Atlantic rower Zara Lachlan: ‘The total isolation made me hallucinate’
All alone, rowing across the Atlantic Ocean, Zara Lachlan reckons the hardest challenge she faced was when her phone broke - leaving her with nothing to listen to except the wind, waves and her own thoughts for two months.
After rowing for 16 hours a day and sleeping for just two hours at a time for 97 days straight, Zara, from Cambridge, has become the youngest person ever - and first woman - to row solo, unsupported and non-stop from mainland Europe to mainland South America.
On the way she has faced a broken oar, close encounters with orca and sharks, was nearly mown down by a huge ship and suffered a bite from a vicious fish.
Now the 21-year-old physics student is back on dry land after arriving in Grand Port Maritime de la Guyane, south of Rémiré, in French Guiana, on Saturday (1 February).
In spite of the enormous physical demands of the journey of 3,600 nautical miles, Zara says the mental challenge was the hardest to endure.
“I had a lot of hallucinations,” she tells the Cambridge Independent.
“I think I had most of them because I didn't have anything to listen to. I broke my primary phone when I capsized, and so I didn't have any songs or podcasts or audiobooks or anything to listen to. You've just got the repetitive noise of the waves, you've got nothing else to look at, then your brain just makes things up. But I'm also sure that the lack of sleep contributed to that. I lost my phone on day 40, so I had 57 days with nothing.”
Asked to describe what the hallucinations were like, Zara says: “Oh, great fun! I was away with the fairies, and I had a great time. It was a lovely place to be, but most of the time I was aware it was a hallucination, and I would see grey horses running - when the waves break and it turns white, they would turn into horses. That happened all the time.”
She also heard noises, some of which could have indicated an emergency.
“I had a lot of hallucinations of beeping, because the boat beeps if something goes wrong. If something's breaking, it'll beep,” says Zara. “I had that at least every day.”
Zara is only the second person in history to complete this extraordinary voyage, which began on the shores of Portugal on 27 Octoberat 9am UTC.
“It was just incredible to see land as I approached. French Guiana is actually quite flat so I wasn’t that far from the coast when I first spotted it,” she says.
“It felt like it was not only the end of the challenge but the culmination of a longer mission to get me here, to prepare me for this challenge and then to take on the Atlantic – and make it!
“It was tough. At some points really tough. But it's in those moments you find out what you’re really made of. In many ways I didn’t really have a choice - I just had to grit my teeth and row.
“I wasn’t physically exhausted, just mentally. It was like: I'm done now, let me stop. But it did feel very good to moor up and then to take my first steps on dry land.
“Stepping onto land after 97 days at sea was really strange. I’ve got so used to the motion of the boat on the water that despite the solidity of the ground – I felt like I was swaying.
“I’m not sure it’s fully sunk in yet. However, it goes without saying that I took on a massive challenge and won – nothing beats that feeling.”
When she arrived she had rowed non-stop for a day and a half.
“I could only see land from about five miles away. And then I had to row all the way up the river, so it was still quite a long way until I got to stop. But it was a very busy day. I arrived at 4.20pm local time, but I'd been rowing since Thursday at 11.55pm so I'd been rowing for over a day and a half without sleeping or stopping properly because the currents were too strong. I was really worried about missing the river and missing the whole country, because I wanted a nap, so I thought I'd just push through.
“I saw a rainforest for the first time on my way in. It’s a very, very pretty country.”
There to greet Zara as she arrived were her parents.
“My mum cried, so she couldn't really say much, but they were both very happy to see me and see that I was OK and that I'd made it, because it was quite stressful for them to have their daughter in the Atlantic and only see a little tracker, so I don't think they got much sleep over the course of the three months,” she says.
Although Zara is keen to play down the dangers, they had good reason to be worried. At one point, she had to send what could have been a final text message to her coach to tell him what was happening in case she went missing.
“I had a close encounter with a big ship, which was probably the most dangerous thing that happened to me,” says Zara.
“Even though I had a capsize from a big wave, the weather and the animals in the ocean are absolutely nothing compared to getting hit.
“It was dark, it was early in the morning, and they weren't picking up the radio, and they were heading right for me. I saw them on my radar, and I would have been on theirs, but they clearly weren't paying attention. I used a white flare to try and get their attention, and they still didn't pick up the radio. They only missed me by point one five of a nautical mile, which is absolutely nothing.
