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Two Circumnavigations, 150 Years Apart
Levi Savage Jr. and the Salt in my Blood
In 1852, my ancestor Levi Savage Jr. boarded a ship in San Francisco, bound for Siam. He was a devout Mormon and was sent on a mission there, halfway across the globe in service of his faith. He never made it to Siam. A civil war blocked his path, so he spent two years in India, waiting, preaching, and recording details in his journal.
When the time came to return home, he boarded another boat and sailed West. He sailed across the Indian Ocean, rounded the Cape of Good Hope, and crossed the Atlantic. He returned to the United States the long way. He was gone four years in total. On June 19, 1856, he wrote, simply: “I have circled the globe.”
That sentence echoed in my mind 160 years later as I sat in the cockpit of a Benneteau 45-foot sailboat, thousands of miles from home, surrounded by nothing but sea and sky.
I didn’t grow up thinking I’d sail around the world. But I did. Not with the sense of duty that drove Levi. My journey was born of curiosity, wanderlust, and a growing need to unmoor myself from land-bound expectations.
And yet-our paths weren’t so different. He answered a call. So did I. He crossed oceans without knowing what he’d find. Same. He faced storms, heat, sickness, and long stretches of…
