by Cy Zoerner

The question "Why do people do what they do?" is endlessly fascinating, perhaps because its answer might tell us why we do what we do. For centuries philosophers, theologians, poets, artists, humanists, and more recently behavioral scientists have pondered the question.

Most fascinating of all is the mystery of singlehanding. WHY? Why do people sail off to suffer isolation and loneliness in an alien and hostile environment? Why do they turn their backs on human kind and human comforts?

Why do they wish to endure every terrifying assault the sea can offer? Why do they put themselves in harms way in order to extricate themselves? Why do they feel this need to test themselves? What drives them to these extremes?

All these questions and more have been asked of California singlehander Frank Guernsey.

Most of the reasons ascribed to Guernsey's voyaging are unoriginal, having been used to characterize singlehanders everywhere. Most are derogatory. The knee-jerk reaction of most landlubbers is he's crazy. Yet what crazy man could spend years planning voyages of thousands of miles, anticipating every contingency? Can a lunatic study the sea, its winds and currents, and use this knowledge to reach destinations thousands of miles over the horizon? What madman could prepare a modest 22.5-foot sloop to brave the Southern Oceans or provision her tiny hold with six months of food? What mental case could adjust his shoreside business to run smoothly during his months at sea?

Like singlehanders since Joshua Slocum's time, Captain Guernsey is accused of a death wish (Slocum was the first man to sail around the world alone.). If a death wish possessed the Redondo Beach sailor, he would have been dead long ago. He would not have returned from his initial voyage down Baja California in 1978. Nor in subsequent years would he have survived singlehanded voyages to Hawaii, Tahiti, Japan, or Uruguay via Cape Horn. Any one of his 289 days at sea would have provided ample opportunity for him to fulfill a death wish.

Glory, fame, and notoriety are often offered as explanations for Guernsey's voyages. "He's just showing off." Dockside pundits glibly assign such reasons to singlehanders from any port. Applied to Guernsey, such motivations seem absurd since he shuns the media and departs on his exploits all but secretly, known only to family and a few friends. He returns without fanfare. Fearing that his attempts will be considered stunts, Guernsey remains reluctant even to discuss his accomplishments.

Some docksiders have credited Guernsey's exploits to an irresistible drive toward gaining immortality, setting records, or making money. For a man so unassuming in the present, it seems incongruous that he would wish for prominence in the future. In fact he claims no records, even though considering his endeavors in small boats, he could rightly do so.

In terms of making money, it took me almost a year to overcome Frank's reluctance to write a book about rounding Cape Horn in a 24-foot boat. Non-writers often think that the publication of a book automatically means fortune. The possibility of making a profit, however, meant little to him.

In the end he proved susceptible to the argument that he owed it to other sailors to describe his experience rounding the primordial cape. As expected, the year's work in preparing "Racing the Ice to Cape Horn" provided only a modest return.

Local wags have also claimed that Captain Guernsey's adventures are driven by escape, escape from his wife, escape from work, and escape from society. Every singlehander since the beginning of time has probably been accused of the same faults. The fact is, however, that he has been married to the same woman for 25 years, the same woman who immediately flies to greet him wherever he ends his voyages. If seeking to escape her, he's making a poor job of it.

He's making an equally poor job of escaping work. Preparing for major voyages is hard, tedious, time-consuming work, especially while holding a full-time "day job." In addition, accepting no sponsorships, he must work all the harder to produce revenues to outfit his nautical expeditions while meeting shoreside obligations.

There is some truth in the notion that he seeks relief from society. But what citizen of a megalopolis like Los Angeles has never wished to escape the smog, congestion, traffic jams, crime, car alarms, and barking dogs of daily big-city life?

One new-age local observer believes that Guernsey was born in the wrong body about 1,000 years too late. Instead of a mild-mannered insurance man, he should have been born a Viking, or perhaps Columbus. He should have lived in the days of great sea exploits and exploration.

A poop-deck psychologist offered a different idea to account for Guernsey's voyages. "He's trying to impress his father. I've met the old boy, and believe me he's hard to please. After his father's gone, Frank will never sail again."

An interesting theory, but Guernsey's greatest attempts have been made after his father's death several years ago.

If none of these explanations characterizes Guernsey's voyages, what does? He is drawn to voyaging, not driven.

Frank Guernsey is an adventurer.

Adventure expresses the nature of this man's character. To the core of his heart and soul he is an adventurer, recognized by membership in the prestigious Los Angeles Adventurers Club. Adventure draws him to the most remote oceans on the planet. He attempts, he risks, and he ventures on the sea because he loves its mystique. His voyages would daunt most other sailors, even brave ones. Though he cringes to be accused of bravery, his courage speaks for itself because with a full measure of human fear, sometimes unbelievably prolonged, he continues to function.

When the smug routines of the land pall on him, the sea calls, luring him with the sure promise of adventure. To him, as to Jan de Hartog, "The call of the sea ceases only when it is obeyed." He has answered this call five times, most recently with an attempt to sail nonstop and alone from Redondo Beach, California, to Cape Town, South Africa, via Cape Horn aboard a 22.5-foot Pearson sloop.

And there is a second lure. In the best of American traditions-Thoreau and Slocum come to mind-Frank Guernsey seeks the independent life. Life on land demands interdependency and many times dependency. Both conditions Guernsey holds anathema. His independence compels him to reject both sponsorships and product endorsements. On the fair sea, the sea that judges him by his competence and nothing else, he finds the independence he seeks-utter self-reliance.

Unlike the motives often believed to drive him and other singlehanders, Frank Guernsey does what he does because adventure and independence draw him into isolated horizons.

(April 26, 2003)

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