How we came to live on a boat

November 2019

We were fairly late starters and sailing took over our lives in our early 40's.  Steve and I set out one day to buy a Harley Davidson with thoughts of riding off in the sunset at weekends as our kids were getting older and less dependent on us.

The Harley turned into a Victoria 30 called Lively Gypsy pictured here and we had great fun on what was a beautifully constructed boat.  I remember one of the children saying to us once 'you're never here, do you realise you've been away for 17 weekends on the trot'.  No we hadn't realised but as the seasons went on we did realise that this was something we could do full-time, live on a boat and sail the world.

In July 2007 our plan was to put the house on the market in April 2008 giving us enough time to do some repairs that were needed in order sell it.  Once the decision was made it was the 'how are we going make it happen?'.

As fate would have it in August 2007 at the height of the then housing boom someone put a handwritten postcard through our door that said......WE WANT TO BUY YOUR HOUSE.  Well, for those of you who know me you'll also know that I am very spontaneous and without a single thought as to how, what, where or why I called the person on the postcard.  Thirty minutes later a couple came to our front door walked directly passed us to the back of the house, looked out the window, which by the way looked over the Itchen River and a lot of Southampton UK, and asked us 'How much do you want for it?'.  That was it, house sold.  We had a house full of stuff that had to be got rid of / sold or boxed up for storage.  The new buyers wanted us out of the house in 6 weeks!!

At that point we still had Lively Gypsy.  We put her up for sale to buy a bigger boat. We thought that by buying a larger boat it would encourage the children & our relatives to join us if and when they wanted.

Our dream boat at that time was a 42' Halberg Rassy.  However, whilst the house sale continued our dream boat didn't materialise.  We travelled for miles every weekend but every time we decided to make an offer someone beat us to it or on one occasion the boat was taken off the market.  We finally moved into Steve's parents house temporarily.

In November 2007 we were wandering around the Hamble Point Boatyard when we spotted Cordelia, a Venus 46 Ketch.  She was on the hard and looked so like a Halberg Rassy that we decided to get onboard, even though there was no sales person about.

We fell in love instantly, she had to be ours (subject to survey of course), we had at last found our dream boat.  The purchase completed mid November following a sea trial and full survey.

Just before Christmas 2007 we moved onto Cordelia on the hard at Hamble Point in freezing cold conditions with no heating but we were ecstatic.  She was ours, paid for and most importantly the initial part of our dream had been achieved 🙋.

Winter berthing at Alcaidesa Marina, La Linea

Oct 2019

Having made the decision to spend 2020 in the Mediterranean  we needed to find a winter berth for approx. 6 months.  We also decided it meant we could travel back to the UK and visit the family so our berth had to be near an airport - La Linea it was as it is so near Gibraltar and the daily berth fitted in with our daily budget too.

We sailed into the Gibraltar Straits with a pod of huge dolphins, the first we had seen since turning into The Algarve several weeks ago.  It was amazing.

We were lucky to get an outer finger berth at the marina, which means there is not a lot of walkers past the boat all the time.  The marina is only 500mtrs from the Gibraltar boarder, very large and accommodates a lot of boats getting prepared for their passage across the Atlantic.  It feels quite strange watching them preparing their boats because this is something that we would have been doing if were going this year, but this will be us in 12mths.  There are boats coming and going every day and a lot of them.

La Linea marina offers specials deals to catamaran's and there are a lot of them here.  Some people stay a while and some only overnight.

There is a set of container like homes as seen in the photo here that you are able to rent for about €100 per night and although very new they seem to be very busy.


We are using our bikes a lot to go shopping and site-see.  There are a lot of bike paths so it feels safe, especially after not riding a bike for 40yrs lol!  There is not a lot to do in La Linea and parts of it are quite run-down, however with a weekly market, being very near Gibraltar, a lovely beach and plenty of cycle paths, I think we will be fine until next year.

We have loads of jobs to finish before April next year and these need to be completed so that we don't have to go into a marina for water or food.  We will also need the water maker & freezer before we head for the Caribbean autumn 2020.

We returned to the UK in mid October for 2 wks and had a great time staying with Katrina in Southampton and Michael in Wattisham.  It was a great time to go as October half term meant we got to spend time with all the grandkiddies but boy did it feel compared to Spain.

I know leaving them all in the UK will be heart-breaking but all our children have said they will visit us next year somewhere in the Med, so we are really looking forward to that.

Cadiz, Spain and meeting Suzie & Robbie

19th Sept - 5 Oct 2019

We had a fabulous overnight sail from Culartra to Cadiz, our destination to meet Suzie & Robbie who are coming to see us at the beginning of their winter break in Spain.

We initially anchored in Cadiz just under the main large suspension bridge because Navily had reported that the holding is good with very little swell, which is exactly what it was and what we needed after an overnight passage.

