Laura Dekker

Laura Dekker (born 20 September 1995) is a New Zealand-born Dutch sailor.

Her parents divorced in 2002.

She lived with her father after the separation of her parents, and her younger sister Kim went to live with her mother.

Dekker spent the first five years of her life at sea and sailed often with her father after the family's return to the Netherlands.

She has owned several boats, all named Guppy. The first was an Optimist dinghy she received for her sixth birthday, and which she promptly learned to sail solo, initially accompanied by her father on a windsurfer.

For her eighth birthday (in 2003), she received the book Maiden Voyage, Tania Aebi's memoir of her round-the-world sailing trip.

In the summer of 2006, after assisting her father in a 24-hour sailing race aboard a friend's Hurley 700, she received permission from the boat's owner to borrow it for personal use, in return for cleaning and maintenance.

It was just at the 7 m limit below which Dutch law imposes on captains under the age of 16.

Sailing it often, she christened this boat Guppy as well.

In the summer of 2007, she took it on a more ambitious 6-week sailing tour of the Wadden Sea, accompanied by her dog Spot.

Over the following winter, Dekker searched for her own Hurley 700, and bought one with a loan from her father.

This boat was also christened Guppy, and she spent her entire 2008 summer vacation aboard it, cruising around the Netherlands.

Over the following school year, she began preparing herself and Guppy for open-ocean sailing, with the goal of a round-the-world tour.

In March, her father told her to gain some experience with the open sea by first sailing to England.

This was intended to discourage her; the strong currents, rough weather, and heavy shipping make the English Channel notoriously difficult for sailboats.

Dekker spent the next eight weeks preparing Guppy for that trip.

On the evening of Friday, 1 May, at the beginning of a 12-day school vacation, she sailed away from Maurik without specifying a destination to her father.

She sailed to the coast and arrived in Maassluis Saturday afternoon.

Early Sunday morning, she set out across the Channel, but weak winds delayed her arrival until Monday morning.

Docking in Lowestoft, she e-mailed word of her success from a local library.

Local authorities requested her father to come and accompany her on her return voyage.

Her father responded that she could sail back on her own.

Local authorities instead placed her in a children's home until he came to retrieve her.

He returned her to her boat and then flew home.

She left England on Monday, 11 May.

In 2009, she announced her plan to become the youngest person to circumnavigate the globe single-handed.

A Dutch court stepped in, owing to the objections of the local authorities, and prevented Laura from departing while under shared custody of both her parents.

In August 2009, Dekker announced her plan for a two-year solo sailing voyage around the globe in the Dutch national newspaper, Algemeen Dagblad.

Her father was in support of her plans.

Dekker planned to sail a seagoing 38 ft Jeanneau Gin Fizz ketch, also named Guppy.

The boat was equipped for long-distance sailing and adapted for solo-circumnavigation.

The planned route started from Portugal westwards, to cruise the Caribbean and then to go through Panama and past Indonesia.

She then planned either to go past Somalia to the Mediterranean, or around Africa, should piracy become a serious concern.

Her plan was to make around 26 stops.

In July 2010, a Dutch family court ended this custody arrangement, and the record-breaking attempt finally began on 21 August 2010.

Dekker successfully completed the solo circumnavigation in a 12.4-metre (40 ft) two-masted ketch named Guppy, arriving in Simpson Bay, Sint Maarten, 518 days later at the age of 16.

Dekker was born in the city of Whangārei, New Zealand, during a seven-year sailing trip by her parents.

Her father, Dick Dekker, is Dutch and her mother, Babs Müller, is German.

Dekker has Dutch, German, and New Zealand citizenship.

With a strong wind this time, up to force 7, the return trip was much faster, reaching Rotterdam by the morning of the 12th and arriving home that evening.