her eyes closed. I was reassured that she did understand what was happening and she was just finding some solution on her own.

When people ask her how she feels today, she will say: “Well, today is today. My vision is good, so I will make the most out of it, and I’ll rise to the challenges when they’re there, but right now I’m just enjoying my life.” And I think it’s a good way to see it.

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Things to see before your eyes die

There are numerous lists of “things to see before you die”. Obviously, your family’s bucket list testifies that even when facing the toughest challenges, we can find greatness in small things.

More than things to see, we made a bucket list of activities we wanted to do during the trip because we didn’t know what we would see besides nice, beautiful places.

Mia really wanted to go horseback riding on the wide steppe of Mongolia. She was so happy and excited when it finally happened. When she got down from her horse, she was all teary-eyed because it was so emotional. It was such a great moment for her.

Colin’s best moment was in Tazara, the Tanzania-Zambia Railway, as he really wanted to sleep on the train. It’s a 24-hour ride that we took through Tanzania, and it’s a really old slow train so it was amazing. It would stop at all these different train stations, people would come up to the window and sell us bananas. And just sleeping on the train while it was rocking us, was really a cool moment of the trip.

Leo wanted to see Pokemons, but that might not happen. He thought Pokemons would be living in the wilderness of Japan. He also wanted to go to see the Great Wall of China, but that’s not going to happen either. His favorite moment so far was on a little hike we did on the foot of Kilimanjaro. The vegetation was so amazing, it was a really nice hike in the misty jungle.

My daughter got to see a dolphin. Seeing giraffes and elephants, we did that. The whole family enjoyed the safari. Kids were so excited to see wild animals in real life. They were very impressed with how tall the giraffe was from close up, and the same for the elephants. Safari is definitely the highlight of our trip.

As for Laurent, he wanted to drink juice on a camel. He was 4 at the time when he made the request, but he was really specific. It was not about seeing a camel, he wanted to drink juice on a camel.

Wait, just any type of juice?!

Yeah, any. It became a kind of an inside joke, we would talk about it all the time because it was really funny. And he actually got to ride a camel, and of course, he made sure he had his juice. So these were funny moments for us.

And tomorrow we are going surfing! That was on the list too, and they will try it. They love playing with waves. Let’s see how surfing goes.

They are not afraid, they can all swim. They got washed out on the beach, even the little one, I was really surprised.

When we started the trip, Laurent wasn’t 5 yet, he had to wear little floaters, but after a few weeks he just wanted to try swimming without those, and he has been swimming since then. He can cross the pool underwater, and he is like a little fish right now.

But in a lot of the best moments, Laurent’s best moment was when we went on a hot-air balloon ride in Cappadocia. We got up before sunrise, and we walked in that dark field. We couldn’t see much, but all of a sudden these huge hot-air balloons started filling up and getting lit from the fire, there were these big giant lanterns rising all around us.

We told the kids that we would see them take off, but that we couldn’t afford to get in them, so they were okay with it. But when we told them we were actually going in, they were so excited. So we got in the hot-air balloon, and it rose slowly as the sun was rising in the valley, with all those hundreds of hot-air balloons, and the color was pinkish, it was just amazing. Even Leo said: “Mommy, it looks like a dream!” And that’s really how it felt, it was so magical.

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Lemay family voyage to authentic Africa

Kids often have the most sincere but fascinating insights. Are there some specific anecdotes you could tell, quoting your children’s reactions to meeting different cultures?

When we were in Zambia, we were in a village where they didn’t have running water, they had a well. My kids were wowed, they were amazed these people had a well. They thought it was a great thing.

“So okay”, I said. “You think it’s great, here’s this huge bucket, and you need to walk over there, fill it and bring it back.” Just for them to realize it’s really fun to play with a pump for five minutes, but if you need to do it every day, it’s actually a lot of work. So they realized it is not that easy.

But then afterward, my little one was really cute. I asked him what did he think of the village, and he said: “Oh, mum, they are so lucky to have baby goats. I want to live here!”

They don’t see the world the same way. When we met the Masai, he wanted to be a Masai because they told us that men, when reaching a certain age, drink a mix of cow blood and milk just to be strong. So he said: “I want to be a Masai, I want to drink milk and blood, to be strong.” For a long time, he wanted to be a Masai.

Journey through sweet and sour

Laurent’s interest in unusual diets is extraordinary! I would imagine that the world tour with children would be complicated food-wise!

Mongolia was really challenging, for everybody. Especially because they had no vegetables, no fruits, for six weeks… We were able to find pasta and rice, with a few carrots and onions here and there, but we craved some good food.

