Broken steering, hurting backs, sweaty cupboards and incessant chat on the VHF enough to drive the calmest person up the wall. Sometimes it’s best to just turn off the VHF, stop looking at the chart plotter and put to one side all the stuff that interferes with what sailing is really all about.
Cast Aside The Technology Read Post »
Coinciding with the Chandler’s release from Somalia by pirates this week we return to the high seas, now entering the middle of the Arabian Sea. We are in the same area the Chandlers were two years ago.
What was a great sail is now turning into a bit of a nightmare with steering problems and no wind. And then there are the freaks on the VHF radio…
Banana Port Control Read Post »
The second of our two-part podcast is here. This is the primary school project we’ve been working on with Nance Lake of Wybunbury Delves Primary School in Cheshire. The children are reading Kensuke’s Kingdom and wanted to learn about life at sea so they send us recordings of them asking us questions. This week we discuss the weather, getting lost and what the worst thing that’s ever happened to us.
Primary School Question Time Part 2 Read Post »
[Explicit] Offensive, rude and quite un-PC. Whatever happened to those two lovely young chaps who joined the rally in Egypt? After 3,000 miles something changed and we ended up with potty-mouthed drunken sailors. In this podcast Terry of Roam II takes on the challenge of interviewing Robbie and Cillian, two chaps who met after cycling across Europe and joined the rally in the Red Sea. Not for children or the faint-hearted.
Drunken Vagrants [Explicit] Read Post »
Got kids? Facebook this week has been awash with proud parents posting up pics of their kids in their new school uniform, compete with descriptions of teary eyes… and that’s just the adults. Liz and I have got into the new term spirit too: followtheboat is involved in a school project which might be of interest to any parent out there with young children. Some educational audio and visual treats coming soon. Also we might just be contravening some international act with our surreptitious recording of the Royal Navy trading secrets with us in Oman. That’s our exclusive podcast that comes out today. Oh and Liz got shortlisted for another writing comp but we said we wouldn’t bore you with those announcements any more 😉 Anyway, it’s all in the link below.
Back To School Round-Up: Kids Projects & Trading Secrets Read Post »
The next part of our Pirate Alley excursion is quite unbelievable as we encounter three major problems within the same night! We’ve split the podcasts up and in the next couple of episodes we have a collision, more fishing net problems and you’ll also hear how one boat starts taking in water. Today’s episode, however, deals with the minor issue of a boat breaking down in the middle of nowhere!
Pirate Alley: Towing The Line Read Post »
It’s Jamie’s 40th birthday. No partying for him though as we move into our second day in Pirate Alley where two boats have to tend to dysfunctional alternators. One of the boats is Esper.
To make matters worse the inevitable happens: two fishing dows are spotted on the horizon, suspiciously following the rally. Could they be pirates? And if so, what chance do we have of reinforcing our safety in numbers strategy if Esper’s group is all over the place?
Pirate Alley: Birthday Close Encounters Read Post »
The hilarious departure from Port Aden raises our spirits as we begin our journey into Pirate Alley. Within two hours disaster strikes as one of the boats runs into a fishing net. In the dark.
This collective of boats isn’t called a rally for nothing. Listen to the boats rallying together to get us through the first of many hurdles lying ahead
Pirate Alley: Night Diving Read Post »
The day before we left Aden we were invited to another leaving do put on by Colonel Mohammed the Coast guard-cum-port police-cum-general bigwig. We also got to chat to a Yemeni woman, covered head to foot in black with just her eyes visible. Her English is excellent and makes for a great little interview.
Dancing Our Way Out Of Yemen Read Post »
In this latest podcast we finally cross the boarder of Egypt and pass in to Sudan, one of the poorest and most war-torn countries on this planet. For us, however, its poor economy is made up for by the very rich beauty of nature. The anchorage of Marob is our first taste of ‘real’ Africa and within 24 hours we have run-ins with turtles, ospreys, camels and, get this, a dugong!
It’s been a while since we gave you a progress update; for the last few weeks you’ve been hearing from some of the Vasco Da Gama participants and getting to know the different people taking part in the rally that takes us 4,500 miles from Turkey to India. There’s been a reason for this staggered narrative though: we’re passing through some of the most dangerous waters in the world. Piracy has been a growing concern in the Gulf of Aden and the Indian Ocean. British sailing couple, Paul and Rachel Chandler of the sailing boat ‘Lyn Rival’, previous Vasco Da Gama rally participants, are still being held hostage in Somalia at the time of publication.
There’s been a reason for this staggered narrative though: we’re passing through some of the most dangerous waters in the world. Piracy has been a growing concern in the Gulf of Aden and the Indian Ocean. British sailing couple, Paul and Rachel Chandler of the sailing boat ‘Lyn Rival’, previous Vasco Da Gama rally participants, are still being held hostage in Somalia at the time of publication. The threat of piracy is very, very real so we are avoiding publishing our exact whereabouts, hence the automated, scheduled podcasts. But now we can continue with the adventure and we get back to our progress on the water…
Electronics And Fishing Read Post »
