Wavewalker – Breaking Free, by Suzanne Heywood
uzanne Heywood’s story is extraordinary, or at least it became extraordinary when, one morning, her father announced to Suzanne, then aged six, together with brother Jon and mother Mary, that the family would be abandoning their home, school and conventional middle-class life in Warwick to sail around the world in the wake of Captain Cook. After finding a suitable boat – a large, wooden, ‘poop-sterne’ schooner – and finishing the fit-out, the family set sail from Plymouth on England’s south west coast for a far-flung sailing odyssey that lasted a decade, taking in Brazil, South Africa, Australia, New Zealand, Samoa, Hawaii, Tahiti, the Line Islands, the Solomons and quite a bit more. The idea of leaving home and taking to the seas on an epic family odyssey like this sounds like an adventure, but what unfolds is a tragedy, with Sue left to wash up and cook for