Cadiz doesn't look much looking in from the sea but we've learnt not to 'judge a city by the sea' lol. What we could see was that a lot of cruise ships stop over for the day and by a lot I mean up to 3 per day!

After a nights rest we up'd anchor and headed across the bay to our next anchorage Santa Maria, next to Puerto Sherry.  Suzie & Robbie were staying in a hotel a mile from the anchorage, which was great because we found a spot to leave the dinghy behind the holding pontoon in the marina.  Hopefully we won't get asked to pay but we would rather pay for parking the dinghy than a marina berth as they had offered a one but it was £336 for 7 days, way out of our budget.

We had a fantastic week with Suzie & Robbie relaxing, sightseeing,  swimming & eating.   We also experienced Uber Taxis for the first time and were very impressed.

Robbie experienced leaving the beach via dinghy, leaving Suzie & I on the beach to film it whilst wetting ourselves with laughter at how much he was being thrown around due to the wave height. Hopefully the footage is good enough for our vlog.

We all took a ferry to Cadiz main town, which is absolutely stunning with its very old walls and very old buildings, mostly in pristine condition too.  In 1587, the English privateer Francis Drake successfully attacked the port of Cadiz, destroying ships, looting supplies & provisions.  The raid became known as the 'singeing the King of Spain's beard', which Drake phrased himself.  Drake is known as Queen Elizabeth 1's favourite pirate and she herself laid claim to half of any treasure Drake bought back to England.

Suzie & Robbie's left for Estepona where they are going to spend the next 3 months and we decided we would go back across the bay to Cadiz for a couple of day but in a marina.  There had been a very bad storm in the Atlantic (Lorenzo) that had battered The Azores and which Cadiz was going to be feeling the after affects of, so going into a marina was the best option.  This also gave us time to sightsee more of Cadiz.

We finally left Cadiz heading form Babate on route to La Linea, which is going to be our berth for the next 6mths over the winter period.

The Algarve, Portugal

1st - 17th Sept 2019

Wow!  Portugal's Algarve coastline is beautiful.  We stop off in Portimao for a couple of days on route to Faro.  The anchorage is just inside the entrance to Portimao.  Here we bump into Float On, Amy & Martin who have recently purchased a Beneteau name Olli and have a Youtube channel, but most importantly they have a lovely dog called BamBam.

We had a wonder around the town and visited the marina to find out the price of a berth for the winter.  The town had an amazing collection of sculptures along the waters-edge but the town did not have a lot going for it.

We decide after a couple of nights to head for Faro but know we are going to have to do an overnight stop.  This had to be the worst night we have ever had on board.  We had a swell that swung the boat so hard over that we had a job to stand up.  We hardly slept and our stomaches ached from clenching each time the boat rolled again so firs thing the following morning we set off for Culartra.

We arrived in Liha Da Culartra early Sept and celebrated Steve's 56th birthday in style at a restaurant.  This is not something we normally do.  We may have a coffee during the day and maybe a snack for lunch but we never go out in the evening.  It was a real treat haha!
Culartra is beautiful.  Its like stepping back in time where there are no cars or roads, only single rise houses, lagoons, sand dunes and stunning beaches where the sand is like icing sugar.

There are a couple of small shops, an ATM and about 6 bars/restaurants.  The men hang around the harbour either readying themselves to go out and fish or sit and gossip in the shade.  The women are nowhere to be seen apart from first thing in the morning when they all catch the early ferry to Olhao with their shopping trolleys to bring back the fruit, veg & provisions they need.

You can achieve your dream ❤

Annette's thoughts..............

We arrive in this world as equals and leave this world as equals. My resting place will be no better or worse than yours when my times comes but I know I will have a memory box of dreams that I can take with me.  

I had a dream and tried very hard to fulfil that dream and whilst doing so was a part of and witnessed the most wondrous breath-taking things and most of all I was fortunate to share my dreams with Steve.

We weren't lucky to live our dream, we'd worked hard for 40yrs laying down the foundation that would hold us up when we finally left to live our dream of sailing as liveaboards to wherever the wind took us.

Yes we've had to compromise, we can't physically hold our children or hug our grandchildren. We still have parents that are with us. We left very good jobs 12yrs before official retirement time and the remuneration from our private pensions will not be as good.  But......we can video talk to all our children, grandchildren & parents. We have a small private pension and we have a home we own. We have a yacht we love and that we know is capable of taking us wherever we want and we know the budget we have to live on.....WE CAN LIVE OUR DREAM.

Our families grow up and create their own circle of friends & gradually slowly their need for you is less and less. We'd bought up our children to be independent in a loving but working home. They all know the importance of being able to set a goal in life and each of them have started achieving these.  This had been our biggest dream, for our children to be happy & healthy and bring their children up to love & live their dreams.

What we do now in living aboard our boat full-time sailing from port to port visiting places we didn't know existed, being fascinated by the different cultures, adapting to a different cultural way of living, seeing magical ocean life and being able to do this without restrictions in our own time is what our life is about and we love it and cherish every day of it.

