Tim FitzHigham - All At Sea

 

Imagine, if you will-- I'm out rowing in the middle of the English Channel. It's a lovely stretch of water. It's very difficult to row, however, and I'm rowing quite quickly. Really, really quite quickly. Fast. It's the fastest I've ever rowed in my life. It's so fast that my lungs are beginning to die. And the reason for this incredible burst of speed, some would say legendary burst of speed, is that just there in this picture of me rowing at this angle, just behind me, just bearing down on me is an oil tanker. [audience chuckles] It's a third of a mile long and it is bearing down on me with really incredible speed, which is why I am rowing faster than anyone has ever rowed [audience chuckles] in their lives. I am desperately trying to get out of the way of that massive, massive oil tanker.

 

Did I mention, by the way, that I am sitting rowing in a bathtub? [audience laughter] It's at moments like this you question how these things happened. [audience chuckles] I think it started in a bathtub, very like the one that I was rowing in. About eight months beforehand, I was lying in the bath and I had this idea, I was thinking to myself, "I wonder if anyone has ever rowed the English Channel in a bathtub." [audience chuckles] And then I started looking it up. And the more I looked it up and the more I thought about it, the more it looked like no one had ever rowed the English Channel in a bathtub. [audience chuckles] And the more I looked at this, I thought someone should row the English Channel in a bathtub. And then the more I thought about this, the more I thought, "You know what? The person that should row the English Channel in a bathtub, that should be me. [audience chuckles] That person should be me." And I said this to some friends of mine, I said, "I'm going to row the English Channel in a bathtub." And they said, "Good luck with that." [audience laughter]

 

And so, I started to go into the preparations for this. Now, the first, and I'm sure you're all very aware that the key preparation for this was get a bathtub. [audience chuckles] So, I phoned hundreds of bathroom companies. I phoned hundreds and hundreds of bathtub companies and nobody would get involved in what I thought was an incredible project until finally one of them wrote back to me. I got my bathroom company, and not just any bathroom company. I got the finest bathroom company in the entire world to give me a bath.

 

I got a bath from Thomas Crapper and Company. [audience laughter] A third of a ton roll-top Victorian copper bathtub, the sort of thing that you see in a museum. A fantastically beautiful piece of bathroom kit. It goes up and has a fluted roll top. It's a gorgeous Victorian artifact. And on that beautiful artifact, I screwed two outriggers from a rowing boat that would take the center of gravity slightly further out, which would help me to spread the weight over a wider area, so hopefully I'd be more balanced and I wouldn't sink.

 

Secondly, a problem began to arise in my mind. It turns out that the English Channel turns out to be the busiest shipping lane in the world. There are more tankers, container ships, frigates, and just general traffic going up and down that tiny stretch of water than any other stretch of water in the entire world. And some of these tankers, as discussed, are huge. But what I didn't realize is that they also have giant stopping distances. Some of their stopping distances are 15 miles. That means that by the time they have seen you and applied the brake, they have already gone through you and somebody is calling the undertaker. [audience chuckles] This is like-- and they go north to south, these tankers and container ships and frigates. And I have to go from east to west, from England to France. So, I am going to be like, crossing the busiest motorway in the world at right angles to the direction of traffic, riding a concrete snail. [audience laughter] This is problem number one.

 

The second problem is that half of the English Channel turns out to be owned not by Great Britain, but by the French. [audience chuckles] Now, I wrote to the French government and I said, "Now, this is what I'm going to do. I'm going to row the English Channel in a bathtub." And they were kind and they were generous and they were helpful. They sent me tons of stuff to read. And all the time they were going into the French parliament and passing a new clause in the shipping act of France, making it illegal to row a bathtub in French water. [audience laughter] So, what I did is I went to the Ministry of Transport in Whitehall and I said, "Now, this is what we're going to do, gentlemen. We are going to register my bath as a registered British ship." [audience laughter] And to my shock, horror and amazement, they said, "Yeah, fair enough, Tim. That's a good plan. Yeah." [audience laughter] 

 

They put me on the captain's register. [audience laughter] They gave me a small ship's registration certificate. They sent me a letter that genuinely said, "Dear Mr. FitzHigham, please find enclosed the paperwork for your newly registered British shipping vessel brackets, bathtub, close brackets. [laughter and applause] Please keep it with you at all times and in all places, even on the high seas. We think the French are going to want to see this. [audience laughter] To assist you in this aim, please find enclosed. We've had it laminated." [audience chuckles] I don't think I have ever been prouder to be British than when I looked down and saw in my hand laminated paperwork. [laughter and applause]

 

