About
Sustainable Sailing is both our vision and our journey. By "our" we mean Jane and Dave. We have been married 36 years and after a number of different careers and projects we are starting to plan for a different future. Currently we live in a house provided for Dave's s job which limits our options for Sustainable Living. We have enjoyed sailing together since we first got married but had a break for over 10 years as our teenage sons didn't shared that enjoyment. So now we are combining our passion for living sustainably with sailing and a little planning for retirement.
This step of our journey began with the purchase of Vida, a 42-year-old Rival 38 Centre Cockpit sailing boat. Together we are looking to a future for ourselves which is:
- Sustainable – Our total environmental impact
- Sustainable – Our health and well-being
- Sustainable – Our finances
A potted history of our journey to this point
Passive Houses Project
This is a derelict house we planned to replace with two Passivhaus homes. The plot was on a cycle path and had lovely views. We wanted to provide sustainable living and considered retiring here. Unfortunately, after several years of work with an architect, we were given such punitive conditions for planning permission that we eventually abandoned the project and sold the plot. It seems that the planning department wanted the plot to fall into disrepair.
House Refurbishment
Our next project was renovation of a three bedroomed house which had not been updated since the 1950s. We knocked the bathroom and toilet together to make a modern bathroom with shower, had central heating fitted and totally refitted the kitchen ourselves.
Sailing
We have sailed dinghies and small cruising boats together. We were the proud owners of a 21ft Jaguar with a lifting keel for a few years before we had any children. It didn't seem so practical once we had a baby on board! We have sailed lasers and a Pico with our children while spending several holidays in a boatyard adapting a Hirondelle catamaran to fit our family of five. That culminated in an epic trip along the south coast of the UK from Hayling Island to Falmouth. After that, life and running a small business got in the way of sailing for quite a few years. After all our children had left home, we got a Sprint 15 and had a lot of fun day sailing around the coast. It was quite a wet boat and we really wanted to be able to stay overnight at an anchorage so we began to think about other options. Since we have experience of hands on work on houses and boats we were willing to look at project boats. (Dave first tried fibre-glassing when he was a scout building kayaks).
Cycling
For many years we have been concerned about climate change and looking for ways to adapt to a more sustainable lifestyle. We began cycling for transport as a family when our children were small and have had many holidays on our bikes. We love the slower pace and the opportunities for chance encounters on the way. We feel that by bike you see things you never notice if you have the ability to travel to the tourist hotspots from day to day. For example the beautiful view from the campsite by the Loire above. We also shared one campsite with a chorus of frogs! These are similar to the options available when travelling by a slow sailing boat.