Indonesia is amazingly good. Turkey was good. Africa was not so bad, it was actually easier than I expected. It was pretty much always the same thing, a lot of chicken and rice, and nshima/ugali, the paste made of maize. I was really worried that our kids would not like it, because it’s all gooey, and you eat it with your hands and dip it in some green sauce or whatever they serve it with. But actually, they loved it. So I was really glad about that.

Throughout the trip, they were pretty good with food.

When I traveled through Ethiopia, I always missed desserts. Traveling through countries without sweets must be a nightmare for Western kids?

Yes, that’s true. Even us as adults, in Africa we were missing sweets. They don’t eat sweet at all there. When we got to Turkey afterward, it was like Christmas! We went crazy for baklavas there. We had enough sweets for a lifetime.

Lessons on privilege and resilience

Of course, traveling through so radically different cultures is a valuable life lesson…

Definitely, we want them to realize on this trip how lucky they are. We have traveled to places where people don’t have electricity or running water, their children cannot go to school, they sometimes don’t have clothes or have really little clothes to put on, no toys.

So I wanted them to realize how precious it is to be able to get up in the morning and have good fresh water out of the faucet, that when you look at the planet, they are actually really, really privileged. Their life is quite easy.

Even if their condition is going to make their life a little harder than other people’s, in the big picture they still have a lot. They still have a lot to be grateful for. Also, they have a really nice loving family, and that’s precious.

I want them to see that and appreciate that. Not to focus on the things that are not good in their life, but really on what they could be grateful for.

Do you think this trip can make them stronger?

We want this trip to make them more resilient. With retinitis pigmentosa, what happens is that they will lose their vision, but slowly. So they are going to need to adapt all the time. They will need to adjust all their life.

For example, they might be able to drive their car, but after a while, they will have to let that go, because they won’t see well enough. And after a while, they might have to use a cane or a guide dog, because their vision won’t be good enough, and it won’t be safe for them anymore. So it will be constant readjustment, constant adaptation.

They are going to fall down, and they’ll need to get back up and find a solution. So I hope the trip will help them achieve that a little bit.

We are not staying at a 5-star hotel or traveling by a first-class plane. We are visiting little places, and sometimes when you travel, it can really get uncomfortable. There’s frustration, it can be hot, we can be hungry, we can be tired. So they need to adapt all the time. And I hope they get that from the trip. It’s going to help them become a little bit more resilient in life.

And I hope they will learn that when a situation is uncomfortable or unpleasant, if you focus on what’s not good, it doesn’t make it any better, it just makes it worse. While, if you focus on what is good in this situation, even in a bad situation, if you focus on a solution, then it makes things easier, in also that any bad situation will eventually end. And it will get better. It’s just a matter of time. So you need to keep your faith that it will get better at some point.

So where do you stay when traveling?

We usually try to sleep in a homestay or a guesthouse. It’s typically family-owned, so we feel the money is going back to the community that way, and it is also a better contact with people.

Sometimes, when you rent on Airbnb, you don’t get to meet the owner, there is nobody there, so I prefer guesthouses.

We find bookings online, but we also get a lot of references in the Family Travel Facebook group. There we get advice “try this family” for anything that is not on the web usually, it’s through a reference in traveling groups.

Childhood on the road

What about the school and other obligations that keep families usually anchored at a particular place?

We homeschool the children, but we really just do the minimum. They are going to be out of school only for a year. We do math and French, just to be sure they will be able to keep up once they get back home. We have the books, and we just follow the program.

Do they like to read school-unrelated books?

The oldest ones have their reader, so they read e-books. And they actually go through so many books! It is just crazy, because they read all the time, on the bus, at night… They read all the time!

For the youngest ones, we have audiobooks. That’s easier to carry than to have books. We play audio stories, they listen to hours and hours of stories.

They all love fantasy, they love stories with dragons. Harry Potter was a big hit, they read Percy Jackson, all fantasy series, that’s what they really like.

Do they miss their Canadian friends?

The boys, not at all. I think they are too young for that. But my daughter definitely. Because she is a little older, she misses her friend.

But recently she said: “I miss my friend, but I want to keep traveling forever.” So she is happy. She does FaceTime with her friends once in a while, to keep in touch.

Sometimes, we meet with other families that have kids, so that’s great also, to be able to bond with kids their age.

How about you? Do you miss the social life in Canada?

(Big sigh) I don’t have time to miss it.

