Month: April 2018

The Grand Old Duke of York…or Snakes and ladders

where we set off from Leeuwarden to Groningen, have a planned stop at Dokkum, sail to Engwerium, rain and wind send us back to Dokkum, try again to get to Groningen but stopped by rain and closed bridges at Garnwerd….

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Nature nurtures

It’s good to be outside, in the sunshine. Compared with people who are confined indoors, for whatever reason: illness, disability, work, fear, danger or imprisonment, I feel very fortunate. Apart from the facts that the sun shining on our skin…

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Milk in the bilges

It’s always best to start your day with a problem! This morning’s was milk in the bilges. Let me explain. The bilges are the spaces under the floorboards and they get wet: either by water draining into them from the…

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‘Ups’ and ‘downs’

Always trying to get the most out of each day and this means planning, so that if it’s fine we can put up the sails and go, rather than having to slog to the shop because we’ve run out of…

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Carpe diem!

We’ve seen more than one boat called Carpe Diem and it seems to be the prevailing attitude here. The sun came out on Saturday – as promised. And so did the people. The main street of Joure was busy on…

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Smelling the coffee

Motored to Joure yesterday- it’s the other side of the Sneekamer. Our final voyage last year was across the Sneekemer-some of you have seen the video clip of us being bumped and splashed in a Force 5. The forecast was…

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Very British weather?

When you think about someone ‘living aboard’ what sort of things come to mind? If you imagine the person is ‘aboard-abroad’ then you probably imagine them swimming in azure-blue water, sipping chilled drinks on deck as the sun goes down…

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Allsorts

I love liquorice. Always have! And so do the Dutch;  so every supermarket or service station has shelves and shelves of the stuff, with fruit – or ‘zoet’ or ‘zout’ (sweet or salt). Last year we always had liquorice in…

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Alice in Wonderland

You know that bit where she drinks and eats and gets bigger or smaller? Changing from living on dry land to living in a boat is like that. When I was packing to come here, I kept thinking, ‘I need…

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