With the rest of the world speculating on the mysterious disappearance of the crew of the Kaz II, some may suggest now is not the best time to set off on a long cruise.

But not New Yorkers Reid Stowe and Soanya Ahmad.

He's a veteran of long-distance sailing voyages in all kinds of weather. She's never sailed outside the Hudson River.

But together, 55-year-old Stowe and his 23-year-old girlfriend, have embarked on a voyage that they intend to take them three times around the globe and last 1,000 days and nights nonstop, with no port calls for supplies or a walk on solid ground.

They set sail on Saturday afternoon aboard his 20-meter, two-masted schooner, named the Schooner Anne, from a Hudson River marina in North Hoboken, in bright sunshine and temperatures in the 70s.

"This will be my first time sailing ever - except for up and down the Hudson River," said Ahmad, the New York-raised daughter of immigrants from Guyana.

"I haven't gotten seasick so far," she said with a grin.

She may be tested when the yacht rounds South America's Cape Horn, an area infamous for waves as high as 100 feet, as well as icebergs.

If they succeed, they say their time away from land will surpass the 657 days spent at sea by Australian Jon Sanders, who circumnavigated the globe three times from 1986 to 1988.

Stowe planned a course that will take them into the north Atlantic to take advantage of wind and currents, before heading south of the Equator.

Past the Equator, before passing Cape Horn, he mapped out a course that would loop around the south Atlantic, in the outline of a heart.

"This is a voyage that takes heart," he said.

Provisions were packed into every nook and cranny of the schooner's hull, everything from rice and beans to tomato sauce, pasta, pesto, olives, chocolate, spices and about 90 kilos of parmesan cheese. Sprouts were already growing in boxes for salads.

They also have a small library of books on yoga, meditation and spirituality, as well as art and history, plus the collected works of Joseph Conrad and every book written by Herman Melville, including Moby Dick.

Source: China Daily/agencies