Don't let anyone tell you you can't do it. All dreams are achievable in some form.  They have to be worked for otherwise you'll never appreciate them. You need to be able to look back and say you lived a part of your dream. You may have to make compromises in order to reach and maintain your dream but remember these are your dreams that you can take with you wherever forever.

A dream or goal doesn't have to be a forever thing it can be anything. What you need to be able to say is 'I have my memory box of dreams' 💙💚.

Sailing the Atlantic Portuguese coast

22nd Aug - 31st Aug

We left Biaona heading for Peniche, Portugal.  It was going to be an overnight passage.  Once again the winds were light as we started but picked up later in the day, which meant we were able to do some sailing but not a lot.  Our autopilot that had been playing up and decided to give up all together, which meant hand steering almost all the way.  We were not happy people, especially overnight.  It amazing how much more you can do with an autopilot, the rudder sensor has stopped working.  It stops us both helping out with the sails, eating, drinking, watching the dolphins, seeing the sunfish etc. etc.

We arrived in Peniche at 6pm the following day, not a place that looked particularly inviting.  From our anchorage it looked very industrial and our anchoring app had informed us that it was not unusual for the police to turn up and ask you to move on, like we're sea gypsies!!  We didn't even get the tender out.

Anyway, we had decided to stay the following day so that Steve could sort out the autopilot.  Lucky for us we had bought a 2nd hand system newer than ours and had not yet installed it.  Firstly Steve found the wire to the sensor had been rubbing against the alternator belt, causing 3 small breaks, he changed that and it still didn't work so he changed the main control box and 'voila' it worked - fingers crossed no more hand steering on long passages.

Our next step Cascais, Portugal. We head out early as it's going to be at least a 10hr sail, but the winds picked up and for the most part we had a cracking sail.  This knocked a couple of hours off the estimated time of arrival, we were chuffed as we averaged 5.5/6knts.  Cordelia is at her best and is a boat that likes to be sailed in slightly stronger winds due to her weight. We had our passage friendly dolphins a lot of the time and it was wonderful.


Cascais is a lovely town.  It was very busy as the Portuguese take their holiday's there too and the cruise ships that go into Lisbon take their passengers there too.  There's a huge supermarket called Jumbo about 10mins walk from the marina (which we weren't in, we were anchored in the harbour).  The marina also had a fuel berth where you could fill up with water too, €5 for 200ltrs.

From Cascais we took a train to Lisbon.  We loved Libson, WOW! what a place.  Such beautiful buildings.  The cost of the train was €4.50 return, we then bought a tram/bus all-day ticket for €6.20 that was great to jump on and off all day.  We loved the trams, what rickety old trams they were too but a fantastic ride with open windows that move fairly fast up hill and round corners with about 10cm between the side of the tram and the buildings - it was better than a fair ground ride!  It's a not to be missed placed to see.

 

The Spanish Rias

19th July - 20th August

Wow!  The Spanish Rias are beautiful.  So many beaches and little fishing harbours, tapas bars and great people.  We started off going to Corme and Camerinas, both of which are north of the Finisterre Peninsular.  Not quite into the Spanish Rias but heading that way.

Matt & Anna came to see us in Corme for lunch, which was a lovely surprise as we didn't think we were going to see them for a long time.  Lunch was delicious with scallops & garlic prawns.  There are few shops in Corme and a lovely small fishing harbour.

Camerinas is a slightly larger fishing town where we anchored and went into a marina.  We were there when the Spanish Galicia were celebrating the Feast day of St. James (Santiago de Compostela) with decorated boats hooting their horns, cannons being fired and Celtic market stalls- it was wonderful to be a part of something that is so bright & colourful.

We love the siesta's the Spanish have every afternoon.  Although it can a bind when everything closes up if you need something between 1pm & 4.30pm, it does mean the tapas bars become busy with everyone having their lunch-break & siesta time.  It also means that the day's feel so much longer because you stay awake later as everything is open so much later than we are used to in the UK.  Every day is a Sunday to us, it's brilliant.



This Atlantic coastline is very pretty.  Although it has it's pitfalls like the Great Atlantic Swell, which can catch a lot of people out, including us (more on that another time), when you are sailing along you would be pretty unlucky to not see a pod of dolphins and maybe a family of Pilot whales and if you're offshore a bit more you may even come across one of the many gigantic whales that swim in their own ocean.  The Atlantic Coastline itself is very rocky so makes for a very scenic sail and holds many surprises within the beautiful Rias.

It's very easy to spend weeks in the Rias as every one has many small anchorages or marina's if that's what you want.  Most of the villages are lovely to wander, some of them are a bit run down but that just adds to the beauty of the place.
Plenty of supermarkets & launderettes and the obligatory Spanish Fiesta creating a lively noisy but happy place to be.