Gavin Henson sailed his own yacht to Cardiff for a night out and carnage unfolded
Gavin Henson has revealed he once sailed his yacht from Cardiff to Swansea after a night out and everything almost went very wrong.
The 33-cap international, who is one of the most revered and talented players of his generation, recently appeared on The Big Jim Show with former Scotland international Jim Hamilton.
The Pencoed RFC product has kept himself largely out of the limelight in his post-playing days, and understandably so, after a career that saw him catapulted to the stratosphere in terms of fame and notoriety. You can read more about Henson's recent interview by clicking here.
READ MORE: Tonight's rugby news as fearful Gabby Logan speaks out and Wales confirm matches after Six Nations
Henson was asked by host Hamilton to explain a 'boat trip' by a mutual friend on X, which took place whilst Henson was on a sabbatical from the sport.
"I had a yacht, a pretty decent-sized yacht," began Henson. " I kept it in Swansea but I took it to Cardiff for a night out. It's only an hour, it's not far."
"Who's driving the yacht, first?," asked Hamilton.
"Oh, me," answered Henson. "I'm the skipper! Few of my mates on board, it was good fun. Get to Cardiff, night out, big night. Get up in the morning, and I didn't check the weather, I just looked out - sunny - I'll be fine, I'm only going back to Swansea.
"Out we go, about half 10 in the morning. Two of my mates on board with me, there's only three of us. Out we go, and there's a bit of chop. Few waves, but it was good. A bit of fun, you know? It was a decent sized boat, a two-storey boat, it was quite high, it was like the size of a house. Four bedrooms, four en suites - it was a proper boat. We go out, bit of chop, I thought it was a bit of fun. Boys are like - 'Wahey!' - carry on.
"But then I got the tides and winds wrong. They were sort of against each other. So we had these rogue waves, but it was bad. I got up and I couldn't turn around, it was so big. Think of the boat now - two stories - the waves were coming over the boat. We were under water for about three or four seconds.
"Now that is scary! Then we come out, we're coming down the back of a wave and there's another wave coming again. We left Cardiff at 10.30am. Two mates are balling their eyes out, crying their eyes out. I was being seasick it was that bad. I'm hugging the thing, I've rung the lifeguard, they wouldn't come out it was that bad.
"You know The Wolf of Wall street? When he's on his yacht.
"(It was like that) but worse," said Henson. "On my life now, it was worse. When I watched that film, I was like - 'That was us!' - how we didn't die...
"I say two of my mates, the one guy has never spoken to us since that day, he's had nothing to do with us. He just thought - 'You guys are nuts' - I have never seen him since. We get to Swansea and it's 11 o'clock at night. We were fighting these waves in the same spot, I couldn't even get the boat to move forward, for 12 hours.
"But it's true what they say - you will give up before the boat does. Thank god the boat didn't sink and just kept going. That was a mad, mad story. We got off at that pontoon, and the boat was an absolute mess - seaweed all over it, I lost a little boat off the back, some lifeguard found it like four days later down in Barry somewhere, I had to re-collect that, that was funny.
"The boat was a mess, it was terrible! That was one of my lives, I was luck there."
Wow.
Once in the the upper echelons of professional sport, and having all the glitz, glamour and crazy adventures that come with it, nowadays Henson lives a far quieter life.
The Welshman started playing rugby again last summer, and regularly plays at fly-half for boyhood club Pencoed RFC. In his working life, he runs his pub 'The Fox' in St Brides Major, and keeps himself to himself.
Henson turns 43 on Saturday, and four days after that, it will be 20 years to the day that he kicked that iconic penalty against England - which changed everything.
Fancy listening to the full interview with Henson? Click here to watch The Big Jim Show.
