Follow our 2023 cruising season that saw us sail from the Isle of Wight to Northern Ireland. The weather in 2023 was not particularly easy to deal with; it was great up until June then it went pretty dire! But we still managed to see and enjoy some beautiful places. We hope you’ll find our information useful and if you have any questions please do not hesitate to get in touch. As always the info contained in our blog is for guidance only, so please prepare your passages accordingly. Safe sailing!
We love our yacht but one thing it certainly doesn’t have is a bath so imagine our surprise when we rocked up to Carrickfergus Marina to discover it had a lovely bathtub! Carrickfergus is situated on the northern shore of Belfast Lough, in County Antrim, Northern Ireland. One of the… Read More »Carrickfergus Marina – 2 Nights for the Price of 1 and a BATH!
After our day trip to Belfast a few weeks earlier we really wanted to explore the city a bit more so we decided to head up Belfast Lough and make our way into Belfast Harbour Marina which is located between the Titanic Quarter and the SSE Arena. Our Transit up… Read More »Sailing into Belfast
We spent most of our 7 hour passage from Strangford to Bangor in fog….not what we had intended! Sadly the time had come to leave one of our favourite anchorages ‘Killyleagh’ and head further up the coast of Northern Ireland. But just like when we had planned our arrival into… Read More »A Foggy Sail from Strangford Lough to Bangor!
After sailing along the coast from Port Oriel (Clogher Head) we anchored in Strangford Lough, just off of the club moorings belonging to Killyleagh Yacht Club on the western shore of the Lough. Killyleagh is a village in County Down, Northern Ireland and the anchorage here provides good holding in… Read More »Anchoring at Killyleagh in Strangford Lough – We LOVED this place!
After sailing from Dun Laoghaire via Port Oriel we had arrived in Strangford Lough, anchored just off the moorings at Killyleagh Yacht Club. Leaving our dinghy at the pontoon belonging to the club we hopped on a bus to the Northern Ireland Capital City of Belfast, leaving our boat at… Read More »Killyleagh to Belfast Day Trip!
After nearly getting hit by a fishing boat whilst at anchor at Port Oriel (Clogher Head) we couldn’t wait to raise the hook and get going! And today we’d be heading to Northern Ireland! Strangford Lough was our destination, in particular a spot close to Killyleagh, approximately 7nm inside the… Read More »Port Oriel to Strangford Lough
We enjoy a beautiful sail up the coast of Ireland from Dun Laoghaire to Port Oriel where we anchor for the night and nearly get hit by a fishing boat! 😱 Summer 2023 weather is ****! A small window to head north finally presented itself, albeit a very small window… Read More »Dun Laoghaire to Port Oriel (Clogher Head)
The weather just wasn’t playing ball for us this summer! We had hoped to visit Howth and Malahide with the yacht however the constant periods of low pressure meant finding a good day to head up there was proving difficult. With Storm Antoni now approaching we made the decision to… Read More »Howth and Malahide
Dublin had been on our wishlist of places we wanted to visit ever since we set sail from the Isle of Wight a few months earlier and finally we were just a short train ride away from Ireland’s capital city. We had taken a berth in Dun Laoghaire Marina and… Read More »Dublin: Enjoying ‘The Craic’ in Ireland’s Capital!
After our sail up from Arklow we checked into Dun Laoghaire Marina and set about exploring this part of Ireland. Dun Laoghaire is a coastal suburb of Dublin, about 8 miles from the Irish capital. It has a somewhat cosmopolitan and Mediterranean feel, in fact it really reminded us of… Read More »Exploring Dun Laoghaire