Ever wanted to quit the nine-to-five, opt out of the rat race, sell your home and take the family around the world in a boat? That’s exactly what a local couple did – and they’ve published a book about their adventures that has attracted movie makers. Shaun Shackleton meets Jean and George Russell and hears tales of storms, shipwrecks, and the international currency of whisky THE first things I noticed when I pulled into the drive of George and Jean Russell’s Vale home were fluorescent pink buoys under a tree.

As soon as I turned off the engine, George was in the drive to greet me: nut-brown skin and skipper’s cap.

‘Still have a boat, I see,’ I said, pointing to the buoys.

‘Just a small one,’ he said.

Inside Jean, her skin the same sun-tanned brown as her husband’s, sat at the living room table, all around her boating memorabilia – model ships and paintings and photos of the sea. These were definitely people who like the great outdoors.

She offered tea – not a dainty cup but a solid pint mug.

‘Because you’re a big fella,’ said Jean.

It was strange meeting in the flesh two people who, up to that moment, had been characters in a book.

Salamander Dreaming was written by Steve Plummer, who used extensive diaries kept by Jean throughout a seafaring adventure that changed their lives.

In August 1979, the couple, along with daughters, Kim, six, and Tania, four, friends Colin and Barbara, a paperboy called Steve and Zoe, a 19-year-old go-go dancer, set off from Guernsey on a 97ft-long, ex-pirate radio boat with the intention of travelling the world.

The story tells how they survived the storms that claimed the lives of several Fastnet yachtsmen, how they ended up shipwrecked on the beach of Esphino, Portugal, and what they had to do to survive while marooned there.

‘Basically, the book is good for anyone wanting to go off [on such an adventure],’ said George, who once worked as a Guernseybus engineer. ‘I got really fed up with the island. It’s so corrupt. I just had to get off.’

The tale began when George and Colin went to view a boat in Belfast called The Deep Diver. After a comical interlude in Customs (‘Aren’t there any boats to buy in Guernsey?’ asked one of the officials), they found their dream vessel and renamed her Salamander.

After a second trip, during which they bought her (and learned that the hotel in which they had previously stayed had been bombed by the IRA), they found themselves in possession of a boat that had been completely stripped.

‘They’d taken off the crane winch and left behind a box of spanners that didn’t fit anything,’ said George.

Jean flew to Ireland with the girls to see this vessel. She had dreamed of an Onedin-Line-style Edwardian sailing ship. What she got was an oil-covered workhorse.

‘I was so disappointed when I saw Salamander,’ she said.

George interjected: ‘The whole point is that it had to be a work boat.’

After days of cleaning and scrubbing and tinkering with the engines, they set off for Guernsey.

To some people, this opting out of society might sound strange, especially with two young children. Did they get any stick from people about it?

‘Some people thought we’d gone mad, especially older people,’ said Jean. ‘I don’t think we’re different from other people. They say: “We would do the same but we’ve a couple of kids.” Well, so had we.’

‘Basically, that was the finest education the girls could have had,’ said George.

And I believe him.

Throughout the book, the ‘little horrors’, as Jean calls them, seem to take it all in their stride – from being taught by their mum and dad and being frozen stiff on deck during a storm through their home being searched by officious policemen and mistakenly eating sweets covered in dead red ants. And how many kids can say that they’ve been shipwrecked?

‘They never wanted for anything,’ said Jean.

After setting off and travelling for a while, Jean and George shed most of their crew until all that was left were the two of them, the girls and Zoe.

‘She was a most amazing girl,’ said Jean.

‘Out of the four who came with us, she was the one I thought wouldn’t last,’ said George. ‘And she turned out to be the best.’

What struck me about meeting George and Jean in person was that they were exactly the same as they are in the book. Both loved to talk, both had a great sense of humour and I could tell that there was not only a huge respect between them but also an immense love.

Jean agreed with me and then said: ‘Unless it comes to the fags.’

George, who had obviously been on the receiving end of his wife’s anti-smoking campaign for some time, said: ‘She found a lighter in my overalls the other day. She’s really paranoid.’

After Salamander ran aground on the beach in Esphino, they learned from an English ex-pat, Yorkie, that they would never sail her again.

‘It was the highest tide in a century,’ said George. ‘Never to get that high again in our lifetime.’

