Beyond the Horizon by Susan Warburton.

BEYOND THE HORIZON.

A personal voyage.

 By Susan Warburton

Prologue.

Back in 2008 my wife Sue and I ventured out on our first adventure at long passaging. We’d had Susan Margaret for two years with our only real trips being twice from Dubai to Muscat and back. Four to five day trips each way. The plan was to sail around the Indian Ocean and back in six months. In the end it took seven. Our first taste of discovering plans at sea are fluid.

 She wrote a wonderful blog at the time which, was posted on the Dubai Offshore Sailing Club website for friends and family. There, they could log in to read the news and even receive notifications when new updates appeared. Sue was always extremely creative. I believe a good artist, and in my view a great writer. She had a mind honed by years of experience as a Doctor to diagnose a problem and provide a prognosis. That latter character trait and her creativity fitted exactly with resolving issues on a boat.

 Always hungry for information, her quest to learn something new drove her to embrace the sea and open her horizons. The revelations she discovered weren’t just about the physical world around her but, also of her own strengths and weaknesses. 

 Imaginary boundaries that come with living on land.

 Those borders were breached. She came to the happy realisation that like the horizon at sea, her mind, body and soul could go beyond that seemingly fixed position. She shared the personal journey along with the physical one in her blogs.

 Over the years she often wondered what had happened to her writings. We thought we had copied them somewhere but they never surfaced. She wanted to expand on her writing and develop a guide of some sort for fellow female adventurers. Never giving up, she would periodically have another round of searching. No longer available online and with no-one able to retrieve copies she could only regale, with fondness, her escapades when in company.

 She always said she never wanted to leave the boat. Only reluctantly going ashore for any extended period for health reasons. Something which, became more frequent in her last few years. Sadly, the last trip ashore ended in tragedy. She passed away in a hospital bed after her body turned its’ back on her for four days. I was with her. Surrounded by a team of doctors and nurses they couldn’t keep her going. I guiltily admit I shouted at her to stay. To hang in there. All to no avail. At that point, comatose as she was, I believe she was already passing from this world and couldn’t hear me.

Three months later I was still trying to find her level of courage to keep going. Her favourite phrase spouted over and over again was, “never give up, never give in”. I was clearing out one of the aft cabin lockers of old paperwork and shocked, I found a hard copy of her blogs.

 To begin with I just fell apart and then to avoid disposing of her personnel treasure. I neatly bound the pages into a sort of flimsy book. It looked quite neat. I was inspired. Why not make it into a real book? Well here it is. The title is her choice. It was already there on the printed pages.

 Her will power, her soul and her mind were strong as steel. It was her body that faltered. I miss her.

 She’s now adventuring beyond another horizon.