Blog Archive

Mud, glorious mud

I have spent the last week or so moving all my worldly goods from my winter quarters ashore to my summer residence – an elderly but charming houseboat  in the middle of Woodbridge. I will be the boat’s caretaker for the summer, kicking the bilge pump if the river threatens to get the wrong side continue reading »


Maritime mayhem and muddy shores

I’m writing this on board ‘Ellen’ anchored on the River Deben in Suffolk, just off a pretty wooded beach called the Rocks. Terns are swooping close by, their calls shrill but kinder on the ear than the boat’s anchor alarm, which goes off regularly enough to stop me getting complacent about the holding quality of continue reading »


Shipshape schooners and perfect proposals

At the beginning of July I hitched a ride to Brittany on a Welsh schooner, came back on a Cornish lugger and enjoyed three festivals of sail along the way…. but more about that another time. Time to come back down to earth…… My adventures are over for the time being and I’m in sunny continue reading »


From school days to schooners, via Stephen Fry

The only thing I remember about my English teacher at secondary school was the telling off she gave me for wearing my trousers too tight.  Well of course I was. Trousers had only recently been introduced as optional school uniform, so the game was to bend the rules in the same way that we rolled continue reading »


Passports and possibilities

Intrepid sailors are a bit like buses – you don’t meet any for ages and then suddenly there’s a whole succession of fascinating salty coves to blog about. It was my enjoyable task recently to introduce the launch of Shirley Billing’s latest book Passport to Adventure, the third and final stage of a circumnavigation that started continue reading »