Innehållsförteckning för June 2025 från Practical Boat Owner

Boat owners and other stakeholders are invited to share their experiences of boat licensing within the UK’s canals and suggest improvements to the network. An independently-led commission is reviewing the legal framework around the Canal & River Trust’s approach to boat licensing and is asking individuals and organisations to have their say before the public consultation survey closes at 9am on 22 April. It has been 30 years since the British Waterways Act 1995 was passed and, in that time, there have been many changes to the 2,000-mile canal network and how it is managed, the number of boats licensed on waterways, and the way people use their boats. Andrew Cowan, a former senior partner at law firm Devonshires is leading the commission. Cowan said: “We have been asked to…

Spring sailing begins on the last night of the local drama festival, mid-March, when my fellow instructor Ewen and I meet up. It used to be at the after-shows party, as winners passed round the various trophies filled with whisky or bubbly, but these days that fun has been banned, so we got together in the dressing room over tea and fancies. Ewen was the Compleat Crofter in an all-over Fair Isle gansey, boilersuit and yellow rubber boots. I was dressed in 1950s black as the rebellious teen Antigone in Greek drama. We planned lift-ins, the first junior sailing meeting and when we were going to get the Picos out while we waited for the adjudicator to add up his marks. It was a great tonic; the very next day,…

Westerly Seahawk | Hallberg-Rassy 352 Colvic Countess 33 | Rival 38 | Scanmar 35 Today new centre cockpit designs are rarely encountered other than at the high end of the market for larger yachts such as those produced by Oyster and Contest. But in the 1970s and 1980s a number of boatbuilders produced desirable centre cockpit yachts as small as 33ft. Designs that incorporated access to the aft cabin from the saloon via an internal walk-through passage quickly became popular, setting a new standard for internal volumes, with a large cabin at each end of the boat, offering both comfort and privacy. Moody was a giant of the British sailboat building industry and forged a reputation from the early 1970s onwards for producing quality family cruisers with spacious accommodation. The…

How much you prepare for a summer cruise is a matter of personal choice. We’re not talking transatlantic, and there will no doubt be stops en-route where you can refuel and stock up on provisions. But marinas can be busy, and if you get caught short with gear or engine failure, or a dragging anchor, your cruise could be memorable for all the wrong reasons. The more you plan for contingencies such as bad weather and breakages, the calmer you’ll be when they happen. If you’re bringing friends and family along with you, especially first-time sailors, now is the time to invest in creature comforts, and maximise opportunities for fun and adventure. This may well be the cruise that makes or breaks it for them, so plan ahead and make…

Estuaries can be fascinating places, even for passage-hardened offshore sailors. They offer all the intricacies of tidal navigation, often combined with delicious rural scenery and frozen-in-time riverside settlements, where quays and hard landings were once used by sailing barges. Some accommodate substantial ports, where visiting leisure sailors benefit from clear buoyage and pilotage aids but must be alert to ship movements. Others, including the upstream reaches of port estuaries, are essentially primitive inlets where boat skippers must act as their own pilots, using whatever information is available. Every estuary is different but there are likely to be narrow channels, shallow water and various obstacles. In this article I’m going to give more attention to the ‘primitive’ places, for which pilotage guidance and accurate information may be sparse. Preparation Before deciding…

+ DIGITAL ACCESS Expert advice and step-by-step guides to every hands-on boating job, impartial in-depth gear and boat reviews, practical cruising tips… and more! REASONS TO SUBSCRIBE PRINT ONLY ✓ £16.21 every 6 months ✓ Digital access to 130+ issues when you subscribe to print!** ✓ FREE DELIVERY straight to your door or device DIGITAL ONLY ✓ £16.21 every 6 months ✓ SAVE money on the shop price ✓ PLUS instant access any time, anywhere SAVE 50%* SUBSCRIBE ONLINE AT www.magazinesdirect.com/XPB/DJ23M or call 0330 333 1113 and quote DJ23M TERMS & CONDITIONS Offer closes 22 October 2025. Please allow up to 6 weeks for the delivery of your first subscription issue (up to 8 weeks overseas). The full subscription rate includes postage and packaging. *Save 50% is based on the cover…

