The Key to Your Safety

In these days of growing crime, here’s a little trick to help protect you.

Put your car keys beside your bed at night. If you’re sleeping on board in your home port and hear a noise on deck or, if at home, hear someone trying to break into your house, just press the panic button on the key fob of your car keys.

The alarm will be set off and the car horn will continue to sound until either you turn it off, or the car battery dies.

Think of your car keys as a security alarm system which requires no installation. But test it first! Your car alarm should activate from almost anywhere inside your boat or house providing, of course, your car is within range.

If your car alarm goes off when someone is trying to break in, after a few seconds, all the neighbours will be looking out of their port holes to see who is out there and odds are the attacker won't stick around. And remember to carry your keys while walking to your car in a parking lot. The alarm can work there, too.

Ah, Sailing Today!

No Sailing Today!

South Hams, Devon, UK

South of Dartmoor, roughly bordered by a triangle with Totnes in the north, Plymouth in the west and Dartmouth in the east, lies an area of outstanding natural beauty called the South Hams. Extremely pretty, undulating countryside with beautiful, historic towns and villages, thatched cottages by the hundreds and some of the best pubs in the South West. If that wasn't enough, the area enjoys the most glorious, rugged coastline with amazing views, all of which is accessible and offers probably some of the finest walking in the country. I lived in the area for thirty years before venturing over to Canada. So if you want to know the inside track on where to stay, places to see, things to do, waters to sail, I'm your man! Email me.

Dartmoor, Devon, UK

Being a UK citizen resident in Canada, requires at least a once a year visit back to the old country to see friends and family. This time, it was over Christmas and the New Year.
It's quite a trek to fly the British Airways over-night to Heathrow, pick up a train bound for Plymouth (in Devon) and be sober and awake enough to pick up a hire car, having been on the go for over twenty-four hours. So we decided to recover for a couple of nights at a quaint hotel on Dartmoor. The Two Bridges Hotel is the place to stay. A lovely old country house with raoring log fires, simple but comfortable bedrooms and excellent food. Good value, too. Its claim to fame is that it was once the preferred hide-away for the actress Vivien Leigh whenever she was visitng the area. The best room in the house to book is The Vivien Leigh Suite.
If you're visitng England, Dartmoor is one of the 'must-do's', not least because it's one of the last remaining wildernesses in Britain.

How to loose ten bucks...fast!

Two of our yacht club members were looking forward to introducing their new girlfriends to life on board. It would be the girls’ first time on a boat so our two chaps decided to bet each other on what the girls’ first question might be. One bet ‘Hey, where are the brakes on this thing?’ and the other, ‘What’s the pointed end called?’ My how they laughed as they both put down a $5 bill on the chart table – winner take all.
At last the girls arrived and had a good look around the boat. The guys waited in eager anticipation when eventually one of the girls asked, ‘Tell me, what are those two $5 bills doing on the chart table?’

Safety or the Environment?

The OPP’s finest have had a fun time on the Lake this summer, running around in their super-charged patrol boats. I’ve been stopped twice and it certainly wasn’t for speeding! At least they were polite and friendly while checking my yacht had the correct minimum safety gear on board for a vessel of its length. (They even checked the flares were inside the 'four years from date of manufacture' requirement). But here’s the eyebrow raiser. Having determined who the skipper was, they then asked ‘What proof of competency can you provide?’ Think about it.

However, the US Coastguard feels it has different issues to check out. While the OPP were concerning themselves with making sure one had a buoyant heaving line no less than 15 meters and a waterproof flashlight on board, amongst other safety items, the US Coastguard dives straight down to the bilges. Are they clean or full of dirty, oily water? And what’s more to the point, where’s the mess going? Not in their waters! And you better not have installed that sneaky little ‘Y’ valve between the head and the holding tank switched to overboard discharge! So, on one side of the Lake, ‘safety’, the other, ‘environmental’. Discuss!