Research routinely suggests that boat owners hardly ever use their boats. You could end up spending £10,000 a year plus the initial cost of buying a boat just to have something quietly floating at the dock for all but a week a year. Is there any point in learning to sail? Of course there is! You […]
After the EU referendum on Thursday the UK has been plunged into uncertainty with regard our place in the world. Reports suggest that the leader of the Leave campaign Boris Johnson had no plans for what he would do should we leave. Whichever way you voted, as a sailor you will be impacted because most […]
I was in an Indian restaurant in Lyme Regis this weekend when I got talking with the couple sat at the next table. They were late middle aged, and had taken early retirement from their jobs in London and moved to Dorset for its pace of life and character – something you see a lot […]
The 2015 US Coast Guard (USCG) safety statistics have been released and there is a clear (if not obvious) message – those without instruction in boating safety are far more at risk of fatal accidents than those who have had training. Another issue is that intoxication at sea is a killer too. USCG Statistics […]
With the explosion of Airbnb the world has become aware of the so-called social economy. Where for hotels this will mean competition with a person with a spare room who can rent it out for a few days to help them pay their mortgage, and taxi companies feel threatened by Uber, but what’s happening for […]
Owning a boat is an expensive affair. Keeping a 40ft yacht in a South Coast marina can cost £5000 a year, and then you will need to pay insurance and maintenance, as well as hauling it out every year to keep its underside in good condition. It is no wonder that there’s a saying that […]
This weekend I took my partner on a sailing experience day with a sailing school in Lymington in the UK. Though the RYA Start Yachting course is two days long, the idea is to let the potential sailor see if they enjoy it. Judging by the conversion of my sailing sceptical partner, perhaps only a […]
One of the skills associated with sailing is the ability to tie different knots for different purposes. It should become as second nature to the sailor as being able to trim their sails for the wind direction. Why are there so many knots out there? Different knots have different purposes for different circumstances. […]
Last week it came out that the US Navy has added celestial navigation to its officer training programme again. The Royal Navy learned this the hard way recently with its newest ships losing all power at random times due to a design fault and being unable to navigate in sometimes awkward situations! With routine […]
As I grew up, I had a habit of getting wet when I was staying anywhere near the sea, and if it floated I would try to have a go on it – be it canoes (surf or inland water), surf boards, a range of dinghies and even tall ships. Behaving badly on the water […]