Its steel hull is painted a bleached-out blue and the wooden seats are worn into dips where thousands of different people have sat and watched the rolling horizons since its construction in 1957. The three-mast schooner belongs to the Brittany-based charity Les Amis de Jeudi Dimanche (AJD), and it never stops sailing, picking up passengers from all walks of life, taking them on journeys to help with addiction, isolation or social exclusion. This journey was a bit different (the boat had been filled only with people we knew) and our objective was more philosophical, as we were attempting to answer the question: How can we put the world on a boat?

The journey began long before the actual departure. Thomas, my odd, French and entirely wonderful partner, had crossed the Atlantic onboard the Rara Avis in the 1990s along with our friends Eric, Valerie, Poulon and Françoise – all of whom were back onboard for this trip. They had intense memories of their initial crossing. It was time to hoist the mainsail again and let the boat bring people together in unexpected ways, starting with the sourcing of 30 willing souls ready for the high seas. By mid-August, we had assembled our varied group, which ranged from teachers and chefs to captains and artists, as well as a core team of seven crew in their final week of work experience with the AJD.

We climbed on board at 8pm on August 31^st. Our first meal was spent moving through the lives of others, asking benign and generous questions about where we live, what we do and how we know each other. At 2am we left l’Aber Wrac’h for the Scillies, leaving the haven of Land for a deep black and heaving swell, sleep or sickness keeping most people below deck. I stood outside from 3am-7am, watching France’s street lights disappearing one by one.