Home at last. A lazy day, starting with a look at the aircraft carrier being decommissioned in Portsmouth harbour. We sailed very slowly in 4 knots of wind to Osborne Bay for the first lunch time stop of the whole trip. To celebrate Debs and I cajoled the remaining crew members to join us for a swim. At one point everybody was in the water and it occurred to me, what would happen if the anchor slipped? After swimming, Debs and I took the opportunity to scrub Jav...

Have been receive Solent coastguard for the last couple of days even when in Calais. We left Brighton at 9am this morning. Overnight the wind had been howling and was forecast 5/6 for today. As soon as we left, it poured with rain and gusted up to 24 knots. Put in 3 reefs and made good progress to wind. The sea was very lively. Slowly the wind changed direction until we had to tack back and forth. As we approached Selsey Bill, we realised only Ian had been round ...

Having arrived late last night in the dark at Boulogne, I reviewed the weather forecasts and decided we should cross back to England. Boulogne is rather down in the mouth as observed during our 12 hour stay. It used to be a ferry port but we did not see any ferries, unlike Calais which has 3 an hour. We set off at 8:15 with the centre of the low pressure over us. At 10 o'clock the wind dropped to almost nothing and started spinning round causing the wind instrume...

We planned to leave on the last bridge opening of the morning at 8:07 but when the time came the water was too low to exit so spent the day in Calais. The weather is going to get worse and we left when the bridge opened again at 16:40. Had good down wind sail to Boulogne arriving at 21:20 in the dark. Having later dinner and then off to bed.

Bonjour mes amis, nous sommes en France. We left Ramsgate at 9:15 with bright sun and little wind. On hoisting the sails are speed fell to 1.5 knots so we the motor was put on again as we piloted our way through the Goodwin sands. Within half an hour the wind changed direction and rose to 19 knots. We then sailed the rest of the way to Calais, arriving in port at 14:30 just as the gate to the marina opened. The gauge showed 3.1 meters and there was a sign saying ...