Porky & Beluga cook at sea

Music, sunshine and bare feet...  Utopia A former boss once said to me that his staff with screen-savers bearing Utopian images of setting suns, beeches or desert islands, were dreamers with no ambition. I learnt a lot from him, but how wrong he was on that occasion... he saw everything very clearly, in either black or white... I arrived back in Cascais last Thursday, much later than I'd originally planned. I'd managed to pick up a stinking cough and cold plus the skipper's arrival was delayed by more than a week; that worked out well for me as it happened. Anyway, it's really good to be back here, still quite warm with fewer tourists - Utopia? Well almost. The music and sunshine are good but not quite bare feet conditions yet. So now I'm installed on the boat with Gunnar, the skipper Grunde and their friend, also from Fredrikstad, Stenar. One Brit with three Norgies. The crew - Me with Stenar, Gunnar and skipper Grunde Last week Gunnar ...

The Gib'sea 37 moored in the marina in Cascais Having found myself a boat that's sailing to Las Palmas in the Canneries, I have finally achieved my second goal.  The boat, H. Breed, is a Gib'sea 37 equipped with radar, AIS, auto-helm, two large Genoas, water maker and a pleasing but sparce little galley. It also has a large, well-protected cockpit, two double aft cabins and a massive double bow cabin. The boat was sailed down from Fredrikstad near Oslo, earlier this summer. The 3 man Norwegian crew are about to start a two-year, around the world adventure, beginning with the 5 day sail to Las Palmas on the 15th or 16th November, where they'll pick-up their additional crew member. Gunnar was left aboard as boat keeper. I met him in Skipper's bar in the marina. We got chatting and have subsequently become good friends, meeting for a beer and a chat most days. Last night I stayed aboard with him and have left the majority of my kit at my former Hotel, ...

I like people watching. During my traveling days in international sales, I spent many hours sitting in airports watching folk drifting past me. Today, if I'm in a bar or restaurant, I still find myself people watching. So many couples sit across a table from each other hardly uttering a word. The younger ones staring intently at their phones, the older ones just staring into a void. I used to think they'd be deliberating... poor guy, sitting there all alone. Now I'm not so sure, maybe they're thinking lucky git.  Some of my friends are in stale relationships, the spark has long gone; please God, don't let that happen to me. Nothing much about sailing in this post you'll be gutted to read. But having left Salamander, I was feeling  disappointed last Friday. I'd arrived in Cascais in the early hours, having never spent time alone in a holiday location, I had no idea how much fun it was going to be.  But I had a mission, find another boat to Las Pa...

I love the peace and tranquility of evening & night watches - best thinking time 'Never start a speech or a report with an excuse' my mentor John Arthur taught me. So I won't. I'll put it at the end instead I sailed from Lymington with just the skipper Chris and Alastair, a very experienced deck-hand who was acclimatising himself to the relative creature comforts of cruising, after many years of serious ocean racing. Our trip took 5 days and eleven hours, 33 minutes and 12 seconds to travel from Lymington to Cascais; we motored for all but three of those hours, burning more than £1,000 of diesel. For the first 36 hours we had 25kt winds on the nose ( boats can't sail with wind on the nose) with choppy seas, then the wind shifted around to behind us, but not enough to push Salamander's bulky 33 tonnes at more than 4kts. She's definetely built for comfort not speed, a total contrast from the Discovery 55. The last three days across Biscay a...

At last we're finally going! If you're looking at my blog for the first time, may I suggest that you don't start here; scroll right down to the bottom and read Genesis and the comments - it might make a bit more sense... My goal is to reach the Caribbean again at the end of the ARC Atlantic rally from Las Palmas in the Canaries to St Lucia in the Caribbean. I'm sailing on a Nauticat 521 which I've already seen in Lymington when I met the skipper and his wife a month or so ago. Salamander sailing close to the wind Skipper Chris has been watching the long range forecasts to find a suitable window for our first leg to Cascais near Lisbon.  Because of the 2 week delay to our start, we'll probably have just a day there before heading down to Las Palmas.  I'll be leaving her in Las Palmas and looking for a new boat and crew to cross the Atlantic to Rodney Bay in St Lucia.  I've been to the Caribbean a few times before on holidays and also...

' The Lord is not slow to fulfill his promise as some count slowness, but is patient toward you, not wishing that any should perish...'  I'm not a scholar of the Bible, just a Christian with faith.  Our voyage to Las Palmas has been delayed again.  The Atlantic has suffered a series of low pressure systems since the arrival of Hurricane Hugo some 18 days ago, making this period particularly difficult for the weather forecasters.  The bottom-line though, the sea conditions across the eastern Atlantic and the Bay of Biscay in particular, are still pretty wild. These delays for me have not been a problem and I was pleased that the skipper on my next boat has put safety and crew comfort before profit; he has lost one fee-paying crew member because of these delays which to me, says a lot about his judgement and business ethic. Whilst my first posting was a bit long, it has already helped me to prevent sailing again with folk with different agendas and or mindsets. Th...

In the beginning - Bereshit *, or maybe you'd prefer Genesis... Sailing on Kazara in Poole harbour - circa 1966 So where do I start? I wanted to start a blog to share the sailing experiences I've had recently plus some from the past and that I'm going to have going forward; I know that some of you find it hard to understand the immense pleasure I get from sailing.  I'm about to embark on some 'blue water' sailing and I'm hoping to cross the Atlantic in November. I've always enjoyed writing, so what better way to fill those R & R moments aboard. But please don't worry, future updates will be sooo much shorter than this first epic 😊. Well having just sailed back to Lymington from Muxia in north west Spain, I had plenty of time on board a Discovery 55 to reflect on what I want from my sailing in future.  I enjoyed this pristine boat which was owned by the skipper; it's a state-of-the-art, fast, cruising yacht and just three year...