The Essex based charity that works with disadvantaged, less able and socially excluded young people, as well as the wider maritime industry, is about to achieve its first aim in the furtherance of its excellent community work – that is the build of a new spritsail barge hull. This, once fitted out, will allow whole year…

After my piece about the spritsail barge Dawn and her tiller steering, I received a communication from Gerard Swift, a key member of the trust caring for the barge. He kindly offered to talk me through what the trust were doing and to look at the tiller itself. Previous blog: http://nickardley.com/ditch-crawler-visits-maldon-to-see-dawn/ Today I went back…

On a visit to my good ship, currently being worked on over in Faversham, I spotted one of Alan’s staff, Alison, working away during her lunch break… She was adding a plank or two to what looked like a large model of a sailing fishing craft of the late 1800s. Alison by her model… In very…

Oh yes, I went to see Dawn, the sweet little stackie barge that is, currently berthed in Maldon… Actually I went to see the ladies in the Salty Dogs Christmas Shop to sign a clutch of books: customers have been asking for it. At the same time I needed to visit the chandlers near the…

Den Phillips and her merry crew – a handful of hard working ladies – have managed to ‘build’ a fine shop again for the festive period. It is situated in Maldon, down the high street fairly close to the town car park by Wenlock Way. Address: 103, High Street, CM9 5EP. It is full of…

The rotting hull of the Cornish Fruit Schooner, Rhoda Mary, has sat on the edge of a Hoo beach for well over 70 years. She was built in Restronguet Creek, Falmouth in 1868, and came up to the Medway for conversion into a ‘yacht’ and like many of those projects it failed to materialise. When…

This is something I have been dreading (my family say) since it was first mooted. It has been on the cards for a little while: this summer we found that two of Whimbrel’s keel bolts either side of the centre plate box had very minor weeps … bubbles of ferous oxide. It first came to…

The Medway & Swale Boating Association (MSBA) is holding its second bi-annual conference at the St George’s Centre (Old dockyard church) in Chatham Maritime on the 7th March 2015. See link for details and booking arrangements… http://msba.org.uk/?ai1ec_event=medwayswale-boating-conference#comment-102546 St George’s Centre (Old dockyard church) in Chatham. This is the second conference under the reorganised Medway/Swale interest…

Today I was sailing up Hadleigh Ray, after a cracking tack east to the Crowstone from my Island YC mooring, when I was seemingly bombarded by dancing balerinas zipping up and over me… It was amazing. See: https://www.facebook.com/#!/photo.php?fbid=306441819566092&set=pcb.306443319565942&type=1&theater I’d departed at a few minutes past nine. It was grey and a little forbidding, but forecast…

I had to go to Maldon today to drop some items off to another person … it being Remembrance Sunday we were not likely to skip our Sunday service… So a walk round to Heybridge via the sea wall and back along the canal was planned after the ‘job’ was done. Passing the Down’s Road…

The Medway and Swale Boating Association reports that Peel Ports the operators of Medway ports are about to hold a series of ‘meet the public sessions’ at various venues on the Isle of Sheppey to discuss their long term plans and obtain feedback and gain views from those interested. Peel Ports planned events can be viewed:…

Well what a weekend … I’ve walked above the Fleet and traversed the Crouch, some way inland. The mate wanted to visit a Sherlock Holmes exhibition at the Museum of London and look up St Pancras Old Church where a little something of interest stood. We’d tickets for the Royal Society of Marine Artists annual…

I love sailing with my mate but today she had a full day visiting a couple of ‘girl’ friends as well as prepare some bits ready to entertain a friend to supper (I’ve just done my bit of that too…). So I went all alone… I wasn’t completely alone: the water was coated in places…

The Port of London Authority (PLA) is the organisation that controls the London River from a line drawn across the estuary bordering areas controlled by Dover, Harwich and Sunk etc. They are also the operators for many of the wharves and docks along the tidal Thames. It is their sway over us, the humble yachtsman (man…

In actual fact, I suppose autumn has been with us for nearly a month, however, it doesn’t feel like it: the fine summer continued to run on and blend blissfully with fine weather as the equinox passed us by. Then, of course, the season really let us know where we are… A week went by when the…

Some hot news from Geoff Gransden … the Edith May’s ‘winter’ season is about to commence. A group sailing out for an afternoon afloat with one of the barge’s famed teas to enjoy whilst gliding through the sedge… There is a Jazz Night aboard the barge at her moorings in Lower Halstow Dock – details…

Out on the water a few weeks ago I came across a strange new vessel sitting at a familiar mooring position … the two did not appear to be as per the norm of many forays across the sands as the tide lifted. I have become used to seeing the lovely little barge yacht Nancy…

It came about by accident in many respects. I’d arranged to take a friend for a sail some time ago, however he dropped out for personal reasons so the mate was back in her rostered place… The trip planned was for a visit to Conyer to enjoy the wonderful wares on offer at the Ship…

Underway again… Grand! After leaving the comfortable confines of Limehouse Basin we pottered up river to turn below Tower Bridge – a kind of rite of passage. Sail was set as we approached Limehouse Reach sail was set and we were off, homeward bound with a planned stop at Greenhithe for our penultimate evening away.…

What a fantastic place Limehouse Basin is. I haven’t berthed here before and we have been very pleased. It is friendly. Staff are supremely helpful and all ones needs are met in the locale. I can remember the basin with a few old ‘manky’ craft within many years ago. It has been transformed, as has the…