After a night in Yorkie’s animal skin and firearms-covered shack (in the book they speculate as to whether he’s a hit man. ‘If he’s a hit man, he can’t be a very good shot. Not if he’s living like this,’ says George), the crew of the Salamander was befriended by another ex-pat, John, and his Portuguese wife, Fernander, and a local journalist, Jorge (whom, because of his unquestioning generosity, loyalty and help, Jean Christened St Jorge).

For me, the part of the book when they had resigned themselves to their fate and begun unloading all their possessions onto the beach was the saddest. It seemed that after all the effort of selling their house, planning the trip and the initial excitement, their dream had been cruelly snatched away.

It’s a testament to Jean’s brilliant writing – at times both funny and touching and others poignant and self-deprecating, but always true – that she turns this scene around to complete optimism. Not just an authorial trick, but in fact a direct reflection of how they saw their future. Punctuating the book like an unofficial motto is George’s saying, ‘It’ll be all right’.

After initially being struck by the kindness of these people, they set about fitting in with village life – and incurring the wrath of local officials.

Apart from wanting to slap high duties on the possessions they needed to sell (in one instance they calculated that the tax on a gift to a deaf boy of a hearing aid would cost them £100), as well as on the moveable parts of Salamander they could sell for salvage, they were also threatened with extradition.

George discovered that a hold full of booze – 84 litres-worth – was a great bargaining tool, until the police found out and limited him to one bottle a day. Meanwhile, they were taking more.

‘With the locals, it’s pinch what you can,’ said George. ‘By the same rule, they’ll let you have what they’ve got. We’d go up the street and they’d call us [George was nicknamed El Capitano] and we’d be invited in for meals.’

Their dreams of an early rescue were raised when a Portuguese Navy tug came around the coast. Jorge and his newspaper’s photographer were on the beach along with dozens of locals.

The tug stayed for half-an-hour, surveyed the scene, then turned and sailed off. Apparently the captain deemed the situation hopeless and rather than embarrass himself with a failed rescue attempt, he cut his losses and ran.

The Russells received even less help from their so-called country’s officials. This made the usually calm George seethe.

‘The British consul in Portugal was a waste of time. He was more interested in playing golf. Four times I went to see him and three times he was playing golf.’

When the time came for them to leave, they’d spent 21 weeks away from Guernsey – 18 of them in Esphino.

I won’t spoil the ending for readers – it’s just as fraught with adventure, bureaucracy, red tape, kindness and humour as the events leading up to the shipwreck and features a Portugese Opel Rekord – but urge everyone to go out and buy this inspirational book.

The Russells’ experience aboard Salamander and their ensuing adventures did nothing to dampen their travelling spirit. Since returning from Portugal, they have lived in Guernsey (at one time on a 30ft ex-lifeboat in Beaucette Marina), France and Spain and, at one time, they travelled in an old Winnebago.

They claim to have not yet found their nirvana – and although not on as grand a scale as the Salamander voyage, they’re still looking for it.

‘George has a 535 Yamaha and I like swimming,’ said Jean.

They also have a small camper van.

‘But we only go as far as Pleinmont in it,’ said George.

During the 80s they visited Esphino several times and were shocked to see how much the place had grown.

‘When we were there it was just a fishing village,’ said George. ‘We went back two years later to say thanks to everyone and it was really built up.’

He shook his head increduously. ‘In two years, to change that much.’

Today, Salamander is still very much a part of Esphino’s seascape. She supports a long slipway running from the top of the beach to below the low water mark. As it crosses the beach, the slipway’s timbers have been built into

Salamander – the perfect launch for local fishermen.

I tell them that their story would make a great film.

‘The production company that made Bridget Jones’s Diary has seen the book and made a few suggestions,’ said Jean.

So who knows, we might yet see Salamander Dreaming: The Movie with Richard E. Grant as George and Helena Bonham-Carter as Jean. But would they get the Guernsey accents right?

As I finish my flagon of tea and pocket my notebook and pen, I have to ask the Russells one last question.

My wife has always harboured a secret desire to sell up everything, Jean and George-style, buy a chrome Airstream trailer and travel around the United States.

‘Go ahead and do it,’ George says immediately, ‘or you’ll regret it.’

But what about coming back to nothing?

‘A lot of our friends have their homes paid for and pensions,’ said Jean. ‘But we’re equally happy.’

I’m still thinking about it.

* Salamander Dreaming – The story of George and Jean Russell as told to Steve J. Plummer is available at The Press Shop in Smith Street, The Bookshop, South Side, St Sampson’s, and Dolphin Stores, La Rochelle Road, Vale, at £7.99.