So we made it to Algehro, now an afternoon to sort out a car, book the ferry, sort out some accommodation & get to a wedding...... Well we managed the first two and at 3am the next day we were on our way to beautiful Tuscany. Thanks to Keira & Arme we were able to share their accommodation, and were all set for a stunning Italian wedding..... The location just north of Lucca was something to behold. Having never been to this part of the world we were both blown away by the beauty of Tuscany, the tree lined mountains with cute little villages set upon them here and there is stunning. As for the wedding the Villa Catureglio in Borgo a Mozzano was as out of this world wedding venue.

A first evenings entertainment catching up with dear London friends, eating freshly made pizza from the wood fired oven, yum! And enjoy a nice bit of Tuscan red wine, fantastic! The perfect antidote to five hard days sailing.

Sophie & Jujus big day was amazing...... To see so many good friends in such great form, in this amazing location will stay with us forever. Audrey & Bertie had a ball, and Audrey managed to endear herself with a loud WOW as Sophie arrived at Jujus side... The four piece local band with Mandolin & Accordion, playing all the Italian favourites were brilliant, mixed with a rendition of 'All you need is love' by Sophie's cousins on the Guitar & Trumpet & sung by all. A great reception and dancing followed the lovely day. The next day was spent by the pool at the villa mixed with games of croquet and boules, and finished off with take away pizza for 40!!! 

We set off the next day for Florence with our good friends Todd & Tills, and Harvey and Emma. On our way we stopped in at Lucca for a bite to eat. An amazing walled city, the home of Pinnochio, we pottered about for a while enjoying the old town. Rising early the next day in Florence we set off to see Michaelangelo's David, which was every bit as impressive and aw inspiring as you would expect. A lovely late breakfast in a piazza and onto wandering around seeing all the statues, art works, piazzas and old architecture. You can really see why so many artists were inspired in Florence. The Pont de Vecchio is a grand old site from a far, and so lucky to still be standing after being the only bridge not blown up by Hitler in Florence. A delicious lunch followed by a prosecco at the members only rowing club along the river which Rolf managed to blag our way into, finished off by a sunset over Florence. A brilliant day.

We ventured off the next day to Cinque Terra with Todd and Tills, again astounded by the beauty of the region. 5 beautiful old villages set on cliffs into the sea. The following few days were filled with lots of smiles, relaxing, exploring, good wine and food and great friends. Staying in Monterosso this was our base, and glad we did choose this village as it was definitely the most child friendly. It is also the largest of the 5 towns with lovely beaches, shops and restaurants. We decided to see Riomaggiore by taking a boat trip which was a great way to see the 5 villages from the sea. With the kids so small it was also a better way for us to travel as although cinque terra is famous for its walks, it's not so suitable with the kids at this age! Riomaggiore has a picturesque little harbour and a steep main street full of little shops and restaurants. We spent our last day in Monterosso relaxing on the beach, even treating ourselves to our last splurge of a Thai massage on the beach. So relaxing on both body and soul! Time and kids did not allow us to see the other 3 villages but best to leave something to come back and see....... As we drove out of cinque terra we were again hit with beautiful scenery. A walkers paradise and definitely somewhere we would like to come back to when the kids are a little older. Back to Sardinia and Maya, to continue our trip down the west coast of Sardinia. Already happy at a little anchorage the past 2 nights just outside of Alghero! 

With our fun times in Tarifa and Gibraltar behind us, we knew we had a long haul ahead of us to get to Sardinia in time to the get to the main land for our friend Sophie & Jujus wedding....

We left Gibraltar on another beautifully sunny day, dodging the armada of tankers on the other side of the rock. We had a decent amount of wind around the 15knts and that night the strong southerly breeze brought a beautiful Saharan breeze with it. To be sailing in the Med properly for the first time on Maya at night with a thousand stars above and in only shorts & T-shirt was a real buzz. For the first time the dream of feeling total freedom away from the hum drum of London started to feel real. 

Our first leg was to get to, or past Almeria, as this would then mean we could head NE and in the direction of the Balerics. It would also mean we had conquered the 3 major capes of the Iberian peninsula, Cabo Finisterre, Cabo de São Vincente & Cabo de Gata in just over a mth. With the wind almost heading us coming up to Almeria we decided we would sail into the bay as far as we could before tacking out to get round the cape. We were amazed to see the land covered as far of the eye could see with green houses used to apparently grow a large proportion of Europes winter fruit & veg. The strategy of sailing into the bay was one I would not advise as we found what must be a strong current apparently sucking us back into the bay. We rounded Cabo de Gata around one in the morning and set course for Cartagena, from where we would take a view on our route across to the Balerics. 

Finally late morning on the following day we caught our first fish - yes! Finally a fish, and a whopping tiddler Tuna at that. Our first thoughts were to throw him back, but the hook had made such a mess I had no choice but to bring out the priest & throw him in the freezer for later fish bate. Not long after our fish excitement, I discovered that although we had the engine on with both alternators running we were not charging the batteries needed to keep our navigational instruments running & fridge & freezer cold. Being only a few hours out from Cartagena, and having already been on the move for almost 48hrs we decided we had little choice & it would be most prudent to pull in and try and diagnose & fix the issue, as well as getting a decent nights kip, out of watch.