Recently we were in a tricky berthing situation, but when I operated the bow-thruster controls, to my surprise it didn’t work. Once the initial shock had passed, I managed to recall the traditional methods of using wind, current and prop-kick to manoeuvre, and we got in safely. I appreciate that you shouldn’t depend on a bow-thruster, but I expected it to work, and when it didn’t it took time to reset my thinking. Normally I try to use the bow-thruster as little as possible, but I’d be the first to admit that this nice-tohave luxury has got us out of trouble on more than one occasion; fixing it was definitely on the high priority to-do list. Fault diagnosis Safely in the berth, I discovered that when I operated the thruster…

Polishing a boat is an arm-aching but ultimately very satisfying task. What many people don’t realise is that polish isn’t just an aesthetic nicety, it’s also a vital extra layer of protection for the gel coat that forms the outer skin of your boat’s hull and superstructure. A GRP surface, especially one that has been allowed to get dirty or chalky, looks like the surface of the moon when viewed under a microscope, with pitting, small craters and other surface irregularities that encourage further degradation. Some of this is inevitable as the gel coat gradually fades and wears over time but you can help counter this by regular cleaning, polishing and, if needed, careful use of a cutting compound to remove the worst of those surface imperfections. The polishing part…

Every year, just as the Essex marshes begin to sprout with the first buds of succulent samphire, a final, final demand to pay the TV licence wafts through my letter box and lands on top of the others. These are as sure signs of spring as the knock on the door a few seconds later. “Oi,” says the gruff, familiar voice through the letter box, “pay your TV licence then get your backside down the boatyard and get your boat cover off.” The truth is that Adi knows too well that his berth holders, and me in particular, are an indolent bunch of slackers who need rousing from the cosy months of hearth-side hibernation when we’d happily forgotten we owned boats. Down in the yard, those with delusions of adequacy…

Several years back I needed a RYA level 2 Powerboat certificate to man the club’s rescue boat and found myself storming across the bay at 40 knots while leaving little wake or prop wash. This was the rigid inflatable boat (RIB) of Rye Harbour Marine, reputed to reach 50 knots. The owner told me he regularly has lunch in Calais. Much as I enjoy speeding in a river, I prefer a sailboat that leaves virtually no wake or prop wash since this is more acceptable to wildlife. For me, one of the great pleasures of boating is seeing and listening to marine animals, and this is easy in a sailing yacht, especially one with the right sort of shape. More on that later. I particularly like seals. They eat a…

Blue River Table, a bespoke cruising and dining experience along the River Fal, is the brainchild of Charlotte Whyte and Jess Harris, who have transformed their decades-long friendship into a thriving business. In the tight-knit Cornish maritime industry, it seems that every marine tradesperson knows one another. Boatbuilders rub shoulders with sailors, who enjoy the company of marine technicians, who know the local boatswains by first name. But even in this amicable, laid-back sector, it’s rare to have a business partner who is also a close friend–rarer still to have known each other since the age of six. As co-owners of Blue River Table, Whyte and Harris count themselves as part of that lucky in-crowd. Having grown up together aboard boats on the Penryn River, the two women became incredibly…

Canals are man-made waterways with little or no natural current. They’re usually narrow, shallow and typically calm, making them ideal for relaxed cruising. Rivers without stream are natural watercourses where flow is minimal, often due to weirs or locks that regulate water levels. They are similar to canals, but can be wider and deeper. Rivers with a steady stream require more attention, as the stream can affect boat handling, especially when mooring or departing from a berth or manoeuvring around bridges or harbour entrances. The stream can vary with rainfall or drought conditions, and navigation may be more challenging. Tidal rivers are influenced by the ebb and flow of tides, creating potentially strong currents that change direction periodically. They demand careful planning for timing and handling, especially when entering marinas…

