I first met Max when he pitched up at my yacht club to begin working on the regular Saturday routine. He had been at it a little while without my knowledge while I was away summer sailing aboard Whimbrel.
I immediately found Max to be one of those honest down to earth guys that often seem all too rare.
Max had appeared at the club with a robust little yacht called Kate which he had sailed across the Atlantic with a ‘duff’ engine. Within months he was negotiating a purchase deal for Wendy May, a deep keeled gaffer then owned by Dick Durham.
Due to family needs (aged parent) Max had to move. So, I felt sad when he slipped his mooring and sailed Wendy May off to a distant Welsh creek.
Christobel bought this book for me as a birthday present. It was read aboard Whimbrel during the recent glorious ‘gas-less’ summer generally when up mud creeks – far removed from the blue waters of the Caribbean where most of the story is told.
I remember this ship at Battlesbridge from many years ago. What it was doing there was alien to my thinking. And, as Max tells, he needed a very good spring tide to make the passage up to the top of the tidal River Crouch. Her name: Gloria.
Max delights in telling us about the trials and tribulations in getting his ship in order. His previous boat was a little yacht kept at the Thurrock Yacht Club.
Max made it to the Caribbean via the Iberian peninsular, Los Palmas and the Cape Verde Islands. There he worked to earn enough to make repairs and ‘live’ … Max then sailed the yacht back home, alone…
Then after stops to visit family ‘down west’ he made it back to Battlesbridge taking a crew aboard to help with this bit!
There are a scattering of black & white images and an end map with some details of the routes taken.
I have sailed the high seas aboard ships, but other than a south coast passage have never gone deep sea aboard a ‘little ship’ so I found this story of great interest. It was compelling…
Max is passionate about his sailing and clearly knows his stuff.
Thanks Max, I thoroughly enjoyed this book.
Published by Amazon, 2012.
ISBN: 9781471043604
Price: £7.99