Cartagena from the sea doesn't sell itself well, the large & unsightly petro-chemical works to the north of the bay are enough to put you off, but once you get inside, you realise what a little gem of a place this really is. When faced with the choice of the old marina with a pool or new marina with out, obviously our fatigue & memory of Lisbon came to a fore, as we went for the old marina with a pool. Big mistake! As the marina hand (old sweaty man on a bike speaking no English) tried to hem us in to a corner of the marina, despite my loud protestations, we were finally offered a mooring on the town wall..... Bitter experience has taught me, the last place you want to be moored for the night is the town wall. Not only are you the evenings entertainment for the local promonaders, but the chances of getting mice & cockroaches on the boat are pretty high, so we were pretty keen to get fixed & get moving. I spent the next hour tracing our generation issue back to a diode box which I thought had blow one of the diodes. Having diagnosed the issue (and phoned Geoff in London to run my theory by him), I called the marina on the VHF to see if they could recommend a marine electrician to source the part. Although they were able to send us an electrician the next morning, within half an hour Jon & Jenny appeared at the boat, having overheard our call on the VHF, Jon and ex big boat skipper & general oracle on boats, said for a small fee he would diagnose & help source parts that evening, which was music to my ears. Having showed him what I thought it was he concurred & promptly showed me a way we could circumvent that diode to get us on our way. Thanks to Jon we were fixed up within 3 hrs of having arrived in Cartagena, a massive thank you to him. By this stage it was so late and we were totally exhausted that we decided to move marinas to the new one & away from the eye sight of people & vermin alike.

Still feeling under time pressure to get to Sardinia on time, but deciding we & kids needed a day on land we decided to stay in Cartagena & we liked it a lot. Cartagena is one of those places everybody has been through from the Romans, Moors and beyond it is a beautiful place, rich in history & pleasant architecture.

The following day we beat our fairwell to make hast for Ibiza/Formenterra, and on past the south of Mallorca & Minorca before looking for a weather window across the Med to the west coast of Sardinia & Algehro. Jon & Jenny came by to bid us a safe travels the night before & to give us their phone number & call should we require any assistance. I have never been so glad to have somebody's number, as shall be revealed.

Our sail to Balerics was beautiful, if some what disappointing to be passing so close to Ibiza, but with so little time that we couldn't stop. We have vowed to return when we leave the med to finally break our Ibiza virginity. The sight of Ibiza from the sea at sunset was, however, stunning! The source of our next boat heart stopping moment was, however, only round the corner. The following morning as I came back on watch, the engine suddenly started to splutter. Our engine has never spluttered........ as I shouted up to Nicky to stop the engine, she shouted down to me 'the engine, Rolf the engine'. As I came up on deck with the worry of the engine in the forefront of my mind, my fear was compounded by seeing we were only 3miles to the east of a small island off the Mallorcan Coast. No wind, no engine & hard lumpy rocks near by, zikes! 

Now as handy as like to profess to be, a diesel engine that doesn't work still fills me with dread. Although we had done a full engine service in Gibraltar, I was now facing one of my greatest fears, how to diagnose & fix an engine problem under pressure. The mind runs wild, diesel bug in one of the fuel lines, air in the system, filter blockage. Our first course of action was to see if we were being swept by any form of current onto the land, it appeared not. Then if we needed to, could we anchor, probably not. With the land dropping straight into the sea, 60 meters is not really anchoring territory. So we contacted the Spanish Coast guard to let them know we had an issue, our location & predicament. This was swiftly followed by a call to Geoff in London to calm the nerves. And finally a call to our friends in Cartagena to see if Jon could help. Never have a been so happy to hear somebody say 'Rolf I'll have you up and running in half an hour'. With the help of Jon at the other end of the phone he talked me through opening up all the injectors and pushing fuel through the system. Thank goodness it was air and not bug in the system. After an intensive half hour of diesel mechanics the engine roared back to life. It feels like I am slowly becoming a diesel mechanic. Hallelujah!!! & a large sign of relief all round. Jon if you're reading this, thank you again.

Onward to Mallorca and a quick fuel stop before the two day magnificent sail across to Sardinia.... As we left Mallorca astern a beer & cigar to a day of excitement. 

We had been watching the weather for the crossing to Sardinia for days and our worry had been the +40knt gale which we had seen would stop us from getting across in time. As it happened with our stop in Cartagena the worst of the weather had gone through a day earlier and we were left with a 20knt northerly breeze which meant we flew across the Med under full main and 3/4 jib most of the way. Maya loves this kind of breeze and we had one of the best sails of our trip so far. As we came into sight of land Maya was made ready for week long rest, not before one last piece of excitement to finish this leg. Out of nowhere we were suddenly faced with the sight of a high speed rib charging around us - the dreaded Guarda di Finanza!!! As they pulled along side us  we are greeted by 7 grey suited men looking quite menacing asking for all our documents, followed by a large fishing net being pointed in our general direction. We obiendtely passed over our passports, ship papers & insurance documents, and waited nervously as they followed us into Algehro, 10 metres behind us. In the end I think the sight of Audrey & Bertie playing on deck swung them to let us get into save port as soon as possible.

An epic 800 mile run, now to get to the mainland for our friends wedding & some land time r&r.....

Sorry for such a long break in our blog updating. As you might have seen from our yellow tracking line, we have been making some long fast tracks leaving little time for updating the blog. A lot to catch up on!

