Maddly Bamy, who was Brel’s companion, will christen the Askoy Il, the singer’s completely renovated ship

Maddly Bamy is expected on Saturday at the port of Zeebrugge, in Belgium, alongside Piet and Gustaaf Wittevrongel, the two Flemish brothers behind this relaunch.

The former Guadeloupean dancer and actress, who now lives in Morbihan, will be the guest of honor at the ceremony. Even if she assures that the tributes must first be intended for the Wittevrongel duo, who managed to restore this piece of maritime heritage, at the end of a chaotic journey of 17 years, with almost no public aid.

Maddly Bamy crossed two oceans with Jacques Brel half a century ago to reach the Marquesas Islands. Companion at the end of the singer’s life, she dives back into this adventure on the occasion of the christening of the ship Askoy II, restored from top to bottom: “an extraordinary dream (as the Wittevrongel brothers) ended up realizing‘”, she declares, admiringly. “When you think about the state of this boat when they found it. It’s huge what they did. We had to fight to get to the end“, insists Maddly Bamy.

Very sick on board

For Jacques Brel (1929-1978), the adventure of the Askoy II began in 1974, when he cast off from the port of Antwerp, taking with him Maddly and his daughter France, who left the ship after six month, in the French West Indies. The crossing proved eventful, Brel discovered that he had cancer and had to make several trips back and forth to Europe for treatment.

The author of Do not leave me does not give up however and finally drops anchor in the Marquesas, in Polynesia, where he spends the last years of his life with Maddly Bamy, far from his family. Today, almost 46 years after Brel’s disappearance (in October 1978), Maddly Bamy still says “connected to him 24 hours a day, every day“.”I sit down at the piano and it sings inside me“, she confides.

The Marquesas, California, Fiji, New Zealand

The trip to the Marquesas with the Askoy II, a 19-meter sailboat, heavy and demanding, for which she herself had learned the basics of navigation, was proof of the “immensity of dreams“from the iconic Belgian singer.”He is a man who did not want to stay still, he wanted to go elsewhere and see how others live. He left saying to himself ‘I let go of everything, I cross the world if necessary'”, continues Maddly Bamy, 80 years old.

The boat’s life did not end when Brel decided to sell it in Polynesia, to retrain as an amateur airplane pilot. With at least three owners at the controls, the Askoy II then sailed towards California and the Fiji Islands, before running aground on a beach in New Zealand. This is where the Wittevrongel brothers arrive, always closely linked to Brel’s maritime adventure since it was in the family sailmaker, in Blankenberge, that the latter came to equip himself before leaving.

“One of the most beautiful yachts in the world”

When Piet and Gustaaf learned in the 2000s, during a conversation about Brel, that traces of the boat had been found in the antipodes, they decided to repatriate it to the Belgian coast. Described in the 1960s by specialists as one of the most beautiful yachts in the world, the sailboat was then nothing more than an empty hull, eaten away by rust.

Saturday in Zeebrugge, the Askoy II will not necessarily leave the port to sail, but Piet Wittevrongel assures that in addition to the brand new hull and interior woodwork, the masts are now erected to hoist the sails, “a complete renovation“.