IN ASSOCIATION WITH boatcare by boatfolk Have you ever emerged on deck after a rough passage only to find it’s dryer above than below? Leaky windows, hatches and deck fittings can happen on any boat, but in extreme cases, water ingress can lead to structural damage. Understanding marine sealants, and how to apply them, is a useful skill for all boat owners. Marine sealants are designed to keep water out. They can also be used to block sound and heat and, unlike household products, will withstand harsh UV conditions. Used for sealing gaps and holes, sealants tend to be flexible, making them useful for joints where contraction or expansion may occur. However, the term is also used for bonding or adhesive products, so choosing the right sealant for the job–whether…

Encouraged by a friend, I decided I needed a spare Raymarine autopilot control head in case mine failed when I was offshore. Rooting around a local boat jumble I found a pair of ST6001s for £50 each. The screens on both of them looked burnt to cinders, so I offered £50 for the pair and walked home hoping the rumour I’d heard that the screens could be repaired was true. A bit of YouTube searching led me to a series of videos about people repairing vintage Nintendo Game Boys which have similar screen technology. The screen has a thin film of polarising filter on the front, and a reflective polarising film on the back. Over time with heat and sun exposure, they dry out and cook themselves into uselessness. When…

SURVEY & CORROSION Is mixing metals on skin fittings a good idea? Q Skin fittings, valves and seacocks are available in a variety of materials such as bronze, DZR, brass etc. Although it is usually good practice to avoid contact between dissimilar metals, is it possible, in a marine environment, to mix fittings made from different materials and alloys, provided they are all corrosion-resistant? David Hind Ben Sutcliffe-Davies responds: In the beginning, we used to fit Blakes and other seacocks which had gate valves, and hardly ever had problems because we all knew how to service and look after them. Then we joined the European revolution of accountants running our boatbuilding businesses and decided to fit £30 fittings. One of the biggest problems that actually happens in a lot of…

A fire on board the sailing vessel, Theros is believed to have been behind the tragic deaths of a Canadian couple whose bodies were found in their inflatable dinghy, the Transportation Safety Board (TSB) of Canada has concluded. Experienced sailors Brett Clibbery, a retired engineer, and Sarah Packwood, a humanitarian aid worker, departed in their electric-converted Gib’Sea 42, Theros, from Dartmouth, Halifax on 10 June 2024, bound for the Azores, Portugal. The couple, who had previously sailed from British Columbia to the Panama Canal, through the Caribbean and up to Nova Scotia, documented their voyages on their YouTube channel, Theros Adventures. They had converted Theros to electric, installing a Nissan Leaf battery pack and electric saildrive, along with six solar panels. Brett and Sarah were reported missing on 18 June.…

Got a news story that would interest a fellow PBO reader? We want to hear from you! Email PBO news editor Laura Hodgetts at pbo@futurenet.com SOUTH COAST & CHANNEL ISLANDS Beeping lighthouse National Coastwatch Institution watchkeepers at Gwennap Head advised that ear plugs were needed when Longships Lighthouse off Land’s End sounded an audible-from-the-shore electronic beep every 13 seconds for a week. Trinity House, which manages more than 60 lighthouses across the UK, said the technical issue was caused by the audible hazard warning signal–intended to sound off during low visibility–sounding during clear conditions. It was resolved on 3 March. A spokesman said: “We were able to secure the use of the helicopter and get our technicians out to the lighthouse, where they quickly identified and fixed the issue.” Fleet…

Apparently much of this issue of PBO is focused on cruising inland waterways. I am happy to be in a position to deal out a few hints on this perilous business, since as recently as 1983 I rowed from the source of the Severn to the Houses of Parliament, traversing many a watercourse and indeed ditch in the process. First, a historical note. It is generally assumed that the waterways of Britain were dug extra narrow so the beastly dictator Napoleon could not load his troops into nasty wide foreign barges and descend on Bromsgrove. Bromsgrove needed protection, as in the event of invasion the royal family would have been squirrelled away there, the reason being that Bromsgrove was only accessible via a fiendish labyrinth of narrow canals (see above)…

