The work is almost done and the plans are set to return to my beloved Harbinger to carry on sailing. As of April 18th 2014 I will be free of the daily grind and I can finally become a nomad.
I will wander as the weather and the whim takes me, sometimes sailing, sometimes by road, but wander I will. Come along, it'll be fun.
The dreaming stage Its was back at Christmas 2010 and I was stuck in Kuwait due to problems with visas. I was a bit feed up and so to give myself something to look forward to I began to plan a summer road trip to the Alps. My first thoughts were to take in some of the great passes through the Alps. This would take me into Italy, which i love and so my thoughts logically moved south and into north Tuscany and the Garfagnana, which I already knew and had fond memories of family holidays. But where to after Tuscany? Well Corsica is somewhere I always wanted to visit, and it has great roads and some amazing mountains, plus the famous and tough GR20 trail. The route home from Corsica naturally leads onto France, Provence ... read more
Dear all, I decide to resurect the blog to keep in touch, but by almeans email me direct. I hope you are all well and enjoying the summer, whereever you are. Please see attached some pics from Kuwait. The titles should be self explanitary. Things are fine here, if a little auster. I was allocated a car and an apartment upon arrival, which was just over a week ago now. It is hot, 47 degrees generally, but the humidity is lower than the UAE and so quite bearable. Presently we are in the holy month of Ramadan and so that means no eating or drinking in public, nothing at all from dawn until dusk. This means that all cafes and resturants are closed during daylight hours. Work takes most of my time what with a 40 ... read more
Dear all, Well I returned to George Town via New York on the 19th May, with a view to making a transat crossing via the Azores, with Carla on Jeremy as crew. However and unfortunately I ended up departing George Town on the 24th May bound for the Azores, but on my own. Many thanks to Jeremy and Carla for helping me get to George Town and for taking care of Harbinger whilst I was away and i'm sorry that we didn't attempt the Atlantic together. Thank you for all that you did to get me to George Town. Well as I said, I departed George Town on the 24th but 5 days out, after 450 miles and half way to Bermuda, I decided that I was not going to get beyond Bermuda, and that is ... read more
Hi everyone, Well I'm sitting in Heathrow airport with a ticket for JFK, and the flight is delayed afew hours because of a cloud of ash. I have had a great time back in the UK seeing the kids and celebrating the engagement of Fay and Stuart. Things have gone very well and I'm returning to George Town in the southern Exumas, Bahamas, to carry on where I left off. Jeremy and Carla have been looking after Harbinger while I have been away and I cannot wait to get back.. We hope to depart George Town in a week or so, when we will head NE to Bermuda. Sadly southern Star with Jason, Molly and porter has already departed and so I won't be seeing them for a while. I attach some photos of spring in ... read more
National Family Regatta week. We have had a great week, the National Family Regatta was held in George Town with lots of racing of the traditional Bahamian working boats. The post sailing partying has been pretty full on as well with some great music and lots of rum. Well I have to bid farewell to my goods friends Molly, Jason and Porter, who I will miss very very much. Thank you for being such good company, you have made this the trip of a life time, thank you, I miss you all very much. I now head off to the UK for a couple of weeks and Southern Star and my friends will move on to new places. However Jeremy and Carla have kindly offered to stay aboard Harbinger while I'm away and when I return ... read more
Hi everyone, sorry for the long delay in posting this page, but there really wasn't anywhere with sufficient band width to download the images. Anyway it took us 32 days to sail from Nassau to George Town in the southern Exumas and what a wonderful time we have had. We have seen storms, 3 inches of rain in half an hour! Lots of sunshine and quite a lot of wind. There are 365 islands in the Exuma chain and we have visited about 25. Of those Cays we visited only 3 have proper settlements of a hundred or more. They are Black Point, Little Farmers Cay and George Town, which is where we are now. Since leaving Fort Myers in Florida back in January I have sailed 534 Nm, crossed the gulf stream and navigated the ... read more
Hi Just a short note to say I hope that you enjoy the attached images of Nassau. It has been great to finelly arrive in the Bahamas and we feel we are truly on our way. Depart for the Emumas Islands tomorrow and so it may be a while before the next posting. Regards to you all. Bob Carla and Jeremy, team Harbinger.... read more
Hello all, Well we made it at long last. It was a bit of a dash to get to Nassau before the next front. We took 60 hours to cover the 260 miles in one hit, from Marathon Florida to Nassau. The last afternoon was a bit of a slog but other than feeling tired we were fine. It turned out that the weather window lasted about 72 hours. Jeremy and Carla have been great and I doubt weather I'd have made it to Nassau without them. Harbinger has also performed well and is easy on the crew, tracking well and riding the lumpy seas well. All in all a memerable passage. Unfortunately we didn't get any pictures until we were approaching Nassau harbour entrance. We'll stay put for about a week before moving on, either ... read more
6th March Crew join Harbinger Great news, Jeremy and Carla have joined the good ship Harbinger. Jeremy is from NZ and his girl friend Carla is from Brazil. They are a great couple with lots of sailing experience and this will make the trip that much more enjoyable. Therefore plans are afoot to depart Marathon at the earliest opportunity, and that might be tomorrow or early next week. Having said that it all depends on the whimes of the weather. We are not the only ones waiting for a window of opportunity, there are dozens of boats her in Boot Key Harbour waiting for a window. As i write this snug in my bed the wind is once again howling outside. It seems that there is little respite from the frontal systems coming through. This coupled ... read more
Hi Well I've had a great week of sailing and now I'm back in Marathon's Boot Key Harbour. During the last week I have had a several great days out sailing. Last Monday Mike and Bruce joined me aboard Harbinger and we went out about 8 miles to the edge of the reef. It was a gentle sail with sunshine, dolphins and sea turtles for company. Later on I went to the mast head of Wanderlust, Mike and Bruce's Endeavour 40, to refit their wind instruments and aerials. On Wednesday I decided it was time to try out my reefing lines and the small jib and so I went out again, but this time I was alone. I sailed out under main alone and Harbinger is a very easy and predictable boat to sail with good ... read more
