Back Home in the UK

On 4th June, Nigel and his crew brought Stratagem in to Woolverstone Marina, exactly a month since leaving Corfu. The passage of 2807 nautical miles included stops in Palermo (Sicily), Ibiza, Gibraltar, Cascais, Portomao, and La Caruna and then on to Woolverstone after a brief stop in Dartmouth for fuel. The weather had proved favourable with only one forced stay in port at Potomao awaiting large Atlantic swells to abate before rounding the cape. The passage had been without incident or damage/breakages, thank goodness. That said, we did find a couple of issues needing attention. The Facnor genoa furl was sticking (not experienced before) and was found to be as a result of a bent piece of wire used in the original installation back in the Beneteau factory to hold the extrusion in place whilst assembling the system. This had dislodged and was catching on the drum when furling/unfurling. All it needed was to remove the offending piece of wire. The old genoa showed signes of wear which needed some stitching at the sailmakers but highlights the need for a new sail. The only other issue is a damaged port side navigation light, broken by a wave accross the bow in heavy weather. Not a big deal.

So, Stratagem is back and safely berthed in Woolverstone marina and in the process of being emptied of all the cruising gear and paraphenalia that long term cruising attracts. This season will be no more than some local sailing, some tlc inside and out and agreeing work to be done for her major winter refit, including hull respray, new standing rigging, new sprayhood and cockpit tent and as previously mentioned, a new genoa. We will decide on the furling gear after it is removed.

To summarize our Mediterranean adventure, we visited France, Spain (including the Ballearic islands), Italy, Greece (including the islands of the Ionian and Aegean) and Turkey. Stratagem covered 12409 Nautical miles, and added 2594 hours on the engine.


That's it ..............

All good things come to an end!

The big decision of 2014 has been to bring our Mediterranean cruising to an end! Once that decision had been made we could turn our attention to how to get Stratagem back to the UK. Sailing her back ourselves was a non starter as Sandra downright refused to do the trip, which is predominately against winds and currents, not to mention that the passage is close on 3000 nautical miles! The alternatives were :-


1. Have her shipped - discounted on the ridiculously high costs quoted.
2. Have her brought by road on a low loader. The overall height from keel to top of the arch prevented this option as it exceeds the maximum height transporters are prepared to accept.
3. Me to sail with a hired-in crew.
4. Use a delivery crew.


We chose (4) and finalised our choice as Nigel Woodcock of Falmouth Yacht Delivery, with a total of 3 crew.


We returned to Corfu on 21st April to complete last minute (below waterline) maintenance items prior to launching on the 23rd. The launch day was fine and sunny with no wind allowing us to get Stratagem back on her berth with no fuss. Sails were delivered from the sailmakers, Kastos appeared as pre-arranged to change both primary and secondary fuel filters on the main engine, and we set to, to get Stratagem all spruced up after a long winter ashore. By the time the delivery crew arrived on the 28th April, Stratagem had been returned to her usual clean, shiny and well maintained self, fully prepared for the long passage home. All was left for us to do was to spend time with the crew giving a full briefing on Stratagem's systems and general location of seacocks, safety gear, spares and the like.


It was a rather surreal experience handing over Stratagem to people we didn't know and leaving her in Greece whilst we returned home. The next time we see her she should be tucked up in her marina berth at Woolverstone on the River Orwell where we started this adventure 11 years ago........

A Caribbean Diversion

With Stratagem safely tucked up on the hard in Gouvia Marina and in the custody of Will and Gill to look after her and carry out some essential maintenance, I turned my attention to a little diversion by way of an Atlantic crossing to the Caribbean. This was a crossing scheduled way back in 2012 with a friend Alan to take his Discovery 55 from Tenerife to the Caribbean.

The plan involved a flight to Tenerife at the end of December 2013 and a crossing to Barbados where our wives would join us for a couple of weeks cruising down to Grenada and then northwards through the Grenadines ending in St. Lucia.

The crossing started on 1st January 2014 and took 19.5 days, arriving at Bridgetown, Barbados on 20th January. Details of the crossing and our "fun and games" en route are recorded on Alan's blog at ticketeeboo.blogspot.co.uk. The track we took is shown below.

The distance run from Tenerife to Barbados was 2772 nm and the best 24 hour run, 172 nm. Thereafter we "cruised" a further 353 nm over two weeks ending in Rodney Bay, St. Lucia.

In summary, the crossing was very successful and we had a good laugh in the process. The time passed very quickly and unlike other reported crossings, we were never bored.

The "cruise" however was less enjoyable (not reflected in Alan's  blog). Beating into winds of 25 to 40 knots is not most people's idea of a nice cruise, not helped by a badly set jib which eventually collapsed when the stitching failed at the head of the sail. Security issues heightened by the death of a skipper murdered on his yacht in St. Lucia resulted in a cruise which did not involve visits ashore - simply sailing from one anchorage to the next. Such a shame.