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

A TRIBUTE TO MICHAEL RICHEY
MBE, Hon FRIN (1917-2009) by Kai Easton
Newport
26.viii.2010

I suspect I am the only one here who didn’t know Mike in his transatlantic sailing days with Jester, but our lives have circled around each other for years, since I grew up, as it happens, not very far from Newport, just across Narragansett Bay in Barrington.

We met very soon after his 90th birthday in Brighton when my husband Robert, our rough-haired Jack Russell terrier Harry, and I moved into the same regency house where Mike had lived since his early days as the Director of the (Royal) Institute of Navigation. He was still cycling his 10-speed Peugeot bicycle along the undercliff, a daily exercise of some five miles, and he still kept his classic ....read more

The Jester Azores Challenge 2012

Start off western end of Plymouth Breakwater at 1200 (to be confirmed) Sunday 27th May 2012
(1.5 hours after HW Devonport - neap tides)

The Jester Azores Challenge is run on a ‘gentlemanly basis’ within the following guidelines:

for sailing vessels between 20 and 30 feet (including multi-hulls)
human power is the only acceptable alternative propulsion to that of the wind: rowing or clubhauling, for instance, are permissible..... read more

67 Entries so far Jester Azores Challenge Entry List

Andy Lane has produced a very interesting DVD showing his participation in the 2010 Jester Challenge and the sad loss of Amadeus. The DVD is available for £10 or 12 Euros which includes postage. The proceeds will help towards the building of a replacement for Amadeus.
Please contact Andy andylane51@yahoo.com if you would like to buy a copy

Jester Challenge 2010 results

And he woke up and rebuked the wind and said to the sea: 'Quiet now. Be calm.' And the wind dropped, and there followed a great calm.
This passage from the gospel of Mark (I use the Jerusalem Bible) brings to mind a curious incident in Faial when I first sailed Jester to the Azores.........read more

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

The inimitable Bill Churchouse and his 40-year-old 22' Westerly, Belgean, arrive in Praia da Vitoria after 21 days at sea
copyright © Tony Head 2008

Mingming's 2009 Northern Voyage

Left Whitehills Harbour on the Moray Firth, northern Scotland, at high water, 0200H on Friday 26th June. Ran up through the Fair Isle Channel, past Fair Isle, then outside Foula, the westernmost Shetland island. With settled weather from the east, though with occasional calms, I was able to lay down an almost straight track to Jan Mayen, which we reached 121/2 days later, on Wednesday 8th July. The highlights of the leg to Jan Mayen were two encounters with pods of killer whales, and a close shave with a Russian factory trawler, the Armanek Begayev, of Kaliningrad, which we met just inside the Arctic Circle. We had crossed the Arctic Circle......more

Amongst the bergs and bergy bits, 80 miles ENE of Scoresby Sound on the East Greenland coast

How to Scull

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