Before captaining her all-female crew, Edwards recalled the Whitbread Race of ’85-’86 as she sailed with 17 men, Edwards being the only female on board. “Why? Why? Why? Why would I want to do that again?” she laughed after pondering the question about battling the ocean that’s “always trying to kill you.” Edwards had dropped out of school at the age of 15. Her mother knew that this troubled teen would be better educated by, as Edwards put it, “The University of Life.” “Navigation is my passion and I knew there was not a male crew in existence that would ever let me on board as a navigator.” She continued, “I thought, this is the way the world looks and if I can’t fit into it, I’ve got to change it. So how do I change my world?”
The film captured every difficult and harrowing moment from Edwards’ decision to go forward with assembling her team and a boat, to the starting gun firing and the perilous adventures at sea. Edwards admitted that initially, this endeavor was rather selfish; “I just wanted to navigate.” With only 3 females out of 230 crew members racing, Edwards said that an all-female crew would “kill a lot of birds with one stone. I got to be a navigator, it would prove that women could sail around the world. We could prove that we could be competitive and I felt that really as we went through the race it was much bigger than Maiden. … It was actually about anyone standing up for themselves and saying, ‘Don’t tell me what I can and cannot do.’” She added, “I suddenly found myself in a battle that I knew I had to fight. I thought if we fail, the next women that come after us will have us hanging around their necks like an albatross. … We’ve got to succeed. We just had to.”
From the moment Maiden set sail, her mission was to empower and inspire women. Now, three decades later, The Maiden Factor, a non-profit organization, in association with Maiden’s current voyage, raises money to help educate women and girls around the world. Why this particular charity? Edwards solemnly said, “It’s a way for me to say, ‘Sorry for throwing away a free education which my country gives me.” Currently, according to Edwards, there are 130 million girls around the world who are denied an education or the opportunity to receive one—and that’s a conservative estimate.
Edwards realized the disparity of opportunities afforded to females and declared, “If [you] educate girls, you educate her family, you educate her village [and] everyone around her. People are happier, healthier.” The reasons behind this vast gender disparity in education are complex and myriad and as the Maiden sails the world once again, The Maiden Factor is partnering with various smaller solution-based charities to increase awareness as she stops at major ports. While docked, the staff offers tours, brings school groups aboard, and educates children, especially boys, accentuating the fact that girls are equals. Additionally, girls pick up a pen and write. They share their hopes and dreams of a better future and that message then travels around the world on Maiden to be developed into a Call to Action and given to world leaders. This activism is a way for young girls to hold up a “…mirror to the world and say, ‘What the hell have you done with our world? You need to change it!’ So we’re very much a part of that whole ethos.”
Maiden’s voyage began last November and will be stopping in Vancouver and Seattle in August. Edwards proudly said, “Maiden is always doing something great” and now you can watch the course she travels on-line, learn more about sponsoring a leg of the trip, or help support this worthwhile endeavor at The Maiden Factor.