Innholdsfortegnelse for July 2020 i Sailing Today

The RYA advises clubs to create a Covid-19 team, which can confirm what is permitted, assess risk, decide controls, introduce policies and procedures, then communicate those policies and keep reviewing them. A 13-page document has been drawn up by the RYA to assist sailing clubs move forward safely and responsibly. The document is available via the main page of the RYA website, which has a link to all of its Covid-19 advice. rya.org.uk Meanwhile Restart Sailing, a group of enthusiasts led by Simon Lovesey, of the SailRacer tracking app, has put together considerations for those debating whether or not to run an event: 1. Number of attendees: larger gatherings offer more opportunities for person-to-person contact; also consider the density of attendees within a confined area. 2. Travel: it may not…

London sailing club fights for survival The Westminster Boating Base (WBB), a charity founded in 1975 to enable kids of any background to sail, canoe and drive powerboats on the tidal Thames, has been forced to the brink of closure by the Covid-19 pandemic. Over the years, the club has taught thousands of young people of diverse backgrounds to sail. The WBB normally raises funds through venue hire, but with activity like this frozen, the future of the club is uncertain. The WBB is run by volunteers and is aiming to raise £100,000 to last it this year. Donate via westminsterboatingbase.co.uk. SailGP SailGP has moved its entire 2020 season to 2021, meaning Ben Ainslie’s win at the Sydney event in January this year will not count towards a possible season…

As sailors recommission and plan the season ahead, the Round the Island Race has been postponed until 26 September and our competition to win race entry and a berth in Cowes is still open. Race director Dave Atkinson, of the Island Sailing Club, said: “We do hope that you will still be excited by the prospect of an early autumn Round the Island Race and taking part in what is sure to be a rather unique occasion. We have issued a revised Notice of Race incorporating the various date and timing changes, but in all other respects we expect to run the Race exactly as planned. Online entry is open as usual.” Our competition to win race entry and a berth in Cowes during the race, plus an incredible bundle…

How has MarkSetBot been affected by the pandemic? This is traditionally our busiest time of year, but with almost every regatta around the globe cancelled, our rental business has come to a halt. There are a number of clubs interested in Bots. Most are reaching out because they see the Bots as a way to run races in a socially distanced way. If you do Rabbit starts with three Bots, you can run an entire race without an RC team. How did the concept for the company come about? I conceptualized MarkSetBot while racing on a small lake in the US. Every racer at our club is required to do Race Committee duties twice a year, and the location is a challenging place for Race Committee work. The wind is…

‘We found shelter in a remote bay which felt like the edge of the world’ Anyone who has spent any length of time stormbound at anchor, will have had no problems with the lockdown, apart from the duration of it, of course; I can’t remember a storm at sea which has raged this long. But I can remember day after day with the wind howling, the chain grinding in the bow roller, and the rain hitting your face like shotgun pellets if you dared poke your head out of the hatch. The first time I was taken prisoner like that was off the west coast of Ireland, when we owned our first little 26 footer, and with a gale forecast to last several days we found shelter in a remote…

“Some sailors are keeping their covers on for the time being” The sitting-down sport of e-sailing has taken off as a form of entertainment and a great way of maintaining and even building social cohesion in an era of real-world social distancing. However, former Olympian and in-demand Olympic coach Hugh Styles has been using Virtual Regatta as a coaching tool for some online workshops he’s been running for his clients. I joined in with a session where the goal was to see how effectively you can battle your way through the pack after a second-row start. Hugh poses questions to his acolytes and offers alternative ideas and suggestions as they navigate their way around the virtual race track. Olympic aspirant for the 2024 Games in the new doublehanded offshore keelboat,…

