Meet Dan-Dan: The Boat
Before Marc rows a single stroke of his 2027 crossing, there's a boat to introduce — and it's not just equipment. It's named after his father.
Dan-Dan is named in memory of Dan Germiquet, a Swiss geologist who introduced a young Marc to the wild on field trips long before Bush Ways or Bush Ways Foundation existed. It's the same boat Marc rowed to a first-place solo finish in 2024/25, and the one he'll take back out to sea in December 2027.
What she's built from
Dan-Dan was built in Holland by Mark Slats and The Ocean Rowing Company, at a cost of R2.5 million. She's 7 metres long, with carbon-fibre oars and foot-steering pedals wired to the rudder — everything designed to squeeze maximum efficiency out of every stroke over a multi-week crossing.
What's on board
Front and rear cabins for sleep, storage, and — critically — flotation if things go wrong
Solar panels powering GPS, communications, and the onboard desalination unit that turns seawater into drinking water
Roughly 100kg of food, bringing Dan-Dan's total loaded weight to around 650kg once everything is packed
The details that matter at sea
Ocean rowing boats live a hard life, and Marc's prep reflects that. Every sharp edge on Dan-Dan has been smoothed down with an angle grinder — including the anchor — so that if he's ever thrown against something in rough seas, there's nothing left to cut him. It's a small detail, but it says a lot about how he approaches the whole crossing: reduce the number of things that can go wrong before they get the chance to.
Because of the size of Atlantic swells, Marc stays tethered to the boat for the entire crossing. That tether did its job on his first row — he was knocked overboard by a seven-metre wave on day five and pulled straight back to safety. Every four days, he also dives in to scrape shellfish and marine growth off the hull, keeping drag down and speed up.
A boat, and a name
It would be easy to talk about Dan-Dan purely in numbers — length, weight, cost, cabins. But the name is the point. Every stroke Marc takes across the Atlantic happens in a boat carrying his father's name across an ocean neither of them ever crossed together.
