Preparing for the journey to South America

In many ways, Jarl prepared the ship for the modern era.

Jarl spent a fortune on Shenandoah’s upkeep, maintaining her magnificently. He installed brand-new diesel engines and, for the first time, electricity throughout.

Viggo Jarl

For most of the period she was based in Cannes and it was from here that she embarked on a series of extraordinary adventures – not just the length and breadth of the Mediterranean but throughout the Greek islands, through the Red Sea, down to the West Indies and Colombia, through the Panama Canal, over to Hawaii and then further down into South America. Jarl even took Atlantide 500 miles up the Amazon until, “the jungle seemed to close in over the decks, the river was teeming with crocodiles and snakes.”

“…the river was teeming with crocodiles and snakes.”

At the onset of the Second World War, Jarl hid the boat in Northern Europe. He removed both the engines and the masts to render the boat useless to the Nazi’s – and keep her out of  the grasp of sailing enthusiast Hermann Goering who was rumoured to be interested in ‘acquiring’ a yacht of his own.

After the War, her adventures continued. With engines and masts reinstated, she set out on an eleven-month expedition up the Congo and Niger rivers of Africa.