Last week, we met some Canadian friends, a family traveling with kids, and we spent a few days together. It was really great to be able to talk. Then I realized I do miss chatting with adults.

My parents also came over, and that was great too. Especially as before the trip we didn’t get to see them that much because of COVID, so I miss my family a bit.

Burden of stuff

Do you travel with a lot of stuff?

Way too much. Not a lot compared to other families traveling, but we have two backpacks and a carry-on. And kids have little backpacks with their school stuff, little games, and stuffed animals.

It is still too much. I wish we could travel extra light. But with kids, you always want to be safe and comfortable so we carry medication, extra this and that, just to make sure everything is okay.

Do you feel traveling teaches us about minimalism, and that we do not need all these materialistic things left behind?

Yeah, we’ve all been living with three T-shirts each for six months. Like, why do we have so many clothes at home? Why do we change clothes so often? While on the road we say: “Yeah, it kind of looks clean, it doesn’t smell too bad so you can wear it again.”

I can imagine it gets more complicated when changing climate zones, from Mongolia to Southeast Asia. Do you get rid of clothes, or get new ones?

When our parents came, we had our coats sent back to Canada. When things get broken, we change them. But we really don’t need to buy new clothes. My kids are skinny, and it’s even hard to find clothes for them.

Now we are shopping for a bathing suit for my daughter, and we are in a Muslim country, so it’s pretty hard. We’ve been to a shopping center, and there is no bathing suit whatsoever. I don’t know where I’m going to find it. Hopefully, at some surf shop around here, I can find something.

Besides photographs, do you take any souvenirs from the places you visit?

We can’t carry anything in our backpacks, we are already full. When we know my parents are coming for a visit, we take little souvenirs we could send by them.

For example, our driver in Mongolia was like family to us, because we spent six weeks with him. He gave us some gifts when we left. We couldn’t just say we don’t want it, and we are going to get rid of it. We kept it and sent it home.

But otherwise, we can’t take physical souvenirs. That’s why I take so many pictures. That’s what will be left of the trip.

Connecting with the world through Instagram and media

Your children are not the only visually impaired kids exploring the world with you. There is a group of students “traveling” with you in a way, through following your social media stories on Facebook and Instagram Plein Leurs Yeux accounts. How does it work?

That school is really close to our home. The teacher knew about my trip, so she started to follow me on Facebook and share it with her students. She has this huge board where she can project the pictures because some of them still have some vision left.

What they do is they read the post which gives them description and information on where we are, and then the other kids or her describe all the pictures. And they actually often comment on my posts. So that’s pretty cool. Afterward, she shows them the map of the country where we are at.

I think it’s a really fun adventure, and of course, I relate to that, I’m just glad to be able to share with them.

Your story connected with many people. It became a great platform for speaking out. But is media attention overwhelming? How do you cope with it?

I did CNN, Sunday Times, People magazine, Global Mail in Canada, I did some news channels all over the world, I’ve been live in Dubai for the news. Honestly, every day I receive dozens of requests. So it’s been totally crazy. I didn’t see that coming at all.

But I am glad to share this story, because of the feedback I get from it. And it’s really surprising that on social media today I receive only good things.

Cures of care

What kind of reactions do you get?

People are reaching out to thank me for sharing the story, or they share their own stories because they are going through similar things. So they are sending me good vibes.

I get a lot of prayers and a lot of recommendations for natural medicine that I should try. That’s a lot sometimes, this whole list of things that could “cure” you from all diseases.

I have people sending something every day. But it all comes from a good place. Even if it’s really weird, people are simply caring. I’m just glad it’s so positive. So that’s why I am happy to share my story because I feel people are getting good from it.

What type of cures do they recommend?

Currently, Ayurvedic medicine apparently does miracles. There is a guy in every country curing you with these. Also, a lot of Bible studies that are supposed to clear everything you have (laughter). Organic barley from Australia that should be able to cure the disease. Oh, sweet potato in lye!

Sometimes, the craziest things I hear, it’s just really weird.

Some people say it comes from the past, that we need to heal the past and consult with this and this to heal their disease.

It’s really actually amazingly interesting what people believe in such a wide range of places. It’s a fun experiment in some ways.

Do you mind if I ask if you are religious?

I don’t mind. But I am not. They are contacting me from many different religions. From Christians to Muslims, Buddhists, and Hindus. It’s really sweet and caring, it is good.

The path to a solution

You do see life beyond “vision or no vision”, you accept it and move forward. I assume people who get confronted with an incurable disease, do get into despair and are rather willing to invest resources into finding any kind of cure that would eradicate the problem. That’s why they support this whole industry of alternative medicines.

