Hope's and Howard's Sailing Adventures

Our sojourn in Crete turned out to be rather short and sadly didn’t allow for much time to explore. It took us several hours to check in, first with the port authority soon after we arrived on Wednesday and then the next day with customs who prepared our transit log, a paper-driven system. Fortunately we had cleared into Schengen in Malta so didn’t need to add a stop at immigration.. Read More

We had a great first impression of the Maltese islands when we passed the sheer cliffs of Gozo on our way to Valetta. They made us think of the white cliffs of Dover! Being back in Schengen and the EU we had to check in with Customs and Immigration. This was accomplished in Grand Harbour. We docked alongside an old high dock wall and had to use a large tire.. Read More

Monastir has turned out to be a good stop. It is an interesting, fairly small marina that was not easy to spot on arrival because it seems to have been constructed in between what used to be an island and is now connected to the mainland. The masts of yachts in the marina only became visible when we were fairly close in. The marina offers good protection and is quite.. Read More

We departed Mahon, Menorca at 09:40 on Saturday September 3rd, in anticipation of good sailing in southwesterly winds that we knew would pick up overnight to gusts of around 23 knots, not bad for our easterly passage towards Carloforte, a smallish island with a large marina off the SW corner of Sardinia. We would then reevaluate to see if we wanted to continue on towards Tunisia or stop and rest.. Read More

We ended up staying 2 weeks in Mahon with a little break in the middle. Having installed a new battery charger and finally found someone (Lawrence of Sail Power Menorca) to review our charging systems and diagnose and fix our battery monitoring system that wasn’t giving us any meaningful information. We now feel ready to move on with our travels east, Hooray! What made our time here so special was.. Read More

On Friday August 12, 2022 at 19:30 we departed Barcelona on our passage east to Turkey; first stop Soller, Mallorca. Ed and Shona, and Margit and Erv were on the dock waving us goodbye.  Tina, a multi-lingual Danish friend from the Club, was on board. She joined at the last moment as Cliff and Nancy, from the US, had to cancel over Covid concerns. The preceding few days had been somewhat.. Read More

We just returned from a month away from Lady M. However, we couldn’t keep away from boats and boating during our trip. Our first stop on the US East coast included a very pleasant Wednesday evening sail from Nyack Boat Club on the Hudson with friends, Cliff and Nancy, which brought back many happy memories of the years when we were members there. We then spent a very enjoyable (but.. Read More

It is about time we put fingers to IPad and write a blog. We have been on Lady Mayfair in Barcelona, essentially since last September.  Much of the time has been spent refurbishing equipment on the boat, a task more arduous and complicated than anticipated. Prior experience in the US has shown it could be a lot easier and less expensive there, than here. However, the upside is that we are.. Read More

I think it is the same whenever you acquire anything new, there is always a settling in phase, getting to know the ins and outs of how it all works and figuring out where upgrades and/or changes may be warranted. This certainly seems to have been the case for us with Lady M. So, not only have we been slowly chipping away at the “must do” ‘B’ items found during.. Read More

After almost a 12 month hiatus as live-aboards, we are back. The pandemic definitely blunted our plans but in the end, June, we managed to fly to Spain and find our next boat, Lady M a 2001 Moody 54. She is a very nice, well loved, blue water boat and much better suited for welcoming guests onboard, although she is a few feet longer than what we were looking for… Read More