Jesse Martin – Lionheart
Last modified: May 14, 2010The following synopsis is from
www.jessemartin.net
Lionheart – A Journey Of The human Spirit
On October 31 1999, at the age of just eighteen, Jesse Martin sailed into the record books in his yacht Lionheart by becoming the youngest person ever to sail solo, non-stop and unassisted around the world.
Jesse Martin was born for adventure. After learning to sail at fourteen, he then travelled along Australia’s tropical coast on a flimsy catamaran, and by sixteen he had kayaked through the remote islands of Papua New Guinea and crewed on a yacht sailing from Belize to Tahiti. But the biggest adventure of them all was yet to come.
Lionheart is Jesse’s story. A story of courage, loneliness and danger, it is also an incredible, gripping, true-life adventure.
You don’t just wake up one morning and commit to sailing solo around the world as a teenager. Jesse was 14 when he decided that he was going to sail around the world. The desire became so strong that he struggled at school because he was always dreaming about his adventure. When you read this book there is no evidence of a lack of schooling. This is a young man who through his actions and following through with his dreams showed you don’t have to be experienced to achieve a large goal.
It is very well written and rarely talks in technical sailing terms and when it does it explains the terms to the layman. Lionheart truly is about the human spirit and what is possible. Things seemed to come together as they should just in time for this journey. That is no accident, the universe rewards those who never give up.