It became interesting ... It turned out to be a whole story. "The 43-foot retractable keel sloop, named Megan Jaye after the owner's daughter, arrived safe and sound after a seven-day voyage from Newport, Rhode Island. An acknowledgment to Captain Hank Halsted was accompanied by Megan Jaye's signature caricature self-portrait and sketch. Caption - John Lennon."

What events brought John Lennon aboard the sailboat Megan Jaye in the summer of 1980?

After the birth of his son Sean in 1975, Lennon "took a break". For the most part, he watched TV, baked bread, read countless books and newspapers, raised his son, unsuccessfully tried to compose. In the spring of 1980, some time after buying a house on the waterfront in Long Island, he turned to assistant Fred Seaman with a request: “All my life I dreamed of owning my own boat.” Lennon loved the sea since childhood. As a child, he scurried around the port of Liverpool and wondered if his father, a merchant sailor, had arrived with one of the ships, and each time he did not findl him, terribly angry. To numb the pain, he imagined what strange countries these ships had visited, or fantasized about how he would get away on one of them away from school and home troubles. But always cowardly and never succumbed to impulse.

At the end of April 1980, Lennon sent Fred Seaman to buy the simplest sailing sailboat. It turned out to be a 14-foot solo sailing sailboat built at the Coneys Marine family yard in Huntington. Her owner, Tyler Konis, spent a significant portion of May teaching the new sailboatsman the basics of sailing. Lennon and his wife, Yoko Ono, were fond of Egyptian art, and the sailboat was named after the Egyptian goddess Isis. A month of trips around Long Island on the Isis had awakened a thirst for travel in Lennon.

With the question of where to go, the musician turned to the family consultant Takashi Yoshikawa, a specialist in the Chinese teachings of Ki. He pointed to the southeast, where "the clouds that darken Lennon's life and creative path should dissipate." In this case, it meant Bermuda. Tyler Conis was tasked with handling the materiel and found and rented Megan Jaye. Captain Hank Halsted was not eager to re-equip at sea - he had just returned from a long voyage from the Caribbean. However, he agreed. Halsted had no idea who tNew Yorkers, whom he will have to deliver to Bermuda. He spent half a day preparing the ship for the road before he recognized one of the future fellow travelers as an ex-Beatle.

“What would you say if you knew that John Lennon himself was on my boat?” he asked his charter agent Paul McCaffrey. "Hold me seven!" McCaffrey was as surprised as the captain. On June 4th, Megan Jaye weighed anchor. The captain and the rock star hit it off right away. Almost the same age, in the 60s they experimented with psychedelics and found many common topics for conversation. The 650-mile Atlantic route passed through the troubled Cape Hatteras and the notorious Bermuda Triangle. The captain expected to overcome it in five days. On the third day of the journey, a powerful atlA notic storm has hit Megan Jaye. The wind accelerated to 65 miles per hour, throwing waves 20 feet high onto the ship. Almost all crew members fell ill from seasickness. Two remained: Lennon in the galley (as the most inexperienced, he took the place of the cook on the ship) and Captain Hank Halsted at the helm.

“It was a serious storm when you need to know for sure what to do,” he later recalled. Without rest, he sailed the sailboat for more than two days, but, in the end, collapsed from fatigue. He was left with no choice but to put John Lennon at the helm.

“I never thought of John as a helmsman. He could steer a sailboat when an experienced sailor stood behind him, and never alone. His duties did not extend beyond the kitchen, where he prepared meals for the entire crew. He went on board knowing that he would observe and learn,” Halsted recalls that day. However, then he realized that he could not stand it any longer. At that time, there was no autopilot on the sailboat, experienced sailboatsmen suffered from seasickness in the cabins, and there was no choice. John Lennon was at the helm. Sleep on the ship is sensitive, and the captain's cockpit was located sothat he could come to the rescue in seconds if something went wrong. After watching his terrified charge for an hour, Halsted went to rest.

“So, I steered the boat for six hours in a row, keeping to a given course. I was buried underwater. For six whole hours, the waves hit my face. No prospects. You can't refuse. It's like you're standing on a stage; Once you hit it, you won't be able to get off. A couple of waves brought me to my knees, ”John Lennon shared with a Playboy correspondent, recalling how he was knocked down on the helm. The adventure didn't end there. When the captain returned to watch, he and John had to repair the torn sails, which took more than one hour.

Halsted told how much John Lennon had changed in those few hours he had been alone in the storm. It's like I got a boost of energy. Halsted wasn't the only one who noticed Lennon's transformation. His assistant, Frank Seaman, described the enthusiasm with which he talked about the trip:

“You can’t imagine what it’s like when there is only sky and water around. At the same moment you are alone, and you touch something omnipotent. An overwhelming sense of freedom." Stephen Fuller understands what Lennon was talking about. The sailboat Megan Jaye now belongs to him and bears the name Jubilee.

“Yachting really does that. I have covered 40,000 miles in the ocean and I assure you, the elements, the weather, the darkness, the isolation, the danger will transform you. John went through this, like all sailors, he faced the fact that man is a speck of dust in space, a speck on the vast ocean, and then he escaped and found the earth again. This major shake-up has spurred his creative power and helped him to start writing again and convey this cosmic experience in several of his last songs." Stephen Fuller is a fan of the Beatles. It so happened that he arrived in Bermudaa week after Lennon, and spent a couple of weeks on the island without knowing that the idol was nearby.

Twenty years later, Captain Fuller would buy the same Megan Jaye, unaware that this was the boat on which John Lennon traveled from Newport to Bermuda. P.S. During the seven weeks spent in Bermuda, John Lennon will write almost all of his latest songs and in November will release the first Double Fantasy album in a long time. In February 1981, he will be recognized as the best record of the past year.