It was to be a 50mile, one day passage from Chatham, up the Thames to St. Katharine’s Dock at Tower Bridge. Lisa from the office, generously offered to drive the ‘bus’ back and we arrived in time to ‘lock out’ at the optimum 10am for the tide. The help of the ebb out of the... Continue Reading →

Extricating ourselves from our mooring in Rye was not helped by the fact that the channel looked too narrow for Hejira to turn around. So, we motored astern (reversed) up to a corner where we thought we had room to turn. With the sides of the channel being shallower, we disturbed a lot of brown... Continue Reading →

It was such a chore to replace the Silic antifouling with a top quality traditional hard antifouling, but it was necessary, and it was finally completed along with several other improvements, and Hejira was ready to return to her natural habitat. A crew working party installed the freshly serviced and laundered sails and after other... Continue Reading →

Having finally been ‘blocked off’ ashore in Northney Marina after the machinations outlined in the previous blog, unfortunately, the saga didn’t end there. The Northney boatyard staff, seemingly disgruntled with the events as they unfolded, and unhappy about the safety of Hejira or any yachts bearing the slippery Silic antifouling, chose to escalate the situation... Continue Reading →

During the major refit 2 years ago, I had the opportunity to review the antifouling situation. (the coating on the hull to prevent the growth of weed and barnacles etc) The existing  ‘coppercoat’ treatment was both disappointing (maybe I expected too much) and coming to the end of its effective life, so I thought it... Continue Reading →