We really had no plan to visit Turkey when we left our winter mooring in Cartagena, Spain. We had just completed a minor refit that took longer than planned and the plan was to head to Greece and spend the summer visiting all the islands that had been recommended by fellow cruisers. It was early June by the time we escaped Cartagena and headed for our favourite anchorage in Formentera. Some fellow liveaboards from the winter in Cartagena were following the same route, and one morning I got an email from them to say that they had got some information on a sailing rally along the coast of Turkey, and thought it looked interesting. This looked like a good way to visit Turkey and have a bit of company along…

The genre of the sailing film is littered with some of the greatest crimes against the silver screen known to man. Essentially, water and film frequently don’t mix very well. Back in the day, you had rather clunky sets with cuts between millpond flat seas to the actors back in the studio having buckets of water thrown over them. Casts also have to battle with seasickness and often being cut off from regular power supplies. Back in the day, Steven Spielberg described filming at sea as a ‘baptism of water’. In recent decades increased budgets eased the problem of totally unconvincing storm scenes and the like. Yet the pitfalls were still there for all to see. Kevin Costner’s monumental flop Waterworld, the most expensive film of its time, was dogged…

Magnus Rassy is the CEO of Hallberg-Rassy and a hugely successful man. While other Swedish manufacturers fell by the wayside following the financial meltdown of 2008, Rassy showed both wisdom and ruthlessness as he retrenched and streamlined, ensuring the company emerged from the crisis as the number one purveyor of bluewater yachts. Yet, for all that success, I don’t think Magnus Rassy would mind if I described him as just a touch eccentric. By way of an example, I’ll cite the day on which I tested the new Hallberg-Rassy 57 out in Orust, Sweden, where Hallberg-Rassy has its yard. The test was an absolute joy, on a crystal-clear day with the wind blowing a good 20kt and the yacht simply champing at the bit to race off across the North…

DANFORTH Works best in sand and mud Well known models: Fortress Often seen on motorboats, the Fortress is made of super lightweight aluminium-magnesium alloy. • £539 (6.8kg) • Fortressanchors.com HINGED PLOUGH CQR: Works best in sand, rock and mud Well known brands: Lewmar CQR. Still popular, this anchor is characterised by the hinge between the shank and the fluke which helps it to reset. Good in most bottom types. • £392 (27kg) • Lewmar.com NON HINGED PLOUGH DELTA Works best in sand rock clay and mud Well known brands: Vulcan Made by Rocna, the Vulcan was designed without the roll bar for easier stowing on the bow. • £812 (25kg) • marinefactors.co.uk Lewmar Delta Originally developed by Simpson-Lawrence, the Delta took the plough-type anchor a step forward…

Few can argue that Plymouth is a true seafarer’s city with a history that includes such highlights as Sir Francis Drake playing bowls on the Hoe before heading off to smash the Spanish Armada and the Pilgrim Fathers setting sail from the Mayflower Steps. Plymouth’s strategic position in the approaches to the English Channel mean that city has had a strong naval presence for centuries and, unfortunately, this meant the port took a severe battering from German bombers in WWII. Thankfully, the Barbican, which sits right at the heart of the old port area, remained largely intact throughout the war and remains the pulsing heart of seafaring Plymouth, with narrow winding alleys leading down to a waterfront that remains as crammed with taverns and bawdy fun as it was in…

As you enter Plymouth Sound you will see a mile-long breakwater in the middle. The channels either side of this – Western or Eastern – are well lit and buoyed with no real hazards. The Sound has minimum depth of 3.7m (at MLWS) and so is navigable by most yachts at all states of the tide. Sector lights will guide you along the channels and past the breakwater at night. Plymouth Yacht Haven is in the northeast of the Sound. Once beyond the breakwater, head across the Sound towards Mallard green buoy, with distinctive red and white striped Smeaton’s Tower in the city behind and Mount Batten Point to the east (this has a breakwater that extends 250m out to sea, with a green light on the end [2F G]).…

