Baby next adventure for rower Debra

Transatlantic rower Debra Veal spoke for the first time today about plans for her next big adventure - motherhood. Mrs Veal, 27, from Teddington, has been offered lucrative book, television and sponsorship deals since completing her gruelling 111-day journey from Tenerife to Barbados.

However, speaking to the Evening Standard at her hotel in Port St Charles, where she is staying until her return to London on Wednesday, she said her next challenge will probably take place much closer to home as she and her husband, Andrew, plan to have children "sooner rather than later".

Mrs Veal, who rowed most of the 2,900-mile Ward Evans Atlantic Rowing Challenge alone in Troika Transatlantic after her husband pulled out on 7 October due to sea-sickness, said: "The response to what I have done has been immense and there seem to be a lot of opportunities opening up as a result.

"Things are moving fast so Andrew and I just need to take one thing at a time. I am thinking of other adventures but I also have to get back to reality at some point. I am 27 and I want to have children sooner rather than later."

Friends doubt whether she will be able to resist the lure of further adventures - either on land or sea - though they say that in conversations via satellite phone during the last weeks of the voyage, the couple had been discussing the prospect of raising a family.

Mrs Veal's twin sister Hayley said: "I know she is already thinking of her next big challenge. I think one of the things she really wants to do is another epic journey, this time with a film crew.

"She is already talking to a respected documentary-maker about a series for one of the main channels, and I know she would be great at it. She's so flexible - she's a very experienced mountaineer as well as a rower and I know her strength of character means she could cover any terrain, even jungle.

"And she has proved she can draw people into her adventure. She has built up quite a following. Hundreds of people from all over the world have been reading her daily log on the internet and sending her messages of support."

Legendary yachtsman Sir Chay Blyth, who praised Mrs Veal's "momentous achievement" as one of only 11 women to have rowed an ocean, said Mrs Veal would find it difficult returning to normal life.

He said: "No one expected her to go on alone when Andrew pulled out - he was the confident one. But she surprised a lot of people, including some of the other rowers who thought she wouldn't make it.

"That sort of tenacity and endurance is a rare thing and I think that now she has tasted adventure she will want more."

Meanwhile, the Veals, who are to meet the prime minister of Barbados tonight at a reception in Debra's honour, have already started work on a book entitled A Wife on the Ocean Waves.

Their literary agent is in talks with at least three publishers over the rights to the book. The contract is expected to earn them a six-figure sum - more than enough to cover the £60,000 cost of the race and the estimated £7,000 bill run up by Mrs Veal in her twice-daily satellite phone calls to her husband in London.

Mr Veal, 35, a management consultant, greeted his wife with a bottle of champagne as she arrived on dry land. She described it as an "absolute taste sensation? after four months of drinking desalinated sea water.

Theakston: I'm sorry for brothel sex