“They moved much, much quicker than me. I was doing everything that I could do, and I messaged my coach, just in case, saying, ‘If something does go horribly wrong and you don’t hear from me, it's because I've just been hit’. They literally just missed me by chance. I'm very unhappy with them, but they'll never know that, because they never picked up the radio.”
Another tricky point was dealing with harsh weather conditions around the Canaries.
“It felt like all of the winds and weather were against me. I was pushing hard for 21 hours a day and going just 11 miles. It was soul crushing.”
As she was blown close to some cliffs on Gran Canaria, Zara thought her voyage may be brought to a sudden end.
“At one point, I was on the west side of the island, getting shelter for some easterly winds, but then, not forecasted, I would occasionally get a very strong westerly gust, and it would push me into the island. I was point three of a nautical mile away from the island trying to get shelter from this easterly and the wind flipped, and I was ready to call a Mayday because I was going to get pushed into the cliffs. And point three of a mile doesn't give you very much time to get help out to you and to get rescued. But thankfully, the gusts didn't last too long, and I could carry on.”
Despite the dangers, there were also many highlights of the trip.
“Lots of people don't think that what I did was fun. They don't think rowing for 16 hours a day by yourself in the ocean is fun, but I found it very peaceful, and I honestly really enjoyed it. People always ask, why did you want to do it? And it was just because I thought it was fun.
“The bad weather was fine. You'd get big waves, but I found them quite fun to play in, because they were usually going in a quite helpful direction. I did have a capsize, which is when the boat was completely inverted, but the boat then did flip back round the right way, so it wasn't really an issue. And nothing broke on it apart from my flagpole, which is pretty good. Overall, the weather was very slow. The trade winds didn't kick in until I was on my 13th week. So I didn't actually have a ton of big weather.”
She also saw some amazing ocean life.
“I saw orcas on day seven, just off Portugal, which is near where a pod of orcas sink small vessels,” says Zara.
“I was very worried, and I've never seen an orca before. They are absolutely huge, so I just stopped and tried to be as uninteresting as possible. They did leave me alone, and I was very grateful for that. I also saw sharks and dolphins and turtles.
“I am an awful swimmer, and I had never swum in the ocean before. So I was absolutely fascinated by everything in the water. And actually getting in the water to clean the boat became my favourite thing to do, and I did it every day for at least the last month and a half. One time when I was in the water, dolphins swam under me, and that was such an incredible thing. I'd never seen dolphins before and I thought that they were really cool.”
The most dangerous wildlife she came across was an unidentified big fish.
“It was about a week ago, and I was dangling my legs over the side before I jumped in the water to clean the underside of the boat, and something came up and bit my foot and left, I think, about 35 teeth marks, but it's healing.”
So what do you do when you’re injured and all alone in the middle of the ocean? “Oh, you just get over it,” she deadpans.
Through this challenge, Zara is hoping to inspire women and girls into sport.
She says: “I know it seems like an extreme way to inspire other women to get into fitness, but I want people to realise their potential and, if I can complete this challenge having never rowed on the ocean before, then other women can attempt a challenge of their own, albeit probably not a cross-Atlantic row!”
Having just completed her physics degree at Loughborough University, Zara will be joining the Army on her return as a technical officer.
She has also been raising money for two charities through her record-breaking trip, Team Forces, which were also her biggest sponsor, and Women in Sport.
But what she is most looking forward to on her return to the UK is seeing her boyfriend, fellow Loughborough student Isaac Newell.
“I called him every day at midday, and sometimes it was literally for a couple of seconds, but it was the most important part of my day, because it reminded me why I was trying as hard as I was,” says Zara.
“I could have done it with a couple more hours of sleep, and it wouldn't have made much difference, but I wanted to be as quick as possible so that I could go home. And it was really nice to feel like I was still living a normal life, and I had something to come home to that I was looking forward to.
“I would sometimes have a really down day, and I wouldn't feel like my miles were good enough that day, and he was the most supportive (person) ever, and made me feel a lot a lot better every single day.”
“I didn't want him to come out (to meet me) because exam season just ended, but he is picking me up from the airport tomorrow morning, and I cannot wait.”
They are now planning a trip away together to a log cabin.
“It will just be really nice to have some time with the person that I missed the most,” she says.
For details of Zara’s fundraising, visit crowdfunder.co.uk/p/zara-lachlan-atlantic-solo-row.
