A dozen young people in cancer remission sailed into the Principality on Friday, April 10 aboard Sir Ernst, having shared life at sea for several days as part of a voyage organised in partnership with the association À chacun son cap.
When Sir Ernst dropped anchor in the Yacht Club de Monaco marina on Friday morning, it marked the end of a crossing that was anything but ordinary. Led by Club members François Miribel and Fabrice Papazian, the voyage had begun in Saint-Tropez and wound its way along the Riviera coast over several days, carrying on board a group of young people who have each faced a serious illness. For some, it was their first time at sea. For others, the first time in a long time to experience something free of medical constraints.
The initiative was made possible through the support of the Yacht Club de Monaco, which provided four of its members’ boats for the occasion, and the association À chacun son cap, whose mission is to offer young people in remission meaningful experiences outside of the medical world. The crossing was not conceived as therapy, nor as an event. It was simply a few days of sailing, shared with people who needed to be somewhere other than where they had been.
Carried by a light easterly breeze, the fleet left the Gulf of Saint-Tropez and set course along the coast, stopping at Fréjus before continuing past the Esterel Massif, the Lérins Islands, Antibes and Sainte-Marguerite, with a final stop at Beaulieu-sur-Mer before Monaco. The scenery changed daily. So did the people on board. From the first hesitant gestures on deck in Saint-Tropez, something shifted quickly. Steering, hoisting, reading the wind: nothing was imposed, and everyone found their own rhythm. Little by little, the young participants grew more confident, took on roles, and became part of the crew rather than passengers within it.
Between the sailing, there were other moments, the ones that tend not to make it into official accounts. Lunches prepared together. An impromptu swim at anchor. Evenings stretched out in a cockpit too small for everyone. Conversations that happened without being planned, and silences that were comfortable in a way that only comes from spending genuine time with people. Sailing structures the day, but it also creates the conditions for something less structured, and that, perhaps, was the point.
The arrival in Monaco on Friday was marked by a warm welcome at the Yacht Club de Monaco. But as those who made the crossing would likely agree, what stays with you is not the arrival. It is everything that happened on the way. Through its support of Sir Ernst and its partnership with À chacun son cap, the Yacht Club de Monaco has made a tangible commitment to something beyond competition, offering a group of young people a few days where the sea, and nothing else, took over.
