Practical seamanship
and boatbuilding
TAMATA
AND THE ALLIANCE
BERNARD MOITESSIER
Translated by William Rodarmor
Born in Fench Indochina in 1925, Bernard Moitessier grew up astride two cultures - French and Vietnamese - in a turbulent era that moved dramatically from peace to war, He was imprisoned during the Japanese occupation, and later drafted into France's war against the Viet Minh. This book tells how, at the age of 25, he left Vietrnam to answer the call of the sea, wandering the Indian Ocean, the South Atlantic and the Caribbean as a sea-Gypsy, and surviving two catastrophic shipwrecks. His greatest sailing adventures followed: the Tahiti - Alicante passage, and the 1969 Golden Globe round-the-world race, from which he withdrew to sail on to Tahiti. He then spent three years on an atoll of Tamata in the Tuamoto archipelago, where he went by the name of 'Tamata' ('Try it'). He planted coconut trees and gradually transformed the sun blasted coral into a speck of green in the middle of the South Pacific. William Rodamor's translation won the American Translators Assoiation's 1996 Award for Best Translation.
'… a delight, but be warned - you may find normal life difficult to follow after you have read it.''
Sir Robin Knox-Johnston
'Told with Lyrical talent''
Le Figaro
243 x 160 mms • 400 pages Illus • ISBN 0 924486775 • Price: £19.95 hbk
© Seafarer Books Ltd 2007
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