We left Lisbon as hurricane Berthas wind finally calmed down, although still providing us with the tail end of lots of wind in the right direction for a good sail down to Lagos. The sea was quite swelly making it a bit rocky to start with, but we eventually had a heading which allowed the swells to come from behind us, easing the boats rocking and allowing Maya to surf the waves a little instead. Lots of dolphins spotted on the trip, the thrill of seeing and sailing with them never dulling. What beautiful, playful animals they are. For the best part of the journey from Lisbon to Lagos we were befriended and looked over by 'Sammy the Seagull', a lovely large brown speckled seagull. He would circle us a few times and then land next to the boat, and as we would drift off he would eventually again circle round. This continued for some time, and he returned a few times along the trip also. It was our first real joy of birds at sea, even if only a sea gull and although we weren't at sea for weeks on end, it provided some joy and comfort having our bird friend watching over our passage. 

Arriving into Lagos in the early morning was stunning. The white/yellow cliffs and rock faces are amazing, with lots of caves and grottos to explore although we didn't have much chance for this, on this trip. Lagos itself was not our cup of tea. A bit of a package tour trap, extremely busy with English holiday makers. The marina itself was also very expensive. The heat was extreme for the day we were there, perhaps heightened by our sheer tiredness of the few nights sailing behind us. The custard tarts were unfortunately not as good as those from Lisbon which we have now well and truly finished. All we have left of those scrumptious little tarts are the sweet cinnamon smell in one of the cupboards which wafts out still every time you open it. Mmmmmm so yummy!!!!! Rolf having stopped into Lagos before knew of a fantastic fish restaurant, which we all enjoyed. 

Making tracks from Lagos quite quickly we left on a other scorcher of a day having another lovely days sailing. Settling into super relaxed mode as evening approached and with the kids all tucked up in bed, we concentrated more on chatting and relaxing rather then setting up for night and the increasing wind. Woops, this meant that as the wind increased to over 30 knots, we then had to reef the main in the dark, with the apparent wind well above 35 knots. Not really being prepared at all made this task quite difficult.... Another valuable lesson. Enjoy, have fun and relax, but always reef when you first think you should, preferably with some day light still about, and always prep for night fall before it's dark!! Then relax after! Arriving into Barbate we looked forward to seeing the Greenland Dock posse and having a bit of a break in Tarifa with them. First we had to round all the tunny nets, made slightly more difficult by the now broken binoculars which we discovered as we headed into port...!! This was also made a bit more nervy as the wind increased as we headed into port, a phenomenon which is becoming more familar to us. 

We decided to leave hiring a car until the next day after arriving into Barbate early evening, and instead went straight to seeing our Greenland Dock friends, with Adrien picking us up. A lovely first night at the farm house, with a delicious BBQ full of chorizo sausages and balls, we were truly in Spain now! Audrey and Bertie took much delight at the numerous farm animals all over the surrounding country side and most car journeys were spent with COW and HORSE being yelled at high pitch almost every 3 seconds and a finger pointing out the window. We were all happy to see Kate, Adrien and the boys, and Pato and Jacko; and to meet the Spanish contingency, and have a few drinks and a chat.

Unfortunately the car hire was not very easy from Tarifa, and so it was decided it would be best for Rolf to get the buses to La linear which borders Gibralter to hire a car from there, as we would have to move the boat some time that week to Gib anyway and so it would making the car dropping easier later on. This took the best part of the day, and also meant we would all have to catch a bus back from Gib later that week to Tarifa when we moved the boat, and battle with Gib/Spain border control a few agonising times! A bit of a logistical nightmare in the end, which ate up a few of our relaxing days with the gang in Tarifa. Better ways we could have done it, but hind sight is a beautiful thing!


While Rolf was off getting the car, the kids and I went along with everybody to Tarifa beach. Wow what a sight! Miles of long beach awash with hundreds of kite surfers, like nothing we have ever seen before. The wind was in the right direction for great beach chilling and both Audrey and Berite were in their element on the beach, with the kids and friends. We ate in Tarifa old town that night, and had a selection of delicious Spanish food shared amongst all friends at the table. We went for a short stroll through the town after dinner and discovered how much Tarifa had to offer. And so, started our love of Tarifa, what cool place!

Upon returning to the boat in Barbate to move it to Gibralter, Rolf recognised on the yacht next to us, his day skipper instructor Mike from 15 years ago!! He and his wife were sailing their boat down to Greece. And so it was that we both sailed down to Gib together. What a small and strange world. Happy to leave Barbate marina (which has nothing to offer and was very expensive for what it did offer). We had a brilliant sail down to Gib. Amazing sight sailing with Europe on one side and Africa on the other. And an epic moment finally rounding into the Med. Really felt like we had made a major achievement in our adventure. As we came into Gib the wind picked up to 35-40 knots, making for a fast and fun sail in through all the super tankers. Our first Mediterranean mooring was a bit tricky. A few missed attempts at stern too (Maya really doesn't like going about & astern), bow first was much easier in the end. The rock of Gibraltar looks pretty amazing but the town itself is a bit 'tacky'. It would have to be great money for a short time for me to live there. It does, however, have super cheap booze, as it's tax free, and so Maya is well and truly packed in the bilges with rum, gin, whiskey, and vodka! While we don't drink that much these days, the £6, 1litre bottles of Havana club rum etc just couldn't be missed! We returned, however, to Spain for our food and provisioning shop for the long haul to Alghero, as the food is much chaper and better quality then in Gibraltar. The freezer is now packed full of chorizo sausages and balls!

