Barnes, back home, recounts ordeal at sea

A Newport Beach sailor adrift last week in a crippled sailboat off the coast of Chile stepped onto Orange County soil Tuesday morning and was met by a crush of family, friends and reporters.

Ken Barnes Jr., rescued Friday after a three-day ordeal that drew international media attention, arrived at John Wayne Airport at about 9 a.m., having flown from Punta Arenas, Chile, to Santiago to Dallas before making it home.

Surrounded by family and girlfriend Cathy Chambers at a news conference, Barnes walked reporters through the calamity that ended his attempt to be the first man to sail nonstop around the world from the West Coast eastward.

He said a 25-foot wave rolled his boat, the Privateer, 360 degrees, snapping his two masts, breaking hatches and letting water into his boat. Chambers, during Barnes’ calls to her by satellite phone, kept him updated on a rescue effort that seemed to keep getting pushed further and further back.

Barnes thanked his family, authorities in the United States and Chile, and the crew of the fishing trawler Polar Pesca 1, which picked him up early Friday morning.

Barnes said he felt conflicted, because while he was glad to see his loved ones after a very rough experience, “I’d like to be out there for another three or four months completing what I set out to do.”

Barnes said he wasn’t sure what he was going to do with himself next, but that he was going to take stock of his situation before making any big decisions. He does not have the money for another trip right now, having sold his house and his pool maintenance business to finance the voyage.

Among the family members with Barnes were his 21-year-old twin daughters, who surprised him at the Dallas airport and joined his flight to Newport Beach. His daughter Teryn Barnes said she appreciated the chance to see her father alone.

“I liked that nobody was there but us,” she said. “He had no idea we’d be there.”

Some of the most emphatic words about the trip came from a man who was meeting Barnes for the first time.

“Please, don’t do it again!” said Michael Morales, the Riverside Ham radio operator who kept Barnes’ loved ones in touch with authorities and the Polar Pesca 1 in Chile during the whole rescue effort.

Morales, who was born in Chile, shook Barnes’ hand and handed him a Chilean flag as a memento. He said he felt like an extension of the family as he shared their worries about Barnes.

Morales offered his help to the family, whom he did not know previously, when he saw media reports of Barnes’ troubles.

Morales said he would do the same thing again: “Do not do it again, but I will do it again [if you do].”

Barnes said at the news conference that he does not regret the trip, despite putting 12 years and all his financial resources into making it.

“We all have dreams,” he said. “You’ve got to live life. You’ve got to do what you need to do.”

A private man who calls himself “a regular guy,” Barnes said he never expected world media attention.

“Now I’d like to get back to my family,” he said.