single-handed sailing - only in solitude can true freedom be known

Jester Azores Challenge 2008 a huge success!
42 Starters and 28 finishers read more

George Pike reports that Alexei Fedoruk arrived at the Newport Yacht Club in his boat Fason on Tuesday 5th August under jury-rig. He had first been spotted by local fishermen last week when they passed him food and water.  more...
Alexei was a competitor in the 2008 Jester Azores Challenge and finished 12th at 11:07 on 14th June.
Fason was designed and build by Alexei in his home town of Velikiy Novgorod in 1988, at a time when materials were virtually impossible to source. He machined all the screws himself!
Alexei had sailed Fason 1,800 miles from St Petersburg for the start of the Jester Azores Challenge.
The likeable Russian was very popular with the JC skippers who presented him with a silver Crown to recognise his outstanding achievement of sailing the first truly home built yacht in the event.

Alexei and the jury-rigged Fason are are shown here on a mooring in Newport Harbour proudly flying her Jester Challenge flag. The picture below shows Alexei (centre) enjoying a drink with George Pike, from the Newport Yacht Club, and Dr. Robin Wallace, Chairman of the R. I. State Yachting Committee, at the Ida Lewis Yacht Club.
Alexei is being taken good care of by our Jester Challenge friends in Newport and they have already found a new mast for Fason....thank you Newport.   Full story

Against the Floe

Bob Beggs, the latest entry in the Jester Challenge 2010, will be setting off next year to attempt the first east-west voyage through the North West Passage and curcumnavigation of North America under sail alone and against the currents.....Against the Floe
Bob who co-owns Plymouth based sailing school Performance Yachting will be sailing in a 28ft Dazcat catamaran designed by Darren Newton.

Info about Against the Floe in PDF format

Mingming's Northern Voyage
Left Burnham-on-Crouch 0915 22 June. Three days later we ran into a severe gale off the N Yorks coast. This was the storm that caused the first lot of flooding across the UK. I had to sail quite aggressively to maintain position. Winds were NE backing N then NW. I had the coast to the west, Dogger Bank to the east and the shallower waters of the Humber, plus the gas rigs, to the south. Fortunately I had had enough time to get Mingming into deeper water with reasonable sea-room.
Two days later, probably because of strains imposed during this storm, my top two battens broke. These were fixed with boathooks, brush handles and bits of spare wood. This patched up rig took me the well over 2000 miles. We had to ride out a less severe storm half way up the Scottish coast.
Eleven and a half days after leaving Burnham we rounded the northern tip of Unst, the most northerly island of the UK. Magical moment. Three days later we were off the east coast of the Faroes. Here we started running into strong northerly headwinds. The next day a third batten broke. More patching up. I was heading for NE Iceland but F7 northerlies kept forcing us further and further west. With the broken rig I could not sail too aggressively to windward.
Between the Faroes and Iceland we had a pod of 200 plus pilot whales with us for 5-6 hours. I took some amazing video of this.
The consistent northerlies finally put NE Iceland and the Arctic Circle out of reach. .............. read more

John Apps and Glayva finish the Jester Challenge 2006

After 410 days, 2 hours and 50 minutes - and in true 'Jester Spirit' - John Apps has finished the Jester Challenge 2006.
He arrived in Newport RI on 18th July 2007, being the third skipper to finish.
John wrote:
"Well we made it. I passed the Castle Hill Light at 1350[UTC] on 18 July 2007. Approximately 410 days, 2 hours and 50 minutes since the start of JC06. I think this might make me third on the podium.
Except for the last 200 miles when I had next to no wind I seemed to go from Low to Low with only a day in between. Even in sectors which according to the Routing Chart should never have anything above F7, I was encountering F9s. I was knocked down twice in a three hour period trying to sail under bare poles in an F10 NE, when I had crossed the top of a low. The first knock down was a bit of a disaster as I had just taken my top stormboard out to check on everything, when I was knocked down - ending up with about 2 feet of water in the cabin. I also lost my wind indicator from the top of my mast, broke my Babystay, flattened my Spray Hood and ended up with a Raincatcher Radar Reflector looking like a flower as it was bent out of shape.
Except for the missing wind indicator everything was more or less repairable. About 100 miles out of Newport I encountered very dense sea fog and unfortunatley no wind for a day and a half. I was caught in something called teh Great South Ship's Channel just south of Nantucket. Every hour or so I could hear a ship's fog horn going past. I was replying on my foghorn, but it sounded very puny in relation to the ships' blasts. Still I think my two radar reflectors are fairly effective [A Dutch ship, the NV Power, passed me one evening and told me they had had me on radar for an hour].
Because of the time it has taken me to get here, I will probably only stay a few days to resupply and head straight back"

John Apps (centre) enjoying a well earned beer with Robin Wallace and George Pike at the Newport Yacht Club

         Pete Hill and Shanti arriving at Newport after 44 days and 6 hours at sea

        Pete Hill and Eric Andlauer sharing a beer after their successful crossing