Club racers determined to finish further up the fleet, and day cruisers keen to get to their destination for the celebratory sundowner often face similar dilemmas. Could they each learn by comparing notes? In this feature I’ll use my own experience of racing our RS200 at the local club, and cruising our heavy displacement, long-keeled yacht in the Solent, to highlight some of the questions that both club racers and passage-makers might try to answer, to come up with a solution for “getting there quicker”. Last month Helena Lucas talked about different sorts of wind shifts and suggested the best strategies for each. If the wind is shifting regularly around a mean direction, tack if the shift makes you sail below your mean heading. That way you will sail the…

Zhik hikers For everyone who’s practicing in the garden on their homemade hiking benches or in dinghies in their Jacuzzi, Zhik’s Powerpads®3 may be just what you need. The Zhik Powerpads are worn as a slim fitting, 4-batten pad around the thigh, under or over a wetsuit or over leggings inside a Drysuit, that flexes to conform to your leg shape. They come with an optional pad that can be inserted for extra body height off the deck, which can increase leverage and help create your own optimised hiking position for different boats. • £89.95 • Zhik.com RNLI for kids These kids’ yellow wellies are part of a Yellow Welly collection, on offer at the online RNLI shop, all supporting the charity as it faces what it fears will be…

HANSE 370 | SERENDIP 4 Serendip 4 has been a Solent-based boat for her owner, securing podium finishes in various races, but has also cruised as far as Finland. Her dark grey hull is of hand-laid sandwich GRP construction, with five coats of Gelshield epoxy treatment and a same-colour vinyl wrap. Standing and running rigging were replaced in 2012 and she carries 87 square metres of sail, in a single-line reefed main with two reefs plus a furling genoa. Because of her racing days the mainsheet traveller is in the cockpit, but she comes with the original and unused main cruising track, which can be fitted on the coachroof, forward of the sprayhood. Her sail wardrobe includes both cruising and racing mains, a 135% genoa, 100% self-tacking jib…

Set against a glorious Caribbean sunset, the VO70 I Love Poland drifts through the Barbuda race mark on day 1 of the RORC Caribbean 600 in February. The annual race sees a fleet of more than 70 boats, ranging from cutting edge multihulls to vintage classics, compete over four days on a course around Antigua, Barbuda, Montserrat, St Kitts & Nevis, Anguilla and Guadaloupe. I Love Poland eventually finished fifth in class. The next RORC Caribbean 600 starts on Monday 22 February 2021.…

Sailors and marine companies across the UK are engaged in an extraordinary drive to make vital PPE for health workers. One voluntary initiative in the New Forest has supplied more than 16,000 gowns to Southampton General Hospital – and has become the hospital’s main supplier of protective gowns. Peter Sanders, MD of Sanders Sails in Lymington, said: “At one stage Southampton General was going to run out of these gowns within a week. It was a desperate situation.” Volunteers worked day and night over one weekend to find the right plastic material, simplify the pattern so it could be welded together with domestic irons instead of being sewed, then distribute the plastic and pattern to marine firms with the cutting ability, then have the pieces ironed together by volunteer seamstresses…

Dream Yacht Charter has opened a new Caribbean base at Compass Point Marina, St Thomas, in the US Virgin Islands. The base opens in partnership with Virgin Islands Yacht Charters in the well-protected Benner Bay, said to be the only ‘legitimate’ hurricane hole in the Virgin Islands, and one that makes for a “wonderfully quiet and calm overnight for charter guests”. Dream Yacht Charter founder Loïc Bonnet said: “St Thomas is an important base for us in the Caribbean and we welcome the new partnership. The natural splendour of the USVIs is often overlooked but now guests can experience this special part of the world, as well as the BVIs.” Kristi Query, founder of Virgin Islands Yacht Charters, said: “The ease of travel, with non-stop flights from many international airports,…