With the UK and Irish coasts so accessible, many sailors forget about the lakes, rivers, and canals just waiting to be explored. But we are lucky enough to have some truly beautiful routes inland, which are often only sailed by those with trailer-sailers or who moor their boat there. Here are 12 places you might consider visiting this summer. Scotland The lochs of the Scottish Highlands are spectacular, with dramatic mountainous scenery, pine woodlands, moorland, sprawling glens and a landscape steeped in history. Loch Lomond is the biggest inland lake in the UK and is just 20 miles from Glasgow. At 24 miles long, it is part of the Loch Lomond and The Trossachs National Park (www.lochlomond-trossachs.org). The main harbour is at Balloch to the south, which has a marina…

Many of us have been brought up sailing on the sea in deep-fin-keelers with plenty of room to manoeuvre. The only time we’ve ventured into shoal waters or up rivers has been in lug-rigged or racing dinghies–on those occasions, the keelboats stayed anchored in a deep pool nearby. On the 120 miles of navigable waterways that make up The Broads in Norfolk, however, they do it differently–and mainly under sail. We visited the Broads for a day, where local sailing coach Mark Elson took us for a spin up the Thurne and up to Potter Heigham, before heading back down the Bure and Ant–which ensured we experienced a wide range of rivers from wide to narrow. We were sailing in the Pegasus 700 The Alternative, a typical Broads cruiser. Mark…

The drying mooring where I keep my boat is a challenge for any antifouling system, as it needs to be able to cope with the constant friction and abrasion caused by my Hunter Pilot 27 regularly contacting a muddy seabed. In 2023 I decided to try biocide free with the Silic One Fouling Release antifoul. I was the first member of the Hunter Association to try it and was surprised when I asked around how little was known about its use for small boats. So I decided to record my findings about going biocide free. If it worked, I hoped to encourage other boat owners to avoid using copper as it leaches into our creeks and harbours. What is it? Silicone marine coatings have been around for decades and are…

IN ASSOCIATION WITH boatcare by boatfolk Everybody likes to keep the outside of the boat clean and shiny and looking its best. After all, it’s the part everyone sees and gives them the right first impression. But how about the inside? This often gets overlooked, and is arguably more time-consuming, takes more effort and can be tricky to keep on top of. A well-presented boat, however–especially her interior–will maintain your investment in the vessel as well as enhance the enjoyment of the whole boating experience. Regular cleaning and inspections are essential to prevent damage from moisture, mould and mildew as well as wear and tear. Following these suggestions will give you a good basis to keep your boat’s interior looking its best for as long a time as possible. Improve…

The anchorage in Tyrell Bay was perfection. Good holding for the anchor, a beautiful setting and a great restaurant ashore. There was no sense of impending disaster. Many of the boats were being taken into the mangroves where the locals, both Grenadians and resident sailors alike, were confident that it would be safe and see out anything Hurricane Beryl could throw at us. The day before I’d taken the dinghy into the mangroves to check them out and to see if we could stay there. As a complete newbie the concept sounded good. I talked it over with our buddy boat, an excellent Texan family who’d recently circumnavigated. They weren’t going to go in there, “We don’t have a stern anchor or enough extra lines to properly secure the boat,…

Some years my sailing doesn’t quite go according to plan. In 2024, I’d intended to join the Jester Challengers in mid-June from Plymouth to the Azores but, for several reasons, I couldn’t get the boat ready in time and had to withdraw. Never mind, I could finish preparations and sail from my home base of Cardiff. Then, in July I caught Covid and it was mid-August before I felt fit enough to head off. No matter, you can get lovely sailing weather in late summer! Sailors are, by nature, optimists. If they weren’t they’d never leave the harbour. I had four weeks free before I needed to be home, so decided to cruise down the Bristol Channel and then go north. I fantasised about Scotland; the Clyde or the inner…