Being on the water is how I find solace, which comes in many forms. One of which, new to me, came after an invitation to go salmon fishing in a…
Sailing Blogs
‘There is nothing difficult about using marine-friendly suncream’ – Lu Heikell
Almost every day we are alerted to a crisis, be it social, political economic or environmental. It is easy to feel overwhelmed and start to block out everything and assume…
Inside the ‘shuddering blancmange’: Pete Goss gets a liferaft reality check
Battling inside an orange blancmange which is in the shuddering throws of a major fit, it strikes me that a liferaft is not the place to be. This is a…
‘With scientists on board, I get force-fed fun and helpful knowledge day in and night out’
I could spend my life sailing towards the horizon. To save my soul, as solo sailor Bernard Moitessier famously said when he turned the boat around to keep sailing instead…
‘Fitting the catamaran’s two hulls into a berth for one just wasn’t going to work’ – Lu Heikell
Driving down to Greece this spring with a car full of bits for Skylax was a bit of a shock to the system. It was the first time we had…
‘An orange glow lit up the horizon: an oil tanker had been torpedoed’ – Dick Durham
Inside an old jewellery box sits a yellowing fang set in a gold mount. It is the triangular molar wrenched from a shark jaw trolled for somewhere in the South…
‘We tied up our wet boat, with wet ropes, to the wet quay’ – Libby Purves
Shuddering our way through the latest cold front, accompanied by dank spring drizzle, it seems fitting to talk of the glory of dryness. A lot of our sailing, down the…
Should there be both foiling and non-foiling classes in the next Vendée Globe? – Pete Goss
The Grand National of sailing that is the Vendée Globe has once again gifted an amazing romp around the globe, in which we were able to live alongside 40 sailors…
‘She went like a bronco, throwing her bow to the western sky’ – Dick Durham
There’s nothing like planning, and of course, it had all been planned a year in advance. Application forms filled in, a berth allocated, pilot book purchased. Documents of competence, proof…
When it comes to yachts, does beauty really matter? – Libby Purves
A seagoing boat is not a toy. It is the most serious of vehicles, built to let humans brave an unpredictable, lethally dangerous element with efficient control and reasonable dispatch.…