Yeah, and for some people it does work. Sometimes, when you believe in something, it does work, just because you believe in it so much. But I trust science too much. So I need to see studies. I’m really a logical person.

Also, studies don’t tell you if and when the children would completely lose their vision.

Yeah, but the thing is that they are already losing it. So for sure, they’ll lose a good part of it. They might see a little bit. But with central vision, you still need a cane because you’ll bump into people or walls. It’s really hard to go around with just a central vision.

But yeah, we don’t know how long they have, so we’re just going to make the best of it right now.

You know, for them it’s just normal. I never try to approach it as something bad, as something sad in their life. It’s just their path. They have different paths and they’ll be able to rise to the challenge when challenges come.

So they don’t feel sorry for themselves. And I don’t want them to, I’m working really hard for them not to feel sorry for themselves. You know, you just find solutions.

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Bert terHart is the ninth person who managed to circumnavigate the world in a solo non-stop trip, using only traditional navigational tools

While the COVID-19 pandemic shut down world economies and quarantined entire countries, this man was writing history, experiencing a quite different form of self-isolation. Rocked by the rough ocean waves, with no continent in sight, it was a definition of social distancing. During the majority of his trip, the closest humans were the astronauts on the International Space Station!

On October 26^th, 2019, Bert terHart left Victoria on Vancouver Island, and rounded the five great southern capes (Cape Horn in Chile, Cape Agulhas in South Africa, Cape Leeuwin in Western Australia, South East Cape in Tasmania, and South Cape in New Zealand), before returning home on July 18^th, 2020. For 267 days, he did not step on firm ground.   

His solitary home was Seaburban, a family sailboat built in 1987. With the navigational help of a sextant, pen-and-paper, and log tables, the dangerous journey of sailing around the world luckily finished as an epic adventure story. Ber terHart is here to tell it!

For more lessons on the dangers of traveling, read about the riskiest situations from my journeys!

The journey worth the risk

There are many ways to go around the world, and a bunch of them don’t require nine months like yours did. The same as when they see a person risking life to climb the highest mountains only to step on the top, many will see your extraordinary journey and ask: why?

The first question I’m usually asked is ‘why’. It’s also the most difficult to answer as there are a hundred of different whys each with its own rich context. For me, there were physical, emotional, mental, and spiritual whys I had in mind. There were interpersonal whys focused on motivating others. There were whys associated with doing something that would outlive me. Any of the ones I’ve mentioned could fill a book. And they probably will if I can’t pair down what I’ve been writing so far.

I think that one of the most interesting whys, is why did the trip resonate with so many people? What is it about someone pitting themselves against such a task that is so compelling for so many? That’s an interesting, nuanced question. It also, or at least I think it offers some insight into why that question is asked so often.

For the other sailors and mountaineers that I’ve spoken to, it’s not “only to step on the top”. Indeed, the top has very little to do with why they take the risks. The journey, the process is worth the risk. The top is simply a measure of where one journey starts and another begins. Similarly, for the adventurers I know, the top is not a bucket-list item to be checked off. It’s another way of saying ‘next’.

The most succinct why I can give you is this: Why not? To fill in the blanks, ask yourself why not choose to do something extraordinary? Or adventurous? Exploratory? Or transformative?

One Canadian family had very clear reasons for taking a trip around the world. They wanted to fill visual memories of their children losing their eyesight. Read our interview with Edith Lemay!

Bert terHart grew up with adventure

Tell us a bit about how you grew up! Did you develop an interest in early-world explorers in childhood?

I grew up on the Canadian prairies. My father taught me to sail on a small dam that was created to provide cooling water for a coal-fired power plant. Estevan and Boundary Dam are about as far removed from a solo, non-stop circumnavigation via the 5 great capes as one might imagine. Nonetheless, I learned to love sailing, science, and adventure in equal measure there.

I also gained an appreciation of the early explorers and surveyors that trekked sea to sea to sea across the great plains, mountain ranges, and vast wilderness that much of Canada is today. That appreciation blossomed when I came to live on the west coast of Canada where the wake and footsteps of Cook, Bligh, Vancouver, MacKenzie, LaPerouse, Thompson, and Bodega y Quadra, just to name a few, can be seen and found to this day. They are, in fact, right outside my front door. Their experiences, shared or otherwise, have fascinated me for decades.

Itinerary at the mercy of the weather

What were your itinerary goals and navigational plans when you left Victoria, Canada, your home, and replaced it with a sailboat?

