The sailing Sixties
Yes, we really did mean to go to sea! Our youthful adventures in our far from suitable amateur-built vessels did nothing to blunt our appetites for further challenges. In PBO April 2019 I explained how Swallows and Amazons had inspired three project boats, and how my fiancée Jack and I had sold our converted World War II lifeboat to pay for our wedding. Now, we were to enter a new phase in our boating lives.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Fay Armstrong worked as a scientist in hospital laboratories from 1949 to 1976, and at York University, specialising in biochemistry. She has three children, two of whom have been inspired to travel. Fay, who turns 88 in April, made her last voyage on a small yacht aged 78 when she assisted a friend in taking his new boat from Barrow-in-Furness to the Isle of Man and Maryport, Cumbria.
We still owned our pretty little Norwegian cutter Duet, which served us well for our simple weekend trips up and down the non-tidal Ouse at York. However, once a year the York Motor Boat Club organised a rally to Ferriby, situated on the Lincolnshire shore of the tidal Humber, just a few miles upstream from the then thriving fishing port of Grimsby.
This trip was a good test of seamanship and navigation skills. The shallow water and shifting sandbanks were the breeding grounds for nasty short, breaking seas and woe betide the unwary helmsman who strayed outside the charts-defined channel! But fortunately our club members were prudent and vigilant so we were all able to enjoy the wonderful hospitality of the Brigg Sailing Club in the safe tranquillity of the