Rapido 50 Rapido Trimarans is a Vietnam-based company that specialises in fast cruisers with three hulls. Plans for the Rapido 50 have been around for a while but the first one is due to hit the water in June. The Morelli & Melvin-designed boat is a real curiousity, featuring fold-up sponsons which are not revolutionary but rarely found on multihulls of this size. Although this is unquestionably a boat with a very high speed potential, the accommodation is impressively spacious and well appointed, making this a versatile fast cruiser. Rapidotrimarans.com Windelo 50 Windelo is a relatively new boatbuilder. Given the proliferation of cruising multihull designs, the company seems to have opted to angle itself more towards a slightly more rugged, adventurous market and also talks up its green credentials. As…

‘Your peaceful night’s sleep is transformed into a slow, lumbering lollop from side to side’ Ugh!” &lt;crash&gt; &lt;clink&gt; &lt;thud&gt; “This sucks.” &lt;slam&gt; &lt;bang&gt; &lt;thunk&gt; I’m awake now, although I’d rather not be, but the swell has other ideas. It is then that my brain starts cataloguing the sounds I’m now hearing, and how important or damaging any of the potential impacts might be. <chink> is the sound of the washing up, left to dry on the chest fridge. It’s reasonably secure so not too much of a worry. <shhh> is the noise made by a tray holding the kids’ Lego, rattling on the spare bunk in our single cabin. <thwack> sounds louder, as we’re flung back over to port, and a book that was resting on the chart table is…

For thousands of years, a thin strip of water has helped define our identity – a physical and symbolic barrier separating the British mainland from the continent: the English Channel, or La Manche (the sleeve) to our European neighbours. A mere 18 nautical miles separate the Kent coast at South Foreland from the Cap Gris Nez, and on a clear day those famous chalky white cliffs are easily visible from the continent. Julius Caesar certainly couldn’t resist the temptation, landing just around the coast at Pegwell Bay on the Isle of Thanet. Today, it’s the ideal playground for cruising sailors enjoying more leisurely pursuits. We’re all familiar with the ubiquitous Dover-Calais, the shortest port-to-port crossing. Yet the Dover Strait bottleneck is also the busiest shipping lane on the globe. So,…

We set out from Portsmouth in bright sunshine before breakfast, bound for Le Havre, writes Rob Peake. I was on a 32ft yacht, part of a cross-Channel rally of around 30 yachts, with crews of varying experience. Some miles out, we got reports from the leading yachts of unexpected fog and before we knew it a bank of whiteness appeared ahead and engulfed the entire fleet. Despite pre-rally guidance, it soon transpired via the VHF that several crews had never used their radar in anger before and were struggling to work it out. They were clearly alarmed at the idea of the now-invisible shipping in the area. The wind had dropped and all boats were motoring. We decided we might drop one of our crew onto a yacht in need…

EU Citizens are required to get a visa to enter Turkey. We did this online and it costs around £16 each. The visa is valid for 180 days during which time you may spend 90 days in Turkey. You must check in at a port of entry, where you will have to buy a transit log, check in with immigration and customs and get a blue card to record that your black-water tank has been pumped out regularly. The easiest way to get this all done is to get an agent to do it for you, they are quite reasonably priced.…

RUSTLER 57 Rustler Yachts’ first foray into the world of big bluewater cruisers certainly takes the eye. The lines are much more traditional, so there is less volume, but this is also a hull form tried and tested in the toughest of conditions. rustleryachts.com OYSTER 565 After a protracted gestation period, the first Oyster 565 hit the water last summer. The Rob Humphreys-designed yacht has proved itself to be a polished performer. oysteryachts.com AMEL 60 A touch bigger than the Hallberg-Rassy, and a touch more idiosyncratic. Like Hallberg-Rassy, Amel has been on a bit of a journey in terms of transitioning to twin rudders and beamier aft sections, which has upset some diehard Amel fans but won new admirers. amel.fr…

