Photos by Marie PreaudWe have lived a unique experience with navigator, Kip Stone, who came to visit our class and who invited us to visit his racing boat. We were also included in a radio broadcast featuring Kip, where we sang the French song, Santiano, to honor Kip and wish him well in the upcoming race, La Route du Rhum. The race would take Kip from St. Malo, France to Guadeloupe. We followed him throughout the course, tracking his position day to day, charting his location on a map in our classroom and exchanging messages via email with Kip on his boat. We experienced many emotions throughout this project: we felt some worry when Servan Escofier, Kip’s leading opponent, came closer to him, and we were afraid he would need to stop the race when his automatic pilot was malfunctioning, We finally cried out with joy when we heard the incredible news of his victory ! From this common adventure we keep and cherish our photos and reports which we have displayed in the hallway just below one of Kip’s sails --which spans the length of the school! We also kept a Captain’s Log to document and illustrate Kip’s journey and our correspondence with him. To conclude this project, on December 14, we went to Kip’s printing factory where we learned how to print T-shirts. He had prepared, just for us, a special T-shirt decal with the school’s logo and that of his boat, in souvenir of la Route du Rhum.
