About us and the boat

About us and the boat:

We were lucky enough to retire early at the start of 2013 so we could head off and "live the dream" on board our Nordhavn 47 Trawler Yacht. The idea is to see some of the planet, at a slow 6 - 7 knots pace. There are no fixed goals or timings, we just had a plan to visit Scotland and then probably the Baltic before heading south.

The idea is to visit the nicer areas in these latitudes before heading south for warmer weather. If we like somewhere, we will stay for a while. If not, we will just move on. So, for the people who love forward planning and targets, this might seem a little relaxed!

If anyone else is contemplating a trawler yacht life, maybe our experiences will be enough to make you think again, or maybe do it sooner then you intended!

The boat is called Rockland and she is built for long distance cruising and a comfortable life on board too. If you want to see more about trawler yachts and the Nordhavn 47 in particular, there is a link to the manufacturers website in our "useful stuff" section. For the technically minded, there is a little info and pictures of the boat and equipment in the same section

Regards

Richard and June

Friday 5 September 2014

Norn Iron hospitality

Life here is never dull. Never. After chatting to David and Caroline (and David's brother), we also saw the nice Seaward 35 boat that was astern of us in Peel (Isle of Man) earlier this year. That ended up in a chat and the lady owner joining us on board for an evening with a bottle open.

Then David arranged for the captain to join in the last Royal Ulster Yacht Club Thursday evening race of the series. Ken, the owner of  a nice new Arcona 410 called Juniper (that boat was fast too...) was a great host:





We crossed the finishing line first - the "first boat home" but we lost on handicap to an elderly yacht that had a minute and a half handicap advantage. Such is life. the moral victory was ours though. Afterwards we joined everyone for supper at the yacht club, just up the road. A beautiful purpose built place:






Have a look at RUYC images for some more shots - especially the old billiard room. Of course, being "Norn Iron" lots of people came and chatted, Ken and his family were most hospitable and friendly and a good time was had by all.

So we could explore some of the inland area, we rented another ball of fire car (Fiat 500) for a few days. The first expedition (even a trip to the supermarket is an expedition in a Fiat 500) was to Strangford Lough. Portaferry marina is a little small and exposed to the fierce tides that rip through the lough entrance:


Might not be going there. The car ferry across to Strangford was "crabbing" nicely as it crossed the entrance, fighting the stream:



As you can see, the sun didn't co-operate with us but we saw enough to realise that visiting the lough by boat (but arriving at slack water) is a must do. The only question is, when? We will leave you with that suspense.


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