Sailing transport: a woman from Sète recounts her journey between Colombia and Brittany in an artistic logbook

Nathalie Cauvi raconte toute la traversée à la voile d’une production de café. MIDI LIBRE – PHILIPPE MALRIC

La Sétoise Nathalie Cauvi raconte tout le parcours, à la voile, d’une cargaison de café entre la Colombie et la Bretagne dans "De la graine à la tasse".

In the current trend of research into decarbonization of maritime transport, some sailboats are already involved. In Sète, there is the Bourlingue et Pacotille association which sails between Sicily, Tunisia, Corsica and the Gulf of Lion. More broadly, in France, we can rely on the modern sailboats of Grain de Sail or also on the old herring boat, the Gallant, which unfortunately sank, leaving two missing in 2024.

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Proposal to the owners of the Gallant

Two years before this tragedy, Nathalie Cauvi from Sète, in the midst of a career change, had the opportunity to board this 1916 iron-hulled boat for her return trip between Colombia and Brittany. Following a meeting with the owners of the schooner through a mutual acquaintance, the former artistic director suggested that they tell the story, in texts, photos and especially in drawings, of the journey of a coffee bean between its starting point and its arrival point.

Stay with a coffee producer

“So I met and spent some time with a coffee producer in Colombia”, explains the woman who is now a sailor on the Black Swan, moored in the Orsetti basin of the port of Sète. This meeting is the starting point of From the seed to the cup, a story of transporting coffee by sail, his very pretty travel diary, published at the beginning of December. The launch of an adventure in every sense of the word between the discovery of coffee production, its transformation, its packaging and its transport to the port of Santa Maria.

57 days at sea to bring it back to Ouessant

“There, we loaded the 35 tons of coffee into the hold, carrying the 70 kg bags on our backs” , she says. She also describes it in her book. A work dotted with watercolors, felt-tip pen and ink drawings. She details this curious life on board where each space is occupied by the cargo, her questions (at the beginning) in front of the different ropes to be activated, the toilet problems, the rough seas, her learning to read the stars to navigate (still without an engine). In short, this almost initiatory journey during these 57 days at sea to Ouessant and the tasting session of this famous coffee with a local. Who is not just anyone… To discover, perhaps during the author’s book signing session, on Thursday, December 12 from 5 p.m. at the Brasserie la Singulière, quai de Bosc.

From Seed to Cup by Nathalie Cauvi, 192 pages, €24.99. Available on Etsy, by email at nathaliecauvi@gmail.com, but also at the Nouvelle Librairie Sétoise and the Tourist Office. I subscribe to read the rest