We returned to Tarifa for a surprise birthday meal for Alex and our last night seeing the Greenland Dock Gang. The restaurant was not a mainstream place, being a specially organised/invite only affair in the mountains near the farm house were everyone was staying. The food was plentiful, fresh and delicious. I think I recall something like 6 courses ranging from pate, to clams, to large fresh tomatoes (the reddest and juiciest), to meat, to a whole fish each! A brilliant 3 piece musical set began after the meal, with 3 local guys on 2 guitars and singing, topping the night off, under the stars. Intending to depart the next morning we set off back to Gib. Sad to say goodbye to everyone but was great to see them all. However, only getting back to the boat at 4am we delayed our departure by a day so that we could recover and prepare the boat properly before the 4 night, 5 day journey to Alghero

We had been told that the diesel in Gibraltar was cheap, so Rolf had stocked up on a few more jerry cans, but were unsure if they would actually fill the cans at the cheap rate. In the end the friendly diesel guy filled our tanks & our cans as we are a yacht in transit for £0.59 a ltr. Brilliant!

Our Lisbon days are almost at an end now as a weather window appears to be opening to let us sail south again. We've had some lovely lazy days in Lisbon enjoying the en suit swimming pool, the local beach & a few days of seeing the sights in Lisbon central. Audrey has been in her element at the pool & beach befriending everybody & anybody in her path, and the locals have been super friendly to her advances, taking delight at having this crazy blond haired little girl play with them; And Bertie has as always signaled his approval with his big smiles & laughs. We've enjoyed the custard tarts too much, the very cool yellow trams, and i've managed to somehow to give up smoking cigarettes and have a humador full of Cuba cigars instead.... The southern life style is certainly very pleasing, as the sun tans take hold & the pace of life slows, we have enjoyed our short but very aimable stay in Lisbon. To those who might follow in our path, we highly recommend the Oeiras Marina with their wonderfully friendly & helpful staff, and the free bread deliveries in the morning will be missed for sure as well as the cheap cheap laundry too.

Its not been all lazing around, we have been busy too, but at slower pace, and in between all the relaxing we were able to get a surprising amount of small boat jobs completed. The Autohelm arm was re-drilled by a local mechanic and new 12mm bolts, rather than 10mm ones now added. This has now been remounted & the hydrolic ram & rudder reference re-attached. We now need to re-calibrate when we set off tomorrow to make sure all is working well.

Our Staysail also arrived from Saunders sails in Lymington, (thanks for the tip Matt) and we've had fun hoisting it in the marina. Looks great, cant wait to use in anger on our run down to the Algave...

Ive also made it a mission of mine to get the old Tinker Tramp to Australia..... Unfortunately two of her boards have already cracked, one in Dartmouth & one in the Ria. We had talked about buying a new tender, but i couldn't part with our super sailing tender without at least a try to save her. I managed to seal the cracks & the bolt two pieces of ply to either side. I then sealed the edges inside & out and added an epoxy cover coat. So far it seems to work and she is staying dry, and still folds.

I was also able to repair most if not all the teak deck screw dowels which were missing, although a few did elude me on closer final inspection. Hopefully this will go some why to stopping some of the minor leaks.

We were able to get our cockpit sunshade re stitched, Berties lee cloth also reinforced (mainly due to Audrey swinging from it!) & a bridal for the outboard also made from a sail tie, all for the very reasonable price of 60 euros. The diesel tank leak will have to be managed until Sicily, when we can pull them out over the winter, and run some pressure tests on them to see if the seals have gone.

After a few days in La Coruna catching up on sleep, restocking & stretching our legs, we looked at our options for heading down the Spanish & the Portuguese coast... Having had so many people tell us about the beauty of the Galician Rias we decided we should visit one before heading further south. To those not in the know a Ria is basically not dissimilar to a Fjord i.e. it has no running river feeding out from in land. We plumbed for Ria Camarinas, which lies between La Coruna & Cape Finisterre, and what a beautiful place this was to drop the hook get the tender out and enjoy some sunny R&R. Time for bbq on the back of the boat, and visit the Monday empty beach. Audrey & Bertie enjoyed eating sand & dipping in the still pretty parky Atlantic waters. With such a lovely day behind us we had decided to leave that night for a night passage south, but with the wind blowing up to 25knts SSW on the clock, we decided to see what the morning brought us, and sit tight & get a good night sleep & reassess. As it was the wind in the morning had died down so we made an early start for Finisterre, and beyond....

We were undecided when we left Camarinas if we would head for Vigo, Porto, Peniche or indeed Lisbon. My desire to get us south as fast as possible meant my preference was Peniche with the beautiful islands of Belinga & its stunning beach or Lisbon a city which has it all. As we passed Finisterre, Nicky was in agreement that Vigo was not really an option & Porto is a beast to get into due to its lack of decent marina facilities & when she read that all the cities raw sewage runs out and into the sea & that crews had been known to get sick from handling ropes after being there we laid a course for the latter two. Although the weather had been over cast off Finisterre, this soon blew over & we were under blue skies & unfortunately little breeze. With the tanks full & another 100ltrs in gerry cans on the back, both Peniche & Lisbon were well within our range. We decided a watch system of Nicky taking the 7-12pm watch & my going down when the kids go to bed & then my taking 12 till morning watch. With us both being able to do the mornings together as the kids wake up, and my being able to catch up on sleep as the kids take their naps throughout the day. Although this is not really sustainable over a longer period for 2 days & 2 nights it is just feasible before fatigue becomes dangerous. 

