The received wisdom about life as a lawyer in the Cayman Islands is not that of unrelenting stress. Certainly the work is as complex as anything the City of London has to offer, but the torment of commuting on the Tube and the daily misery of inhaling pollution has been left behind. Surely, then, for those lucky enough to practise law in the Caymans, life is one of at least relative repose and tranquillity?

You may think so, but for Chris Hall, 35, a solicitor with Ogier, the offshore giant, the Cayman Islands is not only where he works but is also the scene of his next endurance challenge. “I’m in training to paddle-surf around the whole 100 miles of the Cayman Island chain,” Hall, a specialist in trust and hedge fund work, says. “No one has done it before. I’m hoping to be ready in September.”

Although there is no doubting the physical fitness it requires, paddle-surfing is one of conventional surfing’s more obscure offshoots. Hall’s primary sport, however, is one that needs no introduction. “I started rowing at 10 joining Hampton Court Palace, my local club,” he says. “I ended up becoming a member of Leander and training with athletes such as Olympic oarsmen Steve Redgrave and Matthew Pinsent.”

It was this background in high-performance, competitive rowing that enabled Hall to take on what, for many, would be the journey to end all journeys — rowing the Atlantic. “I fancied a challenge,” explains Hall, who converted his history degree from University College London to law, qualifying as a solicitor in 1998. He adds that Richard Pullan, who runs London’s renowned Altitude Centre, approached him and that before long he’d signed up to compete in the Woodvale Atlantic Rowing Race in 2003. The race was conceived by the man who completed, with John Ridgeway, the first successful ocean crossing of the 20th century in 1966 — Chay Blyth, CBE.

“We left from the Canary Island of La Gomera on October 19, 2003, to row to Barbados,” recalls Hall, who joined Ogier this year. He downplays the dangers of the trip: “We didn’t encounter any really bad seas, though I did fall overboard one night. Richard had to haul me back into the boat with a fish-hook. That was a bit of a worry.” He confesses that the pair entertained romantic notions of killing passing sharks for food, but thought again on the one occasion they saw one: “We decided we seeing it from the boat was as close as we wanted to get.”

The Atlantic, for Hall, was “a unique environment. It was fantastic to push ourselves to the limit and see such immensity.” They swam with dolphins but life in a two-man boat for 60 days had its downsides, not least when their water converter broke early in the trip. “That could have been very difficult for us — you drink 20 litres of water a day when rowing the Atlantic. But Richard is good with his hands. He spent a day fixing the water maker while I rowed. Luckily he mended it, though by the end we were down to just 50 litres of water.”

Equipment failure wasn’t the only problem — the strain of being with one person in a cramped space for so long also took its toll. “Within two weeks we wanted to kill each other,” Hall says. “But we got used to life together with no one around and settled into a routine. We had a great feeling of elation by the end, though it was strange to smell land after all that time at sea.”

Would he row the Atlantic again? “No chance,” Hall says. “It was an amazing experience, not least because the hypoxic training I did with Richard before the race meant that I got rid of asthma from which I’d occasionally suffered as a child. The whole thing gives you a life upgrade but once is enough.”

Hall and Pullan arrived in Barbados on December 18, having rowed for more than 3,000 miles. They came a highly creditable fifth in the race and worked with the Steve Redgrave Trust to raise £10,000, a third of which they gave to Asthma UK’s PEAK holidays for children with asthma. Hall loves life in the Caribbean and says he rows at lunchtimes. “It’s a very sea-orientated place,” he says, “perfect for training for my next challenge.”

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