An attempt to sail around the world leaving from the north-west coast of the Americas is bounded by the tropical storms and hurricanes spawned off the west coast of Mexico in the summer and fall months in the Northern Hemisphere and the weather you can expect to face in the Southern Ocean. More specifically, it would be suicidal to try and sail a small boat through a hurricane in the tropical eastern Pacific or around Cape Horn in the dead of a Southern Hemisphere winter. That translates into leaving the northwest coast of America no earlier than September and no later than November.

Once you set a date between September and November and leave on that date, the rest of the trip is pretty much cast in stone. The boat will only go so fast and the weather, outside of what is known by climatological means, will be what it will be. I had hoped to:

1. Leave by the 1st of October 2019
2. Clear Cape Horn at the beginning of December
3. Clear Cape Agulhas at the beginning of January
4. Clear Cape Leeuwin mid to late February
5. Clear South East Cape at the beginning of March
6. Clear South Cape mid-March
7. Return mid-May 2020

Sailing around the world – a true solitude

In reality, I assume there is no such thing as a “solo journey around the world”. Who were the people supporting you and how?

I would disagree with this. It is hard to articulate, let alone imagine just how alien and remote most of the world’s oceans are. This is especially true in the Southern Ocean. It’s one thing to say ‘thousands of miles from the land’, or ‘the nearest person to me was on the International Space Station’, or perhaps ‘it’ll take me 6 weeks to get to shore’ and something completely and utterly different to live it entirely and utterly alone.

There is no one and no thing that can help, do, decide, or make you do anything no matter how big or small, no matter how trivial or life-threatening, other than you. It is impossible for anyone, save a minuscule few who have done a very similar thing, to have an understanding of how alone you are.

Of course, there are people genuinely concerned for your safety and well-being. And people supportive of your efforts. But that support can never be conflated with them being there and somewhere rendering the trip something other than solo.

Solitude is a challenge that Tom Turcich also faced on his adventure around the world - he circumnavigated it on foot, becoming the tenth person ever to do so!

Navigating between tradition and technology

We could count people who managed to encircle the globe via the five great southern capes, without stopping and without GPS, on two hands. Did you say goodbye to all technology?

I am the ninth person to circumnavigate, solo, non-stop around the world using only traditional navigational tools. The first two did it as part of the original Golden Globe Race (1969). The third was Chay Blyth (1971) who incidentally sailed against the prevailing winds and therefore the ‘wrong way’ around. The next 5 did it as part of the reincarnation of the Golden Globe Race (2018). I am the ninth, the first North or South American, and the first to do so leaving from the West Coast.

Traditional navigational tools imply a sextant, tables, pencil, paper, and a watch. I used no electronic navigational tools or aids. No calculators, no GPS, no SatNav, Loran, or anything of the kind.

I used non-traditional technology for communications including single side-band (SSB) and VHF radio, Automatic Identification System (AIS) to warn other vessels of my presence, and an Iridium GO! satellite link for email and limited voice communications. I used a laptop connected to either the SSB or the Iridium GO! to receive weather forecasts.

50 shades of rough

How did the weather serve you? It must have been rough at times?

I served at the mercy of the weather always. Calm or storm, I was enslaved to the weather as any sailboat would be. Rough is relative. Rough in the Strait of Georgia or the North Pacific doesn’t begin to compare to rough in the Southern Ocean.

The only way to sleep for the majority of the trip was to strap myself down to my bunk. Even during calms, the motion of the boat is chaotic as the swell and waves persist long after the wind has evaporated. To work at the chart table required strapping myself down onto the seat at the navigation station. At sea on a small boat, it’s rough ALL the time.

Did you ever question your decision on making this expedition?

No. Once you’ve committed to going, there is precious little room if any at all for second-guessing that decision. While at sea, there’s no room whatsoever for second-guesses. It is literally do or die. You would always be right, but to second-guess as opposed to acting is tantamount to disaster or worse.

You knew that the boat would possibly not survive. Was there ever a plan B?

I had a life raft and an Emergency Position Indicating Radio Beacon (EPIRB). Realistically, if the boat were to sink and I had to take to the raft and hope, the probability of surviving such an event is extremely low.

The most violent environment on Earth

Sailing around the world is dangerous. Have you ever thought you might not make it?

My life was truly endangered the moment I entered the Southern Ocean and remained so until I left some four and one-half months later. It is the most extreme, most violent, most hostile environment on the planet. And that’s not including the most remote. Remote as in no reasonable chance of help or rescue.

