Five hours into our madcap race, we feared that we weren’t going to make it. We knew the odds were stacked against us, but we had no choice but to…
Learning curve
‘We spotted people in the water, fighting for their lives’
Under reefed mainsail and engine we were heading westwards, close to the rocky cliffs off the French south coast, east of Marseille. In the distance I saw something in the…
I sailed across the pacific with one hand
Having reached Bora Bora, I was about to set off on the next leg of my circumnavigation, covering the 1,850 miles to Fiji on my own. There followed a series…
A disastrous trip saw this sailor shipwrecked for the second time on the same islands… 50 years later
During the afternoon of Christmas Eve 2019, I was steering a tubby old steel ketch called Cristina on a delivery passage slowly westward along the south coast of Isla Las…
‘Strange sticky fuel gummed up my engine’
Having a breakdown at sea, and especially in the Bristol Channel, would be extremely scary, with very strong tides, navigational hazards and shipping movements, but we were suddenly confronted with…
‘An out-of-control 40ft motor cruiser reversed at speed into our stern’
Following an already eventful summer cruise to Brittany, our return Channel crossing suddenly became a lot more challenging. We’ve been sailing our 34ft yacht, Hummingbird for 8 years. We generally…
Orca attacks: ‘The orcas shook the boat like a toy’
Departing Nazaré, Portugal at around 0900, we headed south. The day started with no wind and a sizeable swell. The flogging of the sails was incessant but we – my…
How I survived a dismasting in an 80 knot storm in the middle of an ocean
Cape Horn gave me a good beating, and I needed to sort some problems on the boat, so I anchored off Picton Island in the lee of the Horn. It…
‘The boat smashes the shore and the floor bows inwards with each blow’
Setting sail from the Black Sea my husband K and I have enjoyed wonderful journeys through the Bosphorus, Marmara, the Dardanelles and the Aegean, cruising south along the western Turkish…
‘The shaking of the rig was horrific’
Our nadir was approaching. Our home port of Fremantle, Australia would be 6,880 miles away – straight down. From Bermuda our yacht Zen Again would need to literally fly to…