We had a good run down the coast with little shipping & fishing boats being either well inside or well out side of us. I experienced an phenomena i have never had in all my days sailing which happened on the first night out. In the black of night, suddenly all i could hear around me was the splashing of water, slight,y perturbed i switched on the high beam flash light to see hundreds if not thousands of fish jumping all around the boat. If i had had a net we'd be eating fish for the next month. Truely incredible... With the fish came the late night dolphins to keep me company on my watch. Always welcome guests to have jumping around the boat on a dark night.

The next day brought more dolphins by the pod load, and Audrey was beside herself with excitement as they came to play around, performing their acrobatic tricks.... All was going well except we have discovered what seems to be either one or more of the diesel tanks are leaking into the bilge or we have a fuel line which has split. Monitoring the situation we seem to be loosing around 4 litres every 5 or 6 hrs, although we cannot be sure as it is mixing with water in the bilge. But now being in port, it does appear to be an amount which needs to be addressed sooner rather than later. And i have earmarked time tomorrow to investigate. If it is indeed the seams in the stainless tanks, we may need to patch or replace the tanks. If it is one of the lines, which i hope it is, this may be a quicker, cheaper & less laborious problem to fix. Added to this on the afternoon of the second day, we were all sitting in the cock pit when we heard a clunk. Followed rapidly by the auto helm alarm going off, as it ran off position. Quickly diving underneath our bed i found the bolts on the heavy cast steel arm which connects the ruder to the hydraulic arm which steers the boat when the auto pilot is on had sheered clean off due to age & fatigue... Now there is a saying im German 'Glueck im Umglueck', which quite literally means 'luck in unlock', or perhaps blessing in disguise would be more correct. For not only were we over half way through our passage, but we were also in dead calm seas, as this now meant we lost our auto pilot & would be manually steering the boat till we got to Peniche or Lisbon. But more over like our gearbox this did not happen mid Biscay or Atlantic & can be addressed now. However. this would now add an additional burden as it totally takes one person out of the equation of looking after Audrey & Bertie. We took some time out, stopped the boat, went for a dip, had some lunch and did some maths. Based on these two new dimensions & the fact that we would run into Pencihe at 2am, which we could not vouch on their facilities for fixing the auto helm issue, decided the run for Lisbon instead, where not only we could take some time to relax but also get the boat bits we needed. We were lucky in that the wind had picked up a little and we were able to sail nicely round the back of Belinga and on, to Lisbon.

Coming down the final part of this part of the Portuguese coast can be interesting to say the least. You have a mine field of Lobster pots to contend with, which really is a case of luck rather than skill at night, and then a wall of fog which greets you as you come round Cabo Roca in the morning. We managed to come through both this tests fine, only to be hounded by a 735ft Moldovan Supertanker as we wanted to turn left up the river to Lisboa.... Needless to say we gave way grudgingly, and made our way to our chosen marina of Oeiras. 

And what a cracking place it is, i would highly recommend this place to anybody & everybody. The Marina, offers access to an amazing swimming pool complex behind, which was our first port of call following a sea food lunch in the cafes beside the marina. The staff are on the ball and super friendly. The washing machines are good the wifi works, and we are 30mins by train from Lisbon town centre. So today we have been lapping up Lisbon. Aside from Barcelona this place rocks for me in Europe. The city is super cool with its cobbled streets, old yellow trams & totally delicious custard cakes. Nicky had not been here and is loving it, the people are super friendly, the sun is shining, its lovely & hot & now the beating (in miles anyway!) has ceased, moral of the crew has definitely improved. Audrey is being touched by all the locals as i don't think they have seen anybody so blond or curly in their lives & Bertie just smiles and all the girls seems to fall about themselves. I think we are finally in the hot sunny place we want to be. Next stop Largos & the Algarve, but for now a few more days of Lazy Lisbon......

boa noite Lisboa!

So we made it out of England to Spain!!! Yay us! However we must digress a little as we had a few other events, sails, moments worth commenting on before we arrived  in Spain. On our last post we had just arrived in Salcombe. It really did live up to everything we had hoped and I would argue to say that it is the most beautiful place we have visited and most relaxing part of our journey so far. We stayed 2 nights at anchor in the bay which was absolutely lovely. One slightly worrying moment (as the fear of anchoring was clearly placed at the forefront of our minds on our last catamaran charter in Croatia!). As we enjoyed our absolutely lovely beer and lunch at the Salcombe yacht club watching the boat as both the tide and wind kicked in to full force it looked as if the boat was starting to drift.... oh dear....!!! Rolfy jumped up quite spritely leaving us behind, ran all the way down the hill through the town, onto the tender and razzed it back to the boat. We certainly didn't want to have our trip ended so soon, as we joked after about the headlines of young family on round the world voyage, ending their trip tragically in Salcombe, 2 weeks in, as there boat crashes onto the rocks!! HA. We still do not know if we were dragging or the boat in front of us, but we decided to lift the anchor and reposition and all was fine for the following night. It was unfortunate that our lunch at the yacht club was cut short as it is a fantastic place to watch the goings of the bay and have a nice pint and bite. We were also extremely welcomed by the Commodore and her husband who wanted to know all about our trip, sat down and had lunch with us, and even parted with a rather large burgee, much to Rolfs happiness in his quest to get a burgee from every yacht club we visit along the way. 

