South to the Canaries

The dot-com officer having been busy with his A-level studies, the Mollymawk website has spent the past few months lying unattended on its moorings. Not so the vessel herself – or at any rate, not quite so much so.
This very belated report describes our passage south from the Mediterranean port of Melilla down to the Canary Islands.

People often write to us asking, “What special skills do you need in order to go cruising?” Well, herewith, in Part I of the report, you have your answer. Like the rest of life, cruising is a hotch-potch of sunshine and squalls. If you want to cast off from the shore and put yourself beyond the helping hands of mechanics, medics, and law and order, you need to accept the fact that, thereafter, you alone will be responsible for your fate during the squalls. Preparation is one part of the answer but it seldom provides the whole solution. Essentially, the key skills required by the offshore sailor are clever thinking and the ability to bodge something up out of whatever is to hand. Indeed, now I come to think of it, a boat drifting about on the briney would be the ideal venue for one of those ascetic self-sufficiency courses beloved of business men and other such folk who are never ever going to need to be self sufficient… (more…)