The severe storms in the Southern Oceans are vast swaths of hurricane-force winds encompassing thousands of square miles of ocean with waves the size of 4 or 5-story apartment buildings. To say that my life was in danger is not hyperbole.

I never thought I wouldn’t make it. I did, however, worry constantly about keeping the boat in one piece. Like any machine, constant harsh use in extreme conditions takes a severe toll on everything. You have a very small window to get in and get out. Pushing that window means risking mechanical failures and breakdowns that can quickly cascade out of control.

The day of the injury

Injuring oneself on the boat, with nobody nearby to help, could be already nerve-racking as an idea. You had such a moment, but how did you overcome it and found the courage to continue?

Any injury, no matter how minor, is a recipe for disaster. A small cut, constantly exposed to salt water, can easily become infected, turn septic and result in an excruciating, lonely, ignoble end. I did everything I could to avoid injury. It was the biggest concern.

I turned around and let go. Crumpled, I laid in agony and unable to move. I had hurt my back but just how badly, I didn’t knowBert terHart

Avoiding injury requires constant vigilance and attention. Standing in the cockpit and hanging on with both hands to the safety bar that forms part of the main companionway dodger, I turned to look behind me and for some reason, let go. I was immediately tossed some 5 feet (1,5 m, Ed.) across the cockpit and folded in half backward over the stainless steel bars that protect the compass. Crumpled on the cockpit sole, I laid in agony and unable to move. I had hurt my back but just how badly, I didn’t know.

Fortunately, the weather was relatively mild and forecast to be that way for at least two days. I spent those days strapped to my bunk, barely able to deal with the minimum required to sail the boat even in those conditions. Anything not absolutely necessary was out of the question.

I don’t believe it was the courage to overcome. It was rather the simple necessity of continuing. Other than quitting and resigning one’s self to whatever the fates may hold, there’s nothing else to do but continue. I rested for those two days as best as I could and then set about sailing home.

Bert terHart, the luckiest man alive

You are 62 now. Some people of your age have trouble going up the staircase, not even imagining how it is having waves tossing you around the boat like a puppet while you are just trying to use the loo. I wanted to ask you about the secret of your fitness, but then I’ve also read that you broke your ribs three weeks before this odyssey! You really have guts!

I ended up leaving at the end of October as opposed to the beginning as I had fallen off the mast in mid-September. That fall resulted in 4 fractured ribs and a collapsed lung. No one expects to survive a 55’ fall (almost 17-meter height, Ed.), let alone walk away from it. I don’t know how I survived. I was air-lifted by helicopter to the nearest trauma center equipped to deal with someone who has massive internal injuries. The doctor that saw me into the helicopter was not convinced I would survive the flight.

The head of the surgical team that admitted me said on my release that the smartest thing I could do at that moment was buying a lottery ticket. He figured I was the luckiest guy alive and certainly one of the luckiest patients he had ever seen. I limped out of the emergency room using my father’s cane 40 minutes after arriving.

I don’t have any fitness secrets. Other than rugby and Tae Kwon Do (I’m a third-degree black belt), I don’t do anything too different than I’ve always done.

Age is just a number, claim two Texas ladies that traveled around the world in 80 days at age 81. Meet TikTok Traveling Grannies!

Dangers of sleep deprivation

Traveling without a companion is not only about social distancing. It’s also about not being able to share responsibilities with anyone. How did you decide that it was safe for you to sleep, for instance?

Everything you do is done so as to optimize something. Whether it’s the direction you’re going, the weather you’re trying to avoid or catch up, how fast you could or should be going, when it’s OK to eat, to navigate, or to sleep. When it’s not safe to do it, you don’t. You simply don’t have a choice.

If it is safe to do something, or you think it will be safe sometime in the future, then that’s what you do. In some ways, you live a very regimented life. It just so happens that you’re not the one regimenting.

Being alone at sea for a long time can bring a person to a state where reality and fantasy mix. As suggested in the “Life of Pi”, one can even start talking to tigers and discovering phantasmagorical islands… Have you traveled to any of those hallucinatory places?

The only sailors I know of who have hallucinated as you describe are those that have been injured, were sick, or were seriously sleep-deprived. Hallucinations are not at all uncommon to survivors of extreme events and there are numerous stories of sailors (Joshua Slocum after a bout of food poisoning) and mountaineers (Jeff Beck surviving on Everest after having been given up for dead at least twice) coming to mind.

Being alone at sea I believe is neither necessary nor sufficient. A serious injury or ailment would be sufficient. I was never in that state so, happily, I was able to keep my wits!

