Six weeks after Scott Kuhner met Kitty in the late 1960s, he proposed, and four months later they were married. She was up for adventure, so they took their honeymoon on a 22ft sailboat with a Porta Potty and sailed her from Westport to Martha’s Vineyard and back. Scott talked Kitty into buying a 30ft Allied Seawind Ketch, and two years later in 1971, they quit their jobs and spent 4 years sailing around the world. Scott was a securities analyst for EF Hutton and his boss could not believe he was going to leave his well-paying job.

They returned to Rowayton, bought a house and started a family. When their two sons were 9 and 11, Scott and Kitty decided to show them there is more to the world than just Connecticut. They bought a Valiant 40, named her Tamure, took the boys out of school, loaded them on the boat, and spent another four years sailing around the world. The boys were home-schooled, and when they got back, went into their normal class at Brian McMahon in Norwalk. Both graduated in the top 5% of their class and went on to an Ivy League college.

After each world tour, Scott was immediately offered great jobs back on Wall Street. Two years after he returned from the second trip, he was offered the position of running the New York office of a Brazilian Investment Bank, and spent the first six months living in Sao Paulo. Soon after he turned 60 the bank was bought out by a European company, Scott was awarded a big bonus, and retired.

Arranged by Bryan Hooper

Bryan’s notes on the talk:

 Scott Kuhner took us most of the way around the world when he described the time he and his wife, Kitty, embarked on their first circumnavigation 50 years ago. It turned out to be a tale of improvisation, adaptability, and a large dose of courage and perseverance. Some highlights follow:

• Scott persuaded Kitty to read Around the World in Wanderer III by the British sailor, Eric Hiscock, which recounts the Hiscocks’ first around the world sail in the 50s, so as to sow the seeds for the Kuhners’ trip later in 1971.

• In the early ‘70s there was no GPS available for navigational use by civilians, and Scott was forced to rely on using a sextant together with an accurate timepiece (kudos to Rolex). After sailing for 12 days and 1400 miles toward the Virgin Islands he announced to Kitty in the middle of the ocean that they were about to arrive within a couple of hours at St. Thomas: land loomed up one hour later, amid much relief for Kitty that the captain was such an accurate navigator.

• Leaving the Galapagos Islands off Ecuador, they sailed 3000 miles in 22 days, putting a severe strain on their ability to keep clothes clean as they had to conserve water. The solution they came up with gave new meaning to the term “bareboating.”

• In Fiji they met up with Kitty’s parents, and lived a life of relative luxury for a week, bathing and eating dinner in the hotel. That came to a rude end with the arrival of an extremely powerful hurricane packing winds of almost 200 mph. Discretion being the better part of valor, they sailed to New Zealand to skirt the rest of the hurricane season.

• Maintenance was the key task there, and they took the opportunity to change the main mast, and accomplish various other chores: coincidentally, also moored at the port was Eric Hiscock – the original inspiration for the trip!

• After they explored New Zealand by hitchhiking their way on both islands, Kitty found a job in Sydney, Australia, leaving Scott to decide how he would find someone to help him sail to Australia. Fortunately, his father came to the rescue as crew mate and cook (which was not without its problems in rough seas encountered in the Tasman Sea!).

• Scott also worked as a financial analyst in Sydney before wanderlust took over again, and they sailed up Australia’s eastern coast and to Bali in Indonesia.

There was insufficient time to finish the presentation: we’re less than half-way around the world, and we intend to run a Part II on March 3rd. Scott and Kitty wrote a book chronicling their adventures, called The Voyage of Bebinka, where you can catch up on the details of the trip, and you can see the video recording of the presentation at: https://youtu.be/USvhGtHrEE8.