It’s good to be back at sea again. Callisto is currently 40 miles south of Crete motoring along at a steady 12 knots towards Port Said, the harbour which marks the northern entrance to the Suez Canal. We left Antibes four days ago after waiting 48 hours for a weather window to open south of Sicily. It’s been a very good passage so far, only 24 hours of slightly bumpy weather yesterday interrupting the excellent conditions. It’s getting warmer and brighter with every watch which is quite a relief as France was starting to get a little too chilly for my [View Full Entry]

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So on it was Beaulieu-sur-mer to join the motley crew of the motor yacht Moira. Well not so motley actually, I had worked with Toby and Rona, the captain and the chef previously on the S.S. Catastrophe where Toby was the first mate and Rona the Chef. We were all good friends anyway and since I hadn’t been directly responsible for the succession of calamities we had faced, Toby obviously felt that I would make a reasonable addition to the crew. ‘Moira’ is a 28 metre (90 foot) semi-displacement motor yacht built by ‘Cantieri Naval Falcon’ in Via Reggio, Italy. [View Full Entry]

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A few movies and a few more scotches after leaving Heathrow I arrived back at Auckland International. I stepped through into the arrivals hall and was looking about for someone who might be willing to take pity on a smelly traveller when a small six year old torpedo launched itself out of the crowd and attached itself to my right thigh. Luckily it was only my niece Kyra happy to see me again and wanting a present of some sort. Luckily again I had one prepared (courtesy of Heathrow shopping plaza) and was able to ease the vice-like grip and keep [View Full Entry]

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After a fun few days in the desert with camels and scarab beetles, Hannah and I arrived in London and I was straight onto the agency to get me out on a ship asap. The first one was another suction dredger like the one I had worked on before I came back to NZ. The difference with this one was that it was summer and on the south coast so the weather was baking hot and flat as a pancake for the whole three weeks. Whenever I got off watch it was up onto the monkey island above the bridge with [View Full Entry]

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So it was back to New Zealand in April 2006, I had all the paperwork for my UK work visa completed and ready to go. I intended to be back for the minimum time necessary to get the visa as I had interviewed for and been offered a position with a ferry company called Norfolkline and needed only the magic stamp in my passport. In fact if I already had it I would have found myself in Korea as the delivery crew on a brand new cross channel ferry but as it was I didn’t end up working for them for [View Full Entry]

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The next chapter in my yachting saga took a slightly different turn. Looking for a move up from chief chamois technician I took a job as second mate on a 50 metre motor yacht which at the time was in the last stages of construction in a shipyard in Istanbul. It was to turn into quite an education in how not to build boats. Our first little disaster occurred when a poorly tightened hose clamp on the air conditioning unit in the galley gave way and spilled all of its lovely blue fluid into the flooring, flooding the cabin below and [View Full Entry]

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Hi all, I have decided that the Blogging bandwagon is a good one to be on, I have been travelling now for quite a few years and don't have any record of what I have been doing or the places I have been. The first couple of blogs will have a few bits and pieces of things I have been doing in the last few years, sort of bring things up to date. I apologise in advance if it gets a little bit heavy on things that float but those that know me will appreciate that there actually isn't anything more [View Full Entry]

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