Stuart Bithell laughs quietly at the suggestion that he is seen as one of Team GB’s most naturally gifted sailors, that he is one of those rare talents who quite simply makes boats go faster. “I try,” he replies with a chuckle. Bithell, 33, originally from Rochdale in Manchester, will crew the 49er at the Tokyo Olympics next summer, with helm Dylan Fletcher. The two were rivals for years and Fletcher’s team beat Bithell’s to the sole British place at the Rio Games four years ago. After the Games, he and Bithell were competing against each other in a Moth regatta when they “had a lightbulb moment” and decided to pool their talents. Their first year saw them win the European and World championships and their form has continued. The…

Plymouth Yacht Haven has been home to our yacht, Ruawaka for almost two years. The marina is based close enough to the city to be easily reachable, while offering a tranquil escape from the busier waterfronts in and around the Barbican. Clean and quietly efficient, the Haven is run by a team who are always around to help and clearly take pride in the care they afford to their resident vessels and sailors. Ruawaka is a 74-year-old Berthon’s Gauntlet who is currently enjoying the superb cruising grounds of the south west, until the wind takes her south.…

Plymouth is doubly blessed as it sits on the border of Devon and Cornwall with the River Tamar acting as a natural border. As such, it has easy access to a whole range of beautiful ports and anchorages. The stunning port of Salcombe is a leisurely day’s sail away, with Dartmouth not much further on if you carry on going east. If you think west is the best then you’re straight into Cornwall with beautiful ports such as Looe a leisurely day’s sail away. Cast your net a little further afield in either direction and you have Dorset’s Jurassic coast to the east and stunning estuaries such as the Fal and Helford to your west. If it’s a week’s sail you’re after, then the Isles of Scilly are well within…

One of the great joys – and occasionally frustrations – of life afloat is that everything happens at a slower pace. This means that coastlines unfurl gradually before us; landfalls and landmarks unveil themselves in their own sweet time. The same principle applies to taking the inland route through France to the Mediterranean; It takes about seven hours to traverse France by car or train and probably an hour by plane. Yet, take the leisurely overland route by boat and it can take over a month. If you fancy immersing yourself in a country and, as an added benefit, emerging on the pristine shores of the Mediterranean, this is the trip for you. Can my boat do it? If you have a yacht that is anything like normal, the answer…

The ability to download weather data and run routeing software to optimise long-distance routeing is becoming increasingly accessible, powerful and affordable. It’s no longer the preserve of the best-funded race teams or the largest cruising yachts. For those whose voyage start dates aren’t decided years in advance by a racing programme or rally timetable, weather routeing software also includes a useful departure date function. This can be used to figure out the best day on which to leave port at the start of a longer passage, to minimise the risk of headwinds, calms, fog or gales. This makes for a very powerful combination that can transform the experience of passage making, leading to trips that are faster, safer and more comfortable. It applies just as much to a Channel crossing,…

Sailing was among the first activities allowed to get going again in May after almost two months of lockdown. Guernsey led the way, after a Notice to Mariners on 2 May granted owners on the island permission to sail for two hours daily, as part of their allotted daily exercise. An anomaly meaning that many owners still could not launch, because they were not allowed to work on boats on the hard, was later lifted after lobbying by the Guernsey Boat Owners Association. England followed suit after the Prime Minister’s statement on 10 May, with the RYA urging a “considerate and cautious” return to the water. The lifting of restrictions came amid growing concern for the wellbeing of many boats still on the hard. The RYA said that maintenance and…

A new 3,600-mile solo offshore race will run in July as a qualifier for the Vendée Globe. The Vendée-Arctic-les Sables d’Olonne starts on 4 July, taking the single-handed IMOCA fleet from the French Atlantic port of Les Sables d’Olonne, up west of Iceland into the Arctic Circle, down to the Azores and then back to Les Sables d’Olonne, over 10 to 12 days. It has been organised to replace two transatlantic races that would have been used by many Vendée Globe competitors as their qualifying sails for the round the world race, which is due to begin in November. The new race will run within social distancing guidelines, which probably means little in the way of a race village for spectactors. The Vendée Globe itself has said that it may…