The ocean as a spiritual desert

I hope you do not mind me asking, but are you yourself religious? People go to the solitude of monasteries, to deserts and mountains, to talk directly to God. Piscine Patel from Yann Martel’s novel went through a peculiar spiritual journey too. Did your view of religion change in any way after this trip?

I am religious in that I would argue that there is something far greater than me in this universe. What that is, I am unsure. I am sure, however, that it is everywhere and all around us. I am continually amazed and astounded by the natural beauty and wonder that exists everywhere we choose to look.

Yet, in no way did I embark on my circumnavigation in the hopes of finding God. You could make a very good argument that such a journey is in fact an abdication of your responsibilities, perhaps even your duty, as a human.

That said, alone, thousands of miles from land and help, with nothing between you and the universe save for your wits and a bit of plastic, it is impossible to ignore that which is greater than one’s self.

Where have all the whales gone?

Which animals did you encounter?

My encounters with marine mammals were extremely rare and far less than I expected. Encounters with dolphins and porpoises are very common and on my other trips, they’re almost a daily occurrence. Not so on my circumnavigation. Whale encounters, while less frequent, can also be expected. When traveling in the Northeastern Pacific and the Gulf of Alaska, encounters with Humpback, Blue, Killer, Gray, and Minke whales are normal. I was shocked and disappointed that on only one occasion did any whale come near the boat. Similarly, I saw no evidence of them as spouts or breaches.

Would you have an interpretation for that?

Why that is, I can only speculate. I can say that the industrialized commercial fishing fleet is alive and well on the high seas. The population of pelagic seabirds, especially Albatross, has been decimated by a drastic reduction in food supplies by commercial fisheries. I can well imagine that similar industrialized fishing pressure throughout the food chain has resulted in reduced populations of marine mammals and other species that occupy the top tiers of those ecosystems.

If you want to see the whales in their natural habitat, check our experience during the Tenerife whale watching trip!

Regarding the constant entertainment afforded by those species of birds that spend the vast majority of their lives on the open ocean, the Albatross reigns supreme. There are many species of Albatross scattered all over the globe, but the one species that symbolizes all that the Southern Ocean is to sailors is the Wandering Albatross. It is huge, curious, almost friendly, and a wonder. The smaller species, like the Black-Browed Albatross, were more frequent visitors but no less majestic. Of all the birds that accompanied me around the world, the one that captured my attention was the smallest of them all, Wilson’s Stormy Petrel. They are, in fact, the smallest warm-blooded creature to breed in the Antarctic and one of the most numerous bird species in the world. They were with me through every kind of weather imaginable.

Yes we can

Were sea fish your source of protein, or you mainly lived from canned food? How did you deal with food rationing?

I caught no fish. The open ocean is like a vast desert, as most fish, especially those that one person can reasonably eat, are limited to coastal waters and the tropics.

Double-smoked sausage lasts an extraordinarily long time if cared for and canned tuna, salmon, chicken, and ham last indefinitely as long as the cans remain dry.

I rationed food the minute I left the dock. In that regard, I was extremely disciplined and rarely wavered. I had calculated how much food I needed and had provisions on board for more than eight months. Unfortunately, I made a very serious, very basic error.

On other trips, my appetite had waned. I based my caloric intake on my normal diet thinking that, like on my other trips at sea, my appetite would reduce. Thus, my nearly nine months of provisions would be ample with lots to spare.

It turned out that my appetite was huge and I was eating fully twice as much as was normal. 9 months of provisions divided by two makes 4 ½. I very quickly realized I was going to run out of food if I didn’t drastically reduce my rations. As a result, I was down to less than 800 calories a day. At 800/day, I would have enough to complete the trip albeit the last month or so would be rice and oats only.

The beauty and the beast of the ocean

Besides an extreme physical feat, this also had to be a really emotional journey. What were your highs and lows?

The lows were definitely being becalmed. I was becalmed for more than 50 days. Going nowhere, the boat slamming around, barely able to move around the boat all while mowing through precious food and water is emotionally, physically, and mentally challenging to say the least.

The highs have to be the evenings and early nights. The entire universe bursts into being in a way unlike anywhere else I’ve ever been. Moreover, it’s all for you. There is no one else there to see the show.

It certainly sounds like a privilege. Can you be more precise about what have you seen? I am aware we live in highly light-polluted societies, so being on such a boat could be an astronomer’s dream come true. Is that the main reason behind it?

