Interview

1. Your career journey, from the Nautical School in 1976 to becoming a senior pilot today, is quite remarkable. How has your maritime background influenced your passion for kayaking, and how do you balance your demanding role as a pilot with your adventurous pursuits?
Well, to start with, the sea has always an important factor in my life so it was a natural progression to take up kayaking and adventure because adventure is really everything what being at sea is. When you embark on a ship you are going into the unknown, to a certain extent.  I have fulfilled that part of my life, when working on ships you encounter many experiences. So, continuing with kayaking was really extending my sense of adventure and keeping in line with my passion for the sea. So, obviously, it’s really part of me to have continued kayaking.

2. Your kayaking partnership with Dorian has resulted in numerous accomplishments, including the first kayak crossing from Tunisia to Malta and circumnavigating the Maltese archipelago. Can you share some memorable moments from these adventures, and what makes your partnership with Dorian so successful?
Well, first of all, Dorian and I are like brothers to a certain extent.. in that we completely trust each other and when you paddle in a tandem kayak there has to be a sense of trust, and that is certainly an important aspect. Obviously, the fact that we are friends, and that we go back a long way is quite important.  You won’t be able to do the things we have done unless you have that sense of partnership and friendship amongst you, and that was what enabled us to really embark on what seem to be at that time quite wild adventures. I mean 1st September 2009 we paddled solo from Malta to Sicily, and it was something that was never done before to paddle unassisted, yet with the help of the at the Armed Forces of Malta, who green-lighted the adventure, we were able to do it.

Dorian and I really we sit off in a way, into the unknown but obviously having the background that I have on ships and on the sea, its important in recognizing what the risk factors are.  It’s all about managing risks. We trust each other and if for example it is something that is related to the sea, or navigation, Dorian trusts me blindly.  On the other hand I trust him for certain decisions with the “go or not go”.  So it a partnership that works very well. We’ve had many memorable. Too many in a way.

“Can you name a few?”

Obviously, there were instances where we encountered bad weather and we had that team spirit to overcome the situations.

"Where were you for example?”

There was one time where we were at the final part of the crossing from Mahdia, Tunisia to Lampedusa and the last one where we had already been paddling for about 26hours at that stage, but the last 3 miles there was the wind that began to increase and increase, and there was some sea as well and we said we we’re fed up having to shelter under the FES boat so we set-off on our own and we increased the speed.

That was one, and when we paddled for example from Sicily to Rome in 2013, we had many instances, one time we crossed the Gulf of Gaeta.  Strong wind, you know, there was also the thing about partnership, of knowing where to stop. The last one that we did in 2021, we saw that the wind was going to increase and we stopped, it was like we didn’t even need to discuss.

When we were going around Sicily, we’ve had beautiful moments.  When we start talking amongst us saying “remember”.. for example one that time in 2009 when we crossed to Sicily, we encountered a school of tuna, that were leaping in-front of us, just ahead of us.

3. Despite the challenges, including the recent gruelling paddle to Sicily in 2021, you express a continued motivation for the next adventure. What drives you both to seek new challenges, and do you have a specific dream or goal for your future kayaking endeavours?
Well, being at the age that we are, having a challenge is motivation for us to keep fit, to start with. It’s something that we look forward to, at this stage you tend to say “I’m tired” of doing something, but the fact that we are always planning and we talk about doing other things is motivation for us to continue training. At the moment we go to the gym, and we paddle on the sea throughout the winter months.

The fact that we always have a goal or a dream to go after, is motivation for us to continue training.  At our age you tend to relax a bit and say... you know, I’m getting too old to do this. This year we planned to do a navigation of Malta, so at the moment we are training up for it. We go to the gym on a regular basis, and we paddle whenever we can in our kayak. So that is always a good thing, that we have something to look forward to, we don’t just say we’ve done this and that’s it. If we manage to do the round Malta this year, it would be 20th time, the 20th navigation of Malta. Next year we hope that we would be able to paddle possibly one more time from Sicily to Malta. We have a project and we hope that we will be able to realize it.