Dedicated Daryl’s Atlantic Christmas Row for WRAS

A 42 year old man from Forest Row in East Sussex who is so passionate about raising money for a local animal charity he will be spending Christmas away from his family!

Alone at sea for 90 days Daryl Farmer will be raising money for East Sussex Wildlife Rescue & Ambulance Service (WRAS), rowing over 3000 miles solo from La Gomera to Antigua starting on Wednesday 14th December 2016. He will be one of 12 boats undertaking the Talisker Whisky Atlantic Challenge and he will be one of only four soloists!

With no engine and no sails Daryl will have to row every inch of the journey in his Pure Class traditional style ocean rowing boat, expecting to undertake approximately 1.5 million oar strokes to complete the journey.

The journey will test his durability seeing him row for up to 18 hours a day!

“More people have been into space and successfully climbed Everest than rowed across the Atlantic” said Daryl Farmer, “I’ll be encountering waves up to 50ft high and need to carry everything I need in my boat with me for the entire journey, like all my food which include almost 10kg of nuts alone, 1-2 chocolate bars a day, mini cheddars, liquorice, sesame bars and paste and many other meal packs of dehydrated food. I will need to eat 5000 calories a day whilst rowing ”

Daryl’s boat “Bojangles” has a built in desalinator to produce drinking water and the communication and navigational equipment is powered by solar panels which produce 260 watts of electric.

Trevor Weeks MBE founder of East Sussex WRAS said “I take my hat off to Daryl, I think this is the riskiest, furthest and most challenging and demanding fundraising anyone has ever done to help support our charity. This makes me feel so humble and privileged to have been chosen  when there are so many other causes out there. The wildlife of Sussex will certainly be grateful for his mammoth challenge which we hope will see WRAS able to replace one of its ageing ambulances.

Before setting off Daryl said “This challenge is the world’s most toughest row, and I’m just one of four boats doing it solo. I’ve volunteered with WRAS for a couple of years now and I am blown away by how such a small organisation has such a big impact on protecting nature and returning at risk wildlife back to the wild. The staff and volunteers work so hard and tirelessly, and I think this will be mirrored by my row.”

Anyone wanting to sponsor Daryl can do so via his just giving page https://www.justgiving.com/fundraising/atlanticsolo2016

Anyone wanting to following Daryl and race progress can do so at https://www.taliskerwhiskyatlanticchallenge.com/race-tracker/

Daryl in his boat in La GomaraDaryl in his boat in La GomaraDaryl with his boat in La GomaraDaryl prepares to launch his boat into the seaThe sentiments of Daryl's RowDaryl sorting out all his supplies for his 90 days at sea.90 days worth of supplies including 10kg of nuts!Daryl in his boat in La Gomara

Daryl on a couple of WRAS rescues:

 

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