The only other slightly worrying moment in Salcombe was when the RNLI (ironic I know) sped so fast up to Maya only missing us by what seemed like a couple of meters. Being slightly put off by it, Rolf found the RNLI crew the next day and they explained that they were performing a blind navigation exercise and as our yacht happened to be the first in a line of yachts it did not show up on the radar and so the captain performing the exercise did not know we were there. Lucky the crew on top took over and diverted the rather large rescue boat from our path! Apart from these two small moments, we really enjoyed Salcombe. Pretty little beaches to swim from, lots of sand to play and roll in, dips off the back of the boat (although this was kinda cold!!), super cute little high street. Highly recommended as a place to visit for a Uk holiday - obviously better if the sun is shining!

We left Salcombe on a scorcher of day, and had a rather flat sunny crossing onto Falmouth, although with no wind, so it was a motor crossing. Passing Eddystone light house on such a calm day was stunning. Rolf put the fishing reel out for the first time but we didn't catch anything. Arriving in Falmouth late afternoon we rafted up along side a raft of boats at the yacht haven. A couple of days here to get ready for our crossing of Biscay to Spain. We met a super lovely dutch family here who are at the end of the circumnavigation of 3 years with there 2 kids, now 6 & 8. They sailed from Holland to NZ and Aus and back again, even going around the Horn of Africa. Was so nice to take all their advice and stories. Shame our sailing paths were heading in different directions but hopefully we may cross paths again. 

Alex met us Sunday afternoon, for our early morning departure from Falmouth. The weather looked perfect for a crossing of Biscay, however, a low and not so nice weather over Northern Spain meant our intended port of Vigo did not look possible so instead we landed further North at La Coruna. We left Falmouth with good winds and had a great sail for the first part. With a windy west leg out to just south of the Isle of Scilly the sailing was fast and bumpy, especially for all those down below, but as soon as we turned south the conditions improved all round. Maya seems to handle all points of sail beautifully, although we did find a few leaks we didn't know we had. And so it was, all down wind, until the wind disappeared half way across Biscay. The most taxing thing was probably the amount of traffic in the form of very large, fast super tankers, and fishing boats and their lack of navigation lights. A bumpy last night as the wind picked up to 30 knts just before La Coruna, but all in all a great passage across the dreaded bay... 

It was a long sail with the kids without any stops. When the sea is rolley it makes life aboard with the kids somewhat more challenging both at daytime and night. Our first long passage (4 days) and we couldn't have done it with out the invaluable help of Alex. The kids are too small and need too much attention for us to be able to happily and easily do long passages on our own at this stage. While some good moments have been had on the whole trip, the trip so far has also brought about a lot of hard moments and feelings of whether it is going to work and how to make it better and easier. We have found so far that doing this kind of thing with the kids as young as they are can be quite hard, as it can mean that basically Rolf is sailing the boat on his own most of the time and I am stuck down below in what is sometimes a floating washing machine looking after the kids! Kids under 3 need constant attention and with 2 of them it requires even more! The boat also requires a lot of attention both when sailing and also so far little repairs in each place... not quite what we had in mind. We are all having to make adjustments and work out how it will work, what is the best options and how do we enjoy it all as a family. Hopefully it should get easier now that we least reach warmer climes with beaches and swimming fun at each stop. However we have a lot of distance to cover this Summer and engagements to get to, which means a lot of longish sails..... however it will mean next Summer we are were we want to be to cruise in a relaxing style the Adriatic and Greece. Lots to figure out but for the moment we all want to stick at it, make it work, and have FUN!

What a lovely week we have had since arriving in Cowes and beyond. Cowes was awash with gorgeous classic boats on our arrival which made it even more lovely then it normally is. A few chores had to be done here such as a mountain of washing some of which didn't even survive after a good wash, whoops! New regime of washing now in place, small bucket load done every evening after the days end - slightly laborious. Further car seats also purchased for the kids to have a comfy place to sit in the cockpit when needed, as well as below. A bit of sailing practise in the Solent in between it all. Our first trips out in the tender were had form our mooring up the Medina. Loaded with the washing, rubbish, pram, kids and us, it was a little full but lots of fun. The kids even fell asleep in the tender on the way back from Cowes to the boat!! What a gem of a little tender the tinker tramp is. During our stay up the Medina we had a flying visit from a kiwi sailor, GUY, who came aboard for a beer and a little chat on his ambles up the medina in a borrowed rib.

We also discovered upon our trip down from Dover that our chart plotter touch screen was not working properly. So this had to be exchanged. A swift fix at Raymarine, and all set to go further West, only to discover that upon them fixing it, they buggered up the GPS and so we no longer had any means of tracking ourselves or access to charts etc! Slightly bigger issue now. After a long call to Raymarine venting some frustration with the fact  that our brand new chart plotter was not working for the second time in a few days, Rolf managed to ensure that a brand new one was to be delivered and installed to us on Monday. With this in mind we decided to leave Cowes anyway on Friday evening as planned from our very peaceful mooring up by the Folly Inn (thanks Matt and Ornya) as we do have secondary navigation equipment on our iPad. Off to Lymington we went.

