Island Life Magazine Ltd August/September 2010 | Page 38

interview

Paul St John Martin’s philosophy
on life is simple – you either
endure it or enjoy it.
From a very early age Paul opted for the

Island Life - August/September 2010

Maasai elders in Africa, and swum with

his cause he was told abruptly by the

sharks at the Great Barrier Reef – not to

Round the World yachtsman: “You

mention jumping out of airplanes.

don’t look very disabled to me!”

The BT Global Challenge evolved

Paul continued: “I argued that I

latter. Now having just turned 60 he

purely by chance when he spotted

couldn’t run any more so I was not fully

has time to relax and reflect on a hectic

an advert for recruits in a newspaper.

able, but by then the list of 10,000

lifestyle he claims has been enhanced,

When he decided to make known his

applicants had dwindled to 2,500. Then

in order of importance, by happiness,

interest in taking part he was politely

one day I had a call saying ‘if you want

health and wealth.

told from the other end of the phone:

to go you can go’. They had kept me on

“Yes sir, you and 10,000 others!”

the reserve list for a year, by which time

Paul, who lives with Sue, his wife of
37 years, near Merstone, once took

Undeterred, and in the safe

everybody else had dropped out, and I

part in the Cape Town to Boston leg of

knowledge he had suffered a snapped

sailing’s BT Global Challenge. He spent

Achilles tendon twice, and had metal

the Millennium not in an over-priced

pins inserted in his shoulders he

the leg he completed, negotiating force

hotel, but at the base camp of Mount

even applied to sail on a boat for the

10 gales and The Doldrums. He says:

Everest. He has helped the visually

disabled.

“Being on a 63ft boat with 14 others

impaired negotiate the Higher Atlas
Mountains; shared the wisdom of the
38

He got to the interview stage, but
when he met Chay Blyth to further

got the place.”
Paul’s yacht finished 13th of 14 on

for seven weeks taught me an awful lot
about life. For one thing never allow
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