Solo yachtswoman Katie Miller, 19, has arrived in Cowes in her Corribee 21, Elektra, after circumnavigating the UK in three months.

Katie left the Hamble on 20 April and arrives back there tomorrow. She sailed anti-clockwise around the country making 40 stopovers. Her ‘hairiest’ moments were in thick fog in the Moray Firth: ‘It was only when I got into the lock in the Caledonian Canal and started going up that I broke through the murk and into daylight again,’ she said.

She also surfed down breaking waves at 12 knots in the Irish Sea, hand-steering after a wave pooped her, threw the boat through 180 degrees and snapped the tiller pilot in two.

In Bardsey Sound another large following sea – and the fact she was still hand-steering – meant she had to pray she would not hit a rock in the main channel : ‘I could not leave the helm to check the chart,’ she said. She had a few hours of worry sailing from Milford Haven to Padstow – trying to outrun a gale – and dealing with a ‘pitch black’ night, but never once doubted the boat.

Katie – who worked for the Ellen MacArthur Trust and was following Ellen’s own passage in a Corribee has raised £2,500 for the charity with her passage.