London, Jan 18 (Inditop.com) A naval officer bidding to become the first Indian to sail solo around the world has reached the half-way point – a remote British colony in the south Atlantic – to receive a warm welcome by locals and officers of the Royal Navy.
Commander Dilip Donde of the Indian Navy sailed into Stanley, capital of the Falkland Islands, Friday after completing the third and most demanding leg of the adventure – billed as harder than scaling the Everest.
A large number of islanders – many on horseback – turned up to watch Donde being escorted to the port by a flotilla led by a Royal Navy frigate and Lynx helicopter commanded by the head of the British armed forces in the South Atlantic, Commodore Philip Thicknesse, and an array of yachts and boats sailed by locals.
“Now I can wear a ring on my left ear,” said Donde, referring to an old folklore that pirates who had sailed around the Cape were fit for the ornament, as he was received by Thicknesse and the Indian naval attache in London, Commodore Pradyut Banerjee.
Donde, who started out on his sailboat Mhadei from Mumbai August 2009, ushered in the New Year in a part of the high seas dubbed the Fearsome 50s – named after the latitude and fierce gale force winds of the southern Pacific.
This leg of the journey, which began in New Zealand, took 34 days to complete. Donde has now logged 12,600 nautical miles of his 21,600-nms trip.
“Rounding Cape Horn was one of the most satisfying moments of my life,” Donde said, according to a message received from Stanley Monday.
With the Mhadei displaying the tricolour – said to be the first time the Indian flag has flown in the Falklands – Donde was escorted along the Stanley waterfront by a flotilla of 12 boats, including a kayak.
After a two-week halt, Mhadei is scheduled to start out again around the end of January for Cape Town and is expected to reach Mumbai in May.
rounak