Anchoring is often likened to a black art, but we have learnt that there is some science to it, a bit of commonsense and a whole lot of luck! I know plenty of weekend sailors and racers who loath it, even the old sea dog that took me through my RYA Coastal Skipper qualification didn’t... Continue Reading →
Shipping Vega to Sydney
When we first bought Vega, we had envisaged spending a season in the Mediterranean then sailing her home to Australia via the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans. In the end we loved the Med so much we spent three seasons there. I ended up sailing across the Atlantic with friends in 2016 and settled my itch... Continue Reading →
Elba
New crew, Damian and Helen, joined us for the penultimate leg of our 2017 cruise from Bastia in Corsica to the Tuscan Island of Elba and then north to Pisa and the famous leaning tower. Their arrival seemed to coincide with a decided change in the weather. It had been blue sky’s and sun all... Continue Reading →
Circumnavigating Corsica
Having only explored the Straits of Bonifacio in our first season we were really keen to spend some time on Corsica and decided to circumnavigate the island in a clockwise direction from Porto Veccio on the south-east coast. The south-east coast is a wonderful cruising ground. It is picturesque and has a host of anchorages... Continue Reading →
ILAFFT
When I was learning to fly…way before kids…I read a magazine called Pilot. It had an article on the back page called ILAFFT or "I Learned About Flying From That". It was the best section in the mag, and the first bit I read each month. Pilots could admit to their worst, most embarrassing, or... Continue Reading →
Canyoning
Whilst in the Alta Rocca Mountains we decided to go canyoning. For those that don't know, and there can't be many, canyoning is a fancy word for throwing yourself, and your kids, down a pristine, freezing cold mountain river. Location southern Corsica. On the morning of our canyoning expedition we were running late and as... Continue Reading →
Alta Rocca Mountains
After the mistral the weather was fine and settled so we headed back to Porto Veccio to meet up with S/V Intention and head into the mountains. Given our previous experience, rather than head into the marina we decided to leave the yachts at anchor and after a pre dawn start, took the dinghy ashore... Continue Reading →
Corsica, Porto Vecchio & San Ciprianu
There was another mistral coming. At present they seem to be an almost weekly occurrence, but vary from fairly mild to really quite nasty. With winds gusts of 50 knots forecast we had decided to leg it from north Sardinia to shelter in Porto Veccio on south east Corsica. It actually worked well, as we... Continue Reading →
Sardinian east coast
Other cruisers told us the east coast of Sardinia was a boring place to travel, with limited anchorage opportunities and lots of expensive marina time the order of the day. That may be the case in the wrong conditions, but we had a ball and anchored all the way up this spectacular coast. Sure, we... Continue Reading →
Cagliari
After a couple of days recouping in Cape Carbonara we had to run to Cagliari, to escape a fairly intensive Mistral that was rapidly heading across the Balearic sea towards us. The Mistral is another of those Mediterranean winds that sends sailors scurrying to find shelter. It’s a very gusty wind, the average wind speed... Continue Reading →