In my childhood I remember my Dad following the reports of Frances Chichester's single-handed circumnavigation of the world. Being capsized at one point sticks in my memory.
It turns out that this happened soon after he left Sydney when, against advice, Chichester sailed into the path of a storm, on his way to pass to the north New Zealand. It was a remarkable journal, which probably did not capture the public interest until Jon Sanders did three circumnavigations without stopping, and Jessica Watson completed a version of circumnavigation as as a 16 year old.
Chichester's book is a description of the voyage through his own eyes. A fair bit of space is spent on describing the technical aspects - which sail went up, which rope failed etc. which may be interesting for sailors, but probably less so for those not familiar with the jargon.
I was a remarkable voyage, all the more so because he did it without any modern navigation aids, and patchy radio contact.
Fun fact: He was shadowed around the bottom of South America by HMS Protector, which in the previous decade had gone to the aid of ship in distress that had onboard Edmund Hillary and Vivian Fuchs. ( )

It's hard to believe that just over 40 years ago, the feat of solo circumnavigation of the globe had only been achieved by a handful of people. This is a relatively straight forward read, with little self-reflection; however, the strength of Chichester's personality is clear through his writing. Chichester's achievements throughout his lifetime are simply amazing. ( )

4932. Gypsy Moth Circles the World, by Sir Francis Chichester (read 10 Jun 2012) This is an amazing account of the trip around the world whch the author made alone in his sailing vessel, leaving Plymouth, England, on 27 Aug 1966 and making only one stop (in Sydney, Austrialia) and returning to Plymouth on May 28, 1967. He had huge amounts of trouble on the voyage, but got no help from anyone except when he was in Sydney. Some of the technical talk about sailing was of no interest to me, but the exceptional ability of the author to solve the troubles he underwent cannot but be admired. It is an exceptional story and I could not but rejoice over his completion successfully of his endeavor. ( )

Chichester's book details his solo sail around the world, which was the fastest circumnavigation of the globe by a single-handed vessel and it was the longest voyage by a solo vessel without a port of call. (He stopped only in Sydney, Australia during his voyage to and from Plymouth, England.)

His story in interesting and compelling. However, the book is not an easy read for a non-sailor... Chichester assumes you have sailing knowledge and his book is sprinkled with sailing terminology, which was not explained (at least in the 1968 edition.) I found other books about round the world voyages (including Joshua Slocum's "Sailing Alone Around the World" and Bernard Moitossier's "The Long Way") to be more accessible to a non-sailor. ( )

Con 65 años, Chichester da la vuelta al mundo a vela en 1966.