The organisers of two of the biggest UK summer regattas are taking entries and pressing ahead with plans for their events in August. Cowes Week takes place from 8-15 August. Falmouth Sailing Week takes place from 9-15 August. Falmouth Sailing Week organisers say: “We plan to go live with the on-line entry system in May (as in previous years) but, instead of asking for payment of the entry fee then, we will wait until such time as we know for certain that we will be able to proceed with the event. “Furthermore, we have decided that the discounted entry fees (due to be replaced by the normal entry fees from 10 July) will be applicable to all competitors right up to the week itself. An amendment to the NOR will…

The Royal Ocean Racing Club is putting ‘major focus’ on 2021 while there is uncertainty around the remainder of the 2020 season. Chris Stone, Racing Manager for the Royal Ocean Racing Club, said that the club was ‘cautious’ about what racing might be possible over the rest of the 2020 season. RORC club houses in London and Cowes closed during lockdown and most staff were furloughed. Speaking in mid-May, Stone said: “In terms of racing, we had a fairly big year planned and at the moment we are extremely cautious. “You would instantly think that sailing between the UK and mainland Europe is becoming less likely. Other European countries have identified they may be bringing in restricted border access, including Ireland, France and Spain. For some of our racing, that…

‘I don’t recall much about the food that night, but the wine flowed like a spring tide’ It is my pious hope that by the time this column is published we’ll once again be permitted access to our yachts. The reasoning behind why we should have been barred from boarding them to check the bilge for water, the lines for chafe and perhaps take care of a few maintenance jobs, remains shrouded in mystery. Still, as the saying goes, ‘What can’t be cured must be endured’, and at least all sailors worthy of the name have a rich fund of yarns to spin under the swinging lamp of the Zoom-powered happy hour. Stories so tall that they must be true have been doing a noble job of standing in for…

More than two million people visit the start of the Vendée Globe every four years in Les Sables d’Olonne. Around the extensive race village there is more than enough to keep papa, mama et les enfants happy for the day. There are dozens of interactive stands, usually at least one per sponsor, there are bars and cafés, there are Q&A sessions with the skippers and past skippers. Families meander down the race dock, scanning each round-the-world-race-ready IMOCA, eagerly looking for the chance to catch an autograph. It is unlike no other sailing event you will ever go to. And it is big business for the Atlantic coast town and the Vendée region. So, predictably, these are nervous times not just for the skippers of multi-million Euro projects, for which the…

The approach to Saint-Valery-Sur-Somme is not for the faint-hearted, writes Sam Jefferson. Tom Cunliffe in his pilot guide states that ‘the channel can be truly eccentric in its meanderings and don’t imagine for a second that GPS will help you out’. So, after an uneventful crossing from Rye, I eyed the entrance with apprehension. Cunliffe said you should get there two hours before HW. I arrived at HW – so two hours late. The sun was dipping and provisions were low. I had laid in a bunch of bananas and some Hob Nobs – now sadly gone. I quickly inspected my stores and realised I had a bag of sugar, some ketchup and teabags. The idea of anchoring off the fairway buoy and starving for another 12 hours did little…

Jess Lloyd- Mostyn, Adamastor Flores, Indonesia “When the full-scale impact of Covid-19 became clear and countries began to shut their borders the situation for most cruising yachts was like some horrid version of musical chairs; everyone scrambling for a safe spot when the music stopped. We know many who were caught out, those on ocean crossings or turned away from countless ports and even pushed out of safe anchorages. Elsewhere in Indonesia we’ve heard reports of severe aggression against foreign boats by officials, with weapons involved and shots fired, as the fear of outsiders escalated. “We have been exceptionally fortunate to get stuck at anchor outside a town that we had already been relating to since mid-January, while I work on a cruising guide. It is a place we know…