Although effectively stuck again for a few days whilst waiting for our new plotter Lymington is certainly a much nicer place to be hauled up compared to Dover. A fab free kids fete was on whilst we were there which Audrey and Bertie both loved, especially the puppet show with the Beatles and One Direction (although a little churchy!) Crabbing, fishermen coming in with the days catches, salt water baths, lovely walks and a brilliant Saturday food market. We also had a fantastic evening with Tommy D who came to see us in Lymington. Was great to catch up, shame we couldn't go for a Sail, but we will hopefully have a chance to take him and the fan somewhere in the Med. James and Harry also came for a flying visit on their super fast Huntsman on Sunday.

 After our new plotter was in, we decided to do a further night passage down to Dartmouth, as it worked out better time wise and is also easier with the kids. And what a fantastic night to leave the Solent. A sail past the needles was a dream come true for Rolfy, and we both felt like our trip was really starting to begin passing the Needles. A celebration whisky was had as we passed. The lions share of the night was spent sailing with a lovely North to North West Wind. Sailing at 9.5 knots at times, it was a memorable night. Learning a lot from Skipper Rolfy and my ability and knowledge to sail Maya grew a lot on this passage. We shared the night watches although Rolfy did the lions share and slept in the cockpit with me on my watches, as my confidence grows! My first sailing sunrise and sunset for the trip, and even a few dolphins in the morning to welcome us. Plotter also worked a treat which was brilliant!!

We arrived into Dartmouth midmorning. What a stunning part of England. WOW!!!! It felt like we were sailing into somewhere in the Alps. Beautiful as we rounded the corner of the river, with the village set to both sides, boats all around and glorious sunshine. A late breakfast was enjoyed and the boys had a sleep while Audrey and I had a play in a bucket of river water and did the laundry. We ventured into town later in the afternoon in the tender again and enjoyed some local ice cream as we pottered about town. We decided to continue onto to Salcombe the next day, with the high tide as it wouldn't be an early start, gets us a little further West and makes the last leg to Falmouth a little shorter.

And WOW. So thankful we did come to Salcombe. At anchor now, really feeling like the holiday of our life has just started. Enjoyed a lovely sunsetting with BBQ chicken salad, red wine, dark chocolate and glorious views from all angles of our anchorage. The shore is dotted with little beaches which we will explore tomorrow along with the town and scorching weather for our stay. We will stay here tomorrow and enjoy the town, and move along to Falmouth on Friday. We will let you know what fun we have tomorrow in Salcombe. This could even be the place to sail the Tinker Tramp Tender with the Audrey...!

So due to our gear box issue we had to stay a few days longer in Dover than we had at first anticipated. I managed to get the old gear box out and off to French Marine in Essex to see what the cause of the issue was. What i had hoped would be a simple 'fix the clutch' job, rapidly turned into a dozen new clutch plates and a ten day wait for parts!!! The cost of the plates & labour to fix the old gear box was going to be around the two thousand pound mark. Not quite as cheap as a new car clutch, i found out to my horror! The other alternative and the one we went down was that suggested by Mike French and find a more powerful reconditioned gear box from a Yanmar dealer in Cornwall, so this was the option we chose. So four days later Nicky & I installed the new box into Maya and reconnected the all the important parts, such as the prop shaft. Had somebody told me a year ago that i would be proficient in taking out a marine gear box, and reinstalling a new one i would have probably have given them a long hard look. But as needs must, we cracked on and learnt a little more about how Maya ticks along the way.

In the mean time we had some exploring to do. We visited Dover castle which Audrey enjoyed especially, greeting the fair maid & a whole school party to boot. And we learnt a little history of Henry II and his squabbling sons, as well going down into the tunnels which lead into the heart of the white cliffs of Dover from which operation Dynamo and the rescue of the Dunkirk beaches was spear headed.; And Churchill famously spied across to France, and declared war on Germany. We also took some leisurely walks on the west harbour wall, and Audrey hollered her usual 'BYE BYE BYE' as the cruise liners departing, as well as Dover beach, in-between the all to frequent down pours. We stopped in at Dover Yacht club, and managed to convince the kindly general manager Richard to part with a slightly dilapidated burgee, and some good advise on leaving Dover harbour. And we met our first cruising friends (excuse the phrase) Wilue & David from Holland, who cruised the Caribbean several year ago with their young children and were on their way to Brighton, and the Solent. A definite taste of things to come. 

Sadly to say Dover is not the most salubrious of places to hole up for the week, so we are all glad to have moved onto Cowes.....

We departed Dover on Monday both full of nerves & excitement to be moving on.... We force 2/3 breeze forecast from the south west, we felt that if our new gearbox didn't let us down we'd be fine to reach the entrance to Solent the following morning. After some test runs on the engine inside the safety of the harbour walls, and all being well we decided to go for it. Unfortunately two hours out i discovered the light winds were more of the 30-35kts variety and very much on our nose & to add to our woes one of the hoses we had had to take off to get the gear box out and blown off the engine, and proved to be a beast to reconnect in a rolling sea. Lucky i did manage to get the hose reconnected using an industrial sized cable tie (thanks Adrien!). We decided to sail as far as Dungeness before night fell, and continued under engine through the night & pounding seas. Unfortunately both Audrey & Bertie suffered from Mal de Mer but slept soundly once in their bunks for the night. Maya proved she is the boat i had hoped she would be, and can handle a heavy sea with general ease and little banging & a good motion through the water. Due to the time lost fixing the engine hose our passage plan went out the window and it was a hard slog banging some hefty spring tides round Hastings & Beachy head before finally we turned due west and onto the Solent. A small relief came the following day with sunshine & a decrease in the wind speeds down to the late 20s early 30s, which only left us with the Solent to deal with that afternoon. Coming from the west we just had the small matter of Outer Owers & Boulder bank to deal with which under any other wind conditions other than a south westerly would be fine. However, as any sea fairing person will tell you, lee shores run high on the list of fears, and strong winds from the wrong direction will take your boat and park you on the hard before you know it, so we needed to have our wits about us before heading up and having a beautiful sail up the Solent and into the spiritual home of sailing Cowes. Exhausted we dragged our selves to a restaurant for supper & and a well deserved ice cold beer.


