All Posts

The Mycale Strait with Turkey in the background Missy Bear is now, geographically or geologically, in Asia Minor. Samos is an island, but was only cut off from the mainland coast by an earthquake long ago. There is some limestone around, but a lot of the rock has been baked into a metamorphic schist. From the marina, you feel that you can almost reach out and touch Türkiye, as the Mycale strait is only 1km wide at its narrowest point. There is a Greek military station on the

OK. I’m predicting that anyone reading this will fall into one of three groups. The first group will be going “ What? ” The second group will be muttering “ Oooh, could be rude ?”. And the third group will be saying “ Alix love, you’ve got it wrong, there were four and twenty of them! And they came from Inverness ”. For those of you who are luckily unfamiliar with this, it is a play on the opening line of an RAF drinking song which goes, “ Four and twenty virgins came down fr

Missy Bear's Red Ensign remained furled as a mark of respect. We wish His Majesty King Charles III a long and successful reign

The crew members walked down the aisle passing out additional sick bags to the several peaky-looking passengers. The woman in front was gripping tightly onto the seat-back in front of her in a tissue-filled clench. The top of the thin and curly-haired pate of her partner, directly in front of me, was sweating profusely in the manner of someone in some anxiety or distress. The general buzzy background noise of chattering guests slowly quietened as each of them in turn stopped

Missy Bear in Leros marina, ready for her summer haul-out Once upon a time (well, many years ago), Richard and I did a one-day Royal Yachting Association (RYA) course on how to use a ship’s radio. This included the critical safety features for broadcasting a Mayday ( m' aider ), and of course the Nato, or phonetic alphabet – Alpha, Bravo, Charlie etc. Not long after, the two of us went sailing around the Whitsunday Islands in Australia on a 32' Jeanneau Sun Odyssey and though