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Morris and Marilyn Bailey hardly seemed made for each other.

He was awkward and plagued by self-consciousness and doubt.

She was naturally at ease.

She was capable and outgoing.

And what brought them together and kept them together was this urge to get out of dreary, ordinary Derby England. So they dreamed up this project for their lives, save up for a

sailboat, quit their jobs, cross the Pacific to New Zealand, and start over. The writer and

journalist Sophie Elmhurst says the Baileys poured everything into that boat,

all of their energy, all their hopes for a new life, she says it took everything they had.

And in March of 1973, they had done it.

They were underway.

They've sailed halfway around the world already. Everything has gone incredibly well.

They've gone through storms and challenges. It hasn't all been smooth, but they're intact.

Three days into their Pacific crossing, in the middle of the night, Marilyn's up on deck, they take turns on watch.

And she sees a sort of lit up fishing boat not that far away, and she's curious about it, wonders what it is.

But, you know, everything recedes, they pass by.

And she comes to the end of her watch, and she goes downstairs to

wake up Morris so they can swap and have breakfast and coffee when they feel this extraordinary

collision. Objects fly across the cabin, cupboard doors open, spoons,

and cut the re-sailing across the room.

So it's an enormous shock.

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