Today has been spent in Southampton sourcing more car seats for the cockpit. We are now a four car seat family, as well as stretching our legs & ordering spare parts. I think with good weather on the cards we'll spend the next few days pottering around the small anchorages of the Solent before heading onto Weymouth...

So we're on our way and not without some excitement already! We left London on a wet and over cast morning, which seemed fitting for our London departure, with James, Lucy & Harry George all onboard, to help us on our way to Dover. Our trip down the Thames went smoothly, with the wind behind us all the way, our first seal sighting and a marvellous view of the Montgomery's masts as we rounded and headed back up to Queenborough. The wind by this point had picked up to 30 knts on the nose & our gear box decided it no longer wanted to play ball. Some quick thinking and we disconnected the gear cable from the rocker arm on the gear box, and after much engaging & disengaging with no luck, we finally managed get Maya back into gear. A few nervous moments felt by all. Now the only question, how to moor her up along side the pontoon at Queenborough in 30 knots side up and no brakes! As we made our first pass we started to realise this could go one of 3 ways. 1. Get it wrong and upset the three drunken fishermen by totally compounding their boat. 2. Park Maya on the beach, not a great look for our first leg or 3. Hope we could bring her in gingerly enough that we'd be able to jump off and rope some brakes on before pt 2 became a reality. On the first run we came in with a little too much speed and only succeeded in leaving James on the pontoon, but luckily we still had Maya in gear, to make another pass. Luckily having James on the pontoon was an absolute blessing as he was our anchor man, and managed to bring the boat to a halt..... A rather larger sigh of relief on every bodies part. Dark and Stormys (& fruit smoothies) all round.

This now left us with a predicament, were we able to continue onto Dover the following day? After several more light refreshments, and several successful attempts at manually engaging the gear directly from the engine room, we decided if the wind abated some, we'd chance it and motor sail out of the Thames via the Princes channel, and around the Foreland past Ramsgate and onto Dover. As it happens we had a beautiful second half of the day and ended up doing 6.5 knts under Genoa & Main down the Kent coast. Definite Caribbean conditions, if a little cooler. Nicky enjoyed her first taste of helming Maya under sail, and looked quite at home behind the wheel as we raced along. A much smoother entry into Dover Marina pulling alongside the hammer head, which was lucky as Maya would not have made it under the very low bridge ahead!

James, Lucy and Harry left us not long after arriving in Dover. It had been invaluable and fun to have them onboard for the first 2 days of our trip. Now to fixing the gearbox issue before continuing any further. Some very helpful boaties in the Marina dived under Maya to see if we and anything caught round the prop. Fortunately (or unfortunately) we did not, so this then means it is definitely a gear box issue and not a quick fix. Rolf set to work today and has taken the gear box out, and will head off tomorrow to Essex to deliver it to French Marine who will hopefully fix it, fingers crossed its only a clutch problem and we don't need a new gear box. Until then we are Dover bound! Time to take in the sights.

The kids all had a great time. First Mate Harry did a sterling job helping navigate and keeping a good look out for pirates with the binoculars. Bertie slept brilliantly with the lulling of the boats movements and also under the noise of the engine. Audrey enjoyed the excitement of the sail, seeing all the boats, the sea and new sights. Few new things for her to get used to which will take a bit of time for her to get to grips with, such as harnesses and being hooked onto the boat when under sail. She is really enjoying running round the deck of the boat whilst in port, which has netting all the way round, and as always, she welcomes each passing boat pulling into the marina with a loud HI and lots of waving. Today we baked some cupcakes in the BBQ which Audrey loved as it means we get to sing her favourite song 'Happy Birthday' as all cake means birthday happiness to her!! A bit of learning curve for Nicky on the BBQ baking... hopefully less burnt bottoms next time. The ones which didn't burn tasted yummy though!


So far so good, even with the gear box issue. A blessing in disguise perhaps, better to happen now. Next stop Brighton...

So we plan to leave London on Saturday 5th June, well ahead of our original August date. As it happened several things conspired in our favour which has made this possible. Our initial plan is to head down the Thames to Queensborough & onto Dover, Brighton before spending some time in the Solent having our first real shake down as getting used to cruising as a family. We then hope to then head on down the south coast with a view to either jumping off from Dartmouth or Falmouth for the north coast of Portugal. 

The last few weeks have been hectic to say the least. Trying to get all the last minute things we need as well as saying many good byes has been exhausting both physically & emotionally. But having completed a full engine service today, the remaining boat jobs can now wait & be done as we make our way. Now we will enjoy our last Greenland dock BBQ tomorrow night before saying aurevoir London.....