The near-constant haze that hangs near the surface of the ocean obscures the night sky to some degree. There are occasions, however, when the haze clears off and the skies are otherworldly. It is only ‘pitch-dark’ when the cloud cover is thick and low. Otherwise, even on moonless nights, the visibility at night is remarkably good. When the moon is full and the skies are clear, it is astonishing how bright it is. You could read a newspaper by the light of the stars, planets, and moon.

The twilight hours, just after the sun has set, and the moon is yet to appear, were magical. There are only a few places on land that can come close to the vast expanse of the heavens that are on display for anyone willing to get on a boat and sail away from shore. The expanse alone is a thrill. Realizing that it is for you and you alone is humbling beyond words. Arrayed as it is, there is nowhere else anywhere on the Earth like it. As twilight fades and night falls, layer upon layer of splendor reveals until one is at an absolute loss for words.

What were the most beautiful aspects of your voyage?

This is not an easy question. What is beauty? What aspect of the voyage shall we talk about? I think witnessing how perfectly adapted to that vast wilderness of sea and sky the tiniest of creatures were, and how effortlessly they existed there, was a privilege afforded only a handful of humans. I would say there is something beautiful in that.

Social distancing at extreme

The pandemic happened and the world changed while you were away. The planet went into lockdown. Some protested against the limiting of their “freedom of movement”. Some get dramatic even if they need to self-isolate for 10 days! You’ve spent 267 days alone at the sea. Is there a lesson there you could share?

There is opportunity everywhere. It comes in all shapes and forms. In no way am I trying to diminish the suffering that Covid-19 has wrought. The lockdowns do represent an opportunity to reconnect with family and loved ones, to take the time to read important books, or to indulge in a hobby that you’ve missed or given up on. My own father took the lockdown as an opportunity to brush up on his Indonesian and Malayan.

Lockdown or not, we live in a country that still allows us to choose what we do and how we do it. I would say choose and if possible, choose wisely.

What things did you miss the most on this journey?

Beyond the obvious like my wife Nani, my children, and my family, I missed the simple things. The things you take for granted. Sitting down to eat. Putting a pencil down and finding it in the same place 10 seconds later. Dry socks.

After returning, you experienced a sort of stardom. How do you cope with it?

Universally, the feedback has been extraordinary. People are fascinated, curious, motivated, and inspired. The attention has been somewhat overwhelming but incredibly uplifting. I would argue that anything you may have heard, or perhaps believe, about the cynical nature of humankind is not just unwarranted, but flat-out wrong.

Bert terHart, the safest person in the world?

Paradoxically, embarking on this rather risky adventure earned you the title of “the safest man on the planet”. Pandemic aside, what is your view on the notion of playing safe in relation to still living life to the fullest?

Although at zero risk of getting the Coronavirus, I was in no way, shape, or form the safest man on the planet. The Shoreteam and I took a lot of flak, especially from the sailing community, about that. During the time I was in the Southern Ocean, I was perhaps the least safe person on the planet. I just couldn’t die from Covid-19. Everything else, however, was on the table.

In the Southern Ocean, I was perhaps the least safe person on the planet. But how many people die in their sleep every day? My time will come as it must. All I have is my nowBert terHart

There is no safe. Safe is an illusion. My friend, Glen Wakefield, is a testament to that (Editor’s note: Glen Wakefield died from a stroke while sailing solo to the southern tip of South America, in September 2020).

How many people die in their sleep every day? Or are killed walking across the road? Falling down the stairs? My time will come as it must. All I have is my now. What do you think I should do? How do you think that time is best spent?

Of course, there are risks. But there are rewards beyond our imaginations if we can put aside what we perceive the risks to be. I will tell you that one risks far more than I in seeking safe harbor.

If you don't find taking risks stimulating, check out which are the safest countries in the world for travel!

New adventures on the horizon

Was this your “Mount Everest”, or are you already dreaming of some new adventures?

Oh no. I have other adventures planned. All following the same thread: An attempt to discover something about our world and our shared experiences by following in the footsteps of the great adventurers and explorers who have shown us the way.

Are those adventures a secret?

I plan to sail back to the Aleutians next year and sometime shortly after that into the Eastern Arctic. If I can talk my wife into another cold-water adventure, we’ll hopefully head back down to Patagonia and beyond.

With respect to the first, I plan to walk across Canada in the footsteps of Alexander MacKenzie, David Thompson, Henry Kelsey, Jean Baptiste de la Verendrye, and Simon Fraser. By threading portions of their journeys together, I’ll be able to walk from coast to coast navigating only with a sextant, tables, pencil, paper, and a watch. The idea is to compile a then-and-now retrospection of their shared journeys and experiences in the exact places where they were.

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