World
2 years, 5 fish, lots of farmers markets: How Rockland couple sailed around the world
Robin Bell and Karl Coplan sail around the world from Nyack
Robin Bell and Karl Coplan on the Mabel Rose at the Nyack Boat Club May 7, 2024. They had just returned from sailing the boat around the world.
NYACK ‒ Robin Bell and Karl Coplan sailed the Mabel Rose to Nyack Boat Club Tuesday, just a week shy of two years after they left on a worldwide circumnavigation full of adventure, fun and even a little work (at least for Bella who received a Fulbright grant to study in Australia for several months in the middle of their journey).
Were they glad to be back to the spot where they embarked on May 15, 2022?
Bell admitted “a little remorse” when they went under the Verrazzano-Narrows Bridge on their way to the Hudson and home. “The ocean has been our friend,” Bell said. “But we missed our family.”
The trip was a lifelong dream for the West Nyack couple, both 65.
Centered on environment
They met at Middlebury College in Vermont and started sailing together soon after. Married nearly 42 years, they had done two transatlantic trips together before this.
Both of their careers have centered on environmental issues — Coplan is a leading environmental lawyer and professor; geophysicist Bell’s expertise led her to nine major expeditions to Antarctica and Greenland to study ice sheet collapse.
To pursue their dream trip, Coplan retired in 2022 as director of Pace Environmental Litigation Clinic. Bell took a leave of absence from Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory at Columbia University in Palisades.
Such an excursion takes a lot of planning and skills (Bell says she can now steer the boat with her feet as she knits). It could hardly be considered a luxury vacation — they had to sleep in shifts so someone was always alert for any problems they might encounter.
Though they faced a few unexpected challenges, both said they reveled in the experiences they had along the way.
Impressions of a big world
As they relaxed on the Mabel Rose, their 38-foot sloop, Bell and Coplan recalled a few trip highlights: the beauty of the Marquesas Islands of French Polynesia; a visit to the Blue Mountain coffee region in Jamaica, apparently a bucket-list item for Bell; amazing meals, often prepared by families in small ports in South Africa, Senegal and other places; the sound of singing emanating from churches in Indonesia; the welcome they received in Tonga, where they were just the fourth boat to arrive after COVID lockdowns had lifted; skiing in July in the Australian alps.
They would stock up on food at ports — Coplan recalled amazing farmers markets from the Galapagos to Jamaica.
They did fish. “I don’t know if we’re the world’s worst,” Coplan said, but they were only successful about five time, catching mahi mahi. Once they pulled in a barracuda, but those can be contaminated with a toxin that causes the foodborne illness ciguatera, so they threw it back.
What were they looking forward to now that they were again stateside? Coplan had to scurry to the DMV to re-register their car. And, they had family staying in their house in West Nyack so they were going to stay on the boat for a bit.
Do they think they will do another circumnavigation? Both smiled. Coplan admitted he’s already thinking about another transatlantic trip.
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