Aleria's Adventures

Carpet of bluebells Visiting our friends, the Meakins, is always an interesting experience. They live in Southampton, UK, a city with a rich maritime heritage. In fact there is so much history everywhere that it becomes a game to discover how it all interlocks. Row, row, row your boat  On arrival, we were offered a trip up the Hamble River by row boat. Alex and Philip rowed up river against the wind. The marinas got progressively smaller until they disappeared altogether. Here we entered another world. A protected ancient oak forest carpeted with bluebells. The River Hamble in Hampshire, England flows for 7.5 miles (12 km)  before entering Southampton Water. It is tidal for about half its length and is navigable in its lower reaches, which have facilitated shipbuilding since medieval times. Leisure craft are still built there today and boating is very popular on the River. The river, its banks, and its shipbuilding yards, have also been used for military purposes, particul

Daria and Alex Blackwell draw a crowd at PBO Ask the Experts Live 2017 Photo credit: Practical Boat Owner. Alex and I were invited by Practical Boat Owner to present our anchoring seminar at the Beaulieu Boat Jumble near Southampton in England on the 23rd of April. It was the 40th anniversary of the event's launch. Forget the fact that Beaulieu is pronounced bewley, we had always wanted to visit the legendary jumble and this was the 30th anniversary of the event. It was a great opportunity for a triple whammy: promote our book, visit the jumble, and see our good friends Lynda and Philip Meakins. Some of the attendees from our point of view. Photo: Alex Blackwell We thought about coming by car so we could load it up with stuff we wanted to buy, but it proved to be too expensive and time consuming. We flew to Southampton and Philip met us at the airport. After a lovely evening with Philip and Lynda, it was showtime. We had sent our presentation off to Laura Hodgetts to

View from Knockranny over Croagh Patrick, Clew Bay and Clare Island For the past two weekends, we have taken part in the annual meetings of first the Irish Cruising Club and then the Ocean Cruising Club. I am a new member of the ICC this year, which has about 650 members in Ireland. I am a flag officer of OCC, which has about 3000 members around the world.