What’s it about? Donald Crowhurst’s misadventures in the Golden Globe get the Hollywood treatment with Colin Firth playing the troubled boffin Crowhurst, who gets in too deep in his ply trimaran and can’t find a sane way out of the situation. Rachel Weisz plays his stoical wife, Clare. Is it any good? Given that the main premise of this film is a man sat on his own in the middle of the ocean losing the plot, it’s surprisingly good. The fact this had a Hollywood budget helps and means the scenes at sea are well shot and also capture the cloying claustrophobia well. It’s not a laugh a minute but the script is sympathetic and deals gently with its troubled subject while Firth is a convincing Crowhurst anad Weisz superb.…

What’s it about? Shot in 1992 when interest in the America’s Cup and the 12-Metre scene was high, this film was a big budget affair featuring Jennifer Grey (of Dirty Dancing fame) and Matthew Modine. The plot is loosely worked around Dennis Connor’s loss and subsequent recapture of the America’s Cup. Naturally, there is a bit of love interest: Will Parker (Modine) and Kate Bass (Grey) are top class sailors who are on the defending team for the America’s Cup. They end up canoodling too much and Kate is kicked out. Will stays on and Kate dumps him, moving on to some wacky yacht designer. After losing the Cup, Will then bizarrely decamps to the desert with his new girlfriend plus Kate and her boyfriend and they plan a new…

What’s it about? Based on the true story of Tami Oldham and Richard Sharp, who were hit by Hurricane Raymond while delivering a Trintella 44, Hazana, across the Pacific in 1983. Following a knockdown, the yacht was dismasted and Oldham was forced to navigate the crippled ship across the Pacific, enduring 41 days before being rescued. Her harrowing book about the experience is Red Sky in Mourning: A True Story of Love, Loss, and Survival at Sea. The film is half love story, half a tale of survival. Sharp is played by Sam Claflin who hams up his English accent to the max to become a sort of seafaring Hugh Grant, while Oldham, played by Shailene Woodley, does a fine job as free-spirited traveller turned survivor. Is it any good?…

The season was about to begin for most sailors in northern Europe. Recommissioning and launching was suddenly put on hold, with yachts left on the hard for far longer than intended, some boats ready for their own period of isolation, some less so. Either way, no owner could check if their yacht was okay. Meanwhile blue water cruisers left their craft in unknown marinas or anchorages to fly home. Brokerage deals and potential new boat purchases stalled. The past two months has led to widespread uncertainty for boat owners and many of you contacted us with lockdown-related insurance queries. We have put your questions to marine insurers and their answers provide broad guidance. You’ll need to contact your insurer direct for detailed advice on your specific policy and how it…

Some of the best locations in the world are not accessible from marinas or harbours, but from anchorages. However there is an art to anchoring securely which has been overlooked in many quarters today thanks to the proliferation of marina-hopping. With that in mind, here is an anchoring guide: The Anchor We will start with the ‘hook’ itself. There are some excellent new anchor designs available today, Ultra, Delta, Rocna and Bruce anchors to name but a few. The Kraken 50 currently sports a 40kg Lewmar Delta anchor, although, being old school, I have a Lewmar CQR on my own yacht, White Dragon. A Delta 40kg is perhaps over the top and we could go 5 or 10kg lighter but one thing you don’t want is a dragging anchor at…

Royal Western Yacht Club +44(0)1752 660077, rwyc.org Royal Plymouth Corinthian Yacht Club, +44(0)1752 664327, rpcyc.com Tourist information +44(0)1752 306330 visitplymouth.co.uk Mountbatten Ferry (to Barbican) +44(0)7515 370000, mountbattenferry.co.uk Taxi +44(0)1752 252525, 666222 Plymouth Museum, plymouth.gov.uk/museums National Marine Aquarium national-aquarium.co.uk Boating World, River Lynher +44(0)1752 851679, boating-world.co.uk Saltash Sailing Club +44(0)1752 845988, saltashsailingclub.co.uk Tamar River Sailing Club +44(0)1752 362741 tamarriversailingclub.co.uk Yealm Harbourmaster +44(0)1753 872533, yealmharbourauthority.co.uk…