There was another problem that I became aware of, and that is that I couldn't row. [audience chuckles] And I also know nothing about the sea. Nothing at all. Never been on it. And so, I phoned loads of people to try and get someone to talk to me about the sea. I tried all the various organizations I could think of. Nobody had time to talk to me about the sea. I tried the Coast Guard. They seemed to be busy. In the end, I did what anyone would do in this situation. In total desperation, I phoned the Royal Navy. And by mistake at the switchboard, I got put through to an Admiral as it turned out. Now the only sailor who's ever existed in my entire family is a great uncle. And he said to me a long time ago, "Tim, if ever you're talking to a member of Her Majesty's Royal Navy," he said, "always start the conversation with the question, 'How are your futtocks, old man?'" [audience chuckles]

 

What the heck is a futtock? I had absolutely no idea, but I thought, "Well, I'll give it a go." So, I said, "Rear admiral. How are your futtocks, old man?" [audience chuckles] And he replied, "At their furthest reach, dear boy, at their furthest reach." [audience laughter] Now, I asked my uncle about this, my great uncle. And he said, "Yes, Tim, that is the correct nautical response to the question, 'How are your futtocks, old man.'" [audience chuckles] I said, "That's fantastic, uncle, but what does it actually mean?" He said, "Well, that's the thing, Tim. Nobody actually knows." [audience laughter] I thought there was something incredibly British about the fact we had both just had a conversation that neither of us had understood a single word of. We might as well have just said, "Ostrich, hairy gusset strap, rear admiral." "Yes, raspberry flans, Plantagenet blue ass cheese, dear boy." [audience laughter]

 

But the both of us were just too darn Britishly polite to admit to the fact we didn't understand. Now, after this slightly weird beginning to the conversation, me and the rear admiral were getting on really rather well. And after a while, I plucked up the courage to say, "You know this vessel that we're talking about taking across the busiest shipping lane in the world, you do know it's a bath?" And then the line went dead. And then the line crackled into life and the voice said, "Well, same rules of navigation apply. Oi. I'm on board." [audience laughter] So, in one second, I suddenly had the Royal Navy on backing the bath project. Then, I decided to do what any great British explorer I'd ever heard about has ever done in the history of Britain.

 

I decided to write to the Queen and tell her what I was planning to do and say, "Do you mind if I have a crack at the Channel in a bathtub?" And to my shock, horror and amazement, she wrote back. Should we just recap on what's going on here? I've set off to row the Channel in a bath and I now have a letter from the Queen saying, "Not only do I not mind you rowing the Channel in a bathtub, you have my heartiest support. Good luck and let me know how you get on." [audience chuckles] Now, just to get back to this, I'm in front of a tanker, Okay? What's happened is I'm in a third of a ton roll-top Victorian copper bathtub. There's a tanker bearing down on me. It's a third of a mile long. I'm rowing like no one has ever rowed in their entire lives before, desperately trying to get out of the way of this thing. It's a terrifying thing because about two hours beforehand, I had taken what, as it transpired, was not a very good navigating decision. I had thought two hours ago, "I reckon I could probably get round the front of that," as it turned out. [audience laughter] So, I'm rowing in front of the tanker as fast as I possibly can, and my only thought is, "I'm about to die. I'm about to get killed in the English Channel in a third of a ton roll-top copper piece of Victorian bathroom equipment." And there's one thought that popped into my head, and that thought was quite so simply, “Who has right of way?” [audience laughter]

 

Now, in my bath, I had a radio and the sailor's almanac. And so, as I was frantically trying to row with one arm, I was flipping through the sailor's almanac, desperately trying to get to the page that tells you about who has right of way in the English Channel. And I finally got to it and I read it and it says, massive, big tankers like the one about to crash into me, have to give way to sailing ships. Sailing ships have to give way to rowing ships. Rowing ships have to give way to rowing ships of restrictive maneuverability. And that's got to be me in a third of a ton roll-top Victorian copper bathtub. And so, I grabbed the radio and radioed up to the tanker captain and said, "I am in a bath. I am in a bath. Back down, back down. I am in a bath. Over." [audience laughter] 

 

Then the weirdest thing happened which is that the tanker did divert around a bathtub [audience chuckles] for the first time in the maritime history of the world and create what the admiral later called a naval precedent in law. [audience chuckles] He said, "This is the first time in the maritime history of the globe that a tanker has backed down to a piece of plumbing on the high seas. [audience laughter] We are going to name that president in law after you, Tim. The FitzHigham precedent." You can look it up lawyers.

 

However, the problem wasn't over yet because I carried on rowing out in the English Channel. And then something went a little bit awry in that the mist started to come in. And then very quickly, as happens at sea, suddenly there was a massive storm that hit the English Channel. It's a terrifying thing to be out in any storm. This was a force 7. For people who don't go to sea, a force 7 will give you waves of the height of sort of three and a half meters. At one point, the storm got so bad it ripped the roll top off the Victorian copper bath. It popped out of the water. I realized I was essentially ballast, dived across the bath, pushed it back in with my shoulder and ripped my shoulder so badly on the serrated edge of the bath that it went all floppy and stopped working. But I thought to myself, "With one arm, I can still keep rowing through this. I am British." [audience chuckles] I carried on going and survived in that horrible storm for 40 minutes, having lost the support boat totally on my own, rowing with one arm.

 

And after 40 minutes, they found me because apparently for 40 minutes I had been heroically rowing in a giant circle. [audience laughter] They pulled me back in, but the disaster wasn't over yet because we were in French water. The French Navy came on the radio and said that their solution to the Bath Channel-- They were calling me a problem. [audience chuckles] Their solution was to put explosives on my bath and blow it out of the water. Now, I had lost a lot of blood at this stage and I wasn't thinking very clearly from my arm, but I went on the radio and apparently said the following, "Just to remind you that the sinking of a registered British ship without the permission of the captain will be taken as an act of war." [audience laughter] In Dover, you could just hear the coast guard going [screams] [audience chuckles] 

 

Now, the French then went away and looked this up in the legal book, right? And they worked out that actually, in law, I was right. Now, then something very moving occurred because boats came from all the other nations in the English Channel, mainly Holland and Belgium, [audience chuckles] to take me and my bathtub back to the UK, which proved something vital to me. And that is, it's not just Britain, but all the other nations in the English Channel who hate the French. [audience laughter] Now, I was in quite a bad way at this point, I had to go to hospital. I had to get patched back up again. But thanks to the Navy, I got another crack at rowing the English Channel in my bathtub. And I did, I made it across the English Channel in the bath. [audience chuckle]

 

Now, in the end, I ended up, due to a bet that went wrong, rowing the bathtub not just across the English Channel, but round Kent and up Tower Bridge. The fire ships came out that were last used at Winston Churchill's funeral. And lots of amazing things happened as a result of the Bath crossing. It raised a load of money for charity. I got made a commodore in the Royal Navy, [audience laughter] which is the fourth highest rank in the Royal Navy. It basically goes First Sea Lord, Second Sea Lord, Princess Anne, me. [audience laughter] And I get my own flag and a port. I'm in charge of a port, and being the Navy, they have to put me in charge of a port, but they've chosen to put me in charge of the port of Sudbury, which is 15 miles inland. [audience laughter]

 

And then the weirdest thing happened in that I got a letter from the Queen, saying I had to go up to the palace for an audience with the Queen. I got up to the palace and normally you're not allowed to report anything that you say to the Queen. There's this whole, like, Chatham House rules thing. But she has allowed me to say a couple of things that we talked about. She said to me, "Gosh, that bathtub must have been awfully heavy. It must have weighed half a ton." And I thought, "This is my one moment of being Bond." And I just smoothed my hair down, looked her directly in the eye and went, "Well, it was actually only a third of a ton, ma'am, but still really rather heavy." [audience laughter]

 

And then she said, "But did you not think about putting a shower curtain on it?" [audience laughter] And I said, "Well, I did consider it, but I couldn't decide on the color." [audience chuckles] And she said, "I think blue don't you." [audience laughter] But more than all of these honors, I got a phone call from my beloved sponsor, Thomas Crapper and Company, right? And they phoned me up. More than anything else, this is a most amazing thing. They phoned me up and they said, "Tim, in honor of the Bath Channel crossing, we at Thomas Crapper and Company are going to release a commemorative lavatory, a commemorative toilet named after you." [audience laughter] It's an amazing thing about Great Britain that I don't think perhaps it's something that I have found to be very very true.

 

And I'll leave you with this thought that is that Great Britain is a land where you can turn to the great British public, look them directly in the eye and go, "I'm going to do something really quite hard." You can say, "I'm going to run up Kilimanjaro or I'm going to climb Everest." And the great British public will look you in the eye and they will go, "Well, it's not that hard." [audience laughter] Or you can look them in the eye and go, "I'm going to do something really quite hard like run up Kilimanjaro or climb Everest or row the English Channel dressed as a dolphin or carrying a fridge or wrestling a weasel." And the great British public will look you directly in the eye and go, "This man's a hero. Get right behind him ladies and gentlemen, someone get the Prime Minister on the phone.” I don't know what it says about Britain as a nation, but I have broken my entire body to prove it to be true. Thanks so much for listening. Goodnight.