Core Info

Why do we love sailing from Plymouth? Plymouth is a wonderful base location for our sailing experience business, and it is rapidly being picked up on the radar by journalists as being a cool little city by the sea. Did you read Holly Bruce’s review in GQ magazine last month? It was an inspiring read – but we think we can add to it (from a sailing perspective and with our guests in mind, of course!)

When planning a bareboat charter or sailing experience, Plymouth is often overlooked as a possible sailing starting point because it is viewed as being too far away. However, it is more accessible than you think. Firstly, Plymouth has a mainline train station, making it just over 3 hours from London, 2 hours from Bristol and 3-and-a-half hours from Birmingham. Our yachts are based at the King Point and Mayflower Marinas – just a 5-minute (or a 6-minute at the very most) taxi ride from the station. In my opinion, you can’t get much more accessible than that!

For the same reason, bareboat charterers often request yachts on the River Dart thinking that Dartmouth is closer to their home than Plymouth. Mileage-wise, it probably is. However, have you tried driving through those narrow lanes…behind a tractor…then tried to find a parking space close enough to unload your provisions? (Forget it during regatta week!) It certainly adds to your journey time. Travelling to Plymouth is so straight forward: the M5 turns into A38, so at least 2 lanes most of the way giving you the opportunity to overtake all the way down! With a car park at the marina and the yachts being moored on pontoons (as opposed to trot moorings), everything is so much easier. (Incidentally, Dartmouth is easily accessible within a days sail, and in my opinion, it is so much more fun accessing it by water rather than road.)

As a starting location, sailing from Plymouth is ideal because it gives you so many destination choices regardless of the wind direction. Leave King Point Marina and head west for Fowey, Falmouth and the Isles of Scilly, or head east for Salcombe, Dartmouth, Brixham and Torquay. It is an ideal solution for those looking to bareboat charter or take part in one of our weekend sailing experiences package.

Plymouth itself has so much to offer our guests. Looking for restaurants within easy reach of the marina? The Dock is based at King Point Marina and offers a wonderful range of food in a lovely environment. A 15 minute walk in one direction will take you to the historic Royal William Yard which houses a number of restaurants, whereas 15 minutes in the opposite direction will take you to the buzzing Barbican area of the city, where you will find yourself walking past (or perhaps into) the famous Plymouth Gin distillery and a further selection of places to eat.

Plymouth is a vibrant waterfront city packed full of attractions, activities, shopping, entertainment and sightseeing. And as far as we are concerned, it is an ideal base location for the start of your sailing adventure.

We were delighted to be asked to donate a raffle prize for the Great Gatsby Ball held earlier this month raise money for the Children’s Hospice South West Daisy Chain fund.

Held at Boringdon Park Golf Club, the evening began with a reception drink on arrival, a delicious 3 course meal, coffee and mints, entertainment, DJ and disco and the chance to enter a draw and win some amazing prizes.

This fabulous event was organized by a wonderful group of energetic people who are raising money in memory of a beautiful baby girl who sadly passed away aged just 16 weeks old. Their target is to raise £50,000 by July 2019 – and they are close to reaching it. Around £2,500 was raised by their raffle alone!

Donations received from the ball and prize draw are going to Little Bridge House, who cared for the whole family during the little girl’s short life, and a new hospice, Little Harbour in St Austell.

We were pleased to be able to offer a voucher for a day sail for them to put forward as a prize in their draw, and we look forward to meeting the lucky winner next season.

Looking for that unusual Christmas gift? Got a friend or partner who is impossible to buy for? Our sailing experience gift vouchers make perfect presents.

According to a report in Forbes magazine, the secret to happiness is spending your money on experiences rather than on material things. So, we are taking that to mean that to get into your loved-ones good books at Christmas, buying them an ‘experience’ is the way to go.

An experience out on the water! What could be better?

A day sail would make a perfect Christmas gift for someone who hasn’t sailed before. For £99 per person, your loved one gets a full day sailing on our Jeanneau 409, Bewitched. They will be encouraged to take part in as much (or as little) helming and yacht handling as they choose. A light lunch, to be enjoyed in a sheltered bay, is included.

Perhaps you would like to spend some time away with your friend or loved one. If so, a voucher for a weekend sail could be the unusual Christmas gift you are looking for. With 2 nights accommodation on-board our 41’ yacht, £299 per person would buy you a wonderful sailing experience. With amazing locations on our doorstep, a sail to Salcombe or Fowey offers a great weekend away.

With both of these options, the recipient of your Christmas gift voucher can choose a date to take their experience at their convenience. Scheduled sails are listed on our website, and if they cant see a suitable date, they can just request one. We will always do our best to accommodate your requirements.

Further information about our Christmas gift vouchers can be found here.

Whether you are looking for unusual Christmas gift inspiration ‘for him’, ‘for her’, or ‘for them’, a Devon Sailing Experience gift voucher comes highly recommended. You can purchase yours here.

 

Welcome to our final newsletter of 2016.

New for 2017

During 2016, we had lots of potential customers contacting us requesting to join 5 or 7 day skippered charters with the idea of booking a cabin for themselves and sailing with a group. However, this was often difficult to arrange in a cost-effective way at the convenience of all our guests. Therefore, we have been working hard to find a way of making this type of sailing experience work for 2017.

We would like to create a database of individuals who would be interested in booking a cabin onboard our 40’ yacht, Bewitched, with the aim of meeting like-minded people and just setting sail with a skipper. We will use your contact details to email you to let you know when potential dates for such experiences are available, giving you the opportunity to make up a group and just go!

Whether you are an experienced sailor looking to build some miles or just looking to have a fun week on the water – this group skippered-charter is an ideal opportunity. If you would like your details added to our database (no obligation to book), just let us know by emailing katie@devonsailingexperiences.co.uk. Your personal information will not be passed on to anyone else.

Sailing Gift Vouchers

Looking for a Christmas present with a difference? A Devon Sailing Experiences gift voucher could be the answer. We can provide vouchers for day or weekend sails for you to present to family members or friends. Valid for 1 year, the recipient can choose a convenient date to take their sail (subject to availability).

Top Experiences for 2016

We had an extremely busy second season where we were able to rely on our fantastic team to work long hours at short notice. Our sincere thanks go out to Gail, Neil and Tim who all helped make things happen. Here are the top packages we were able to offer (in order of popularity during 2016).

#1 – Day Sails (Bewitched)

Day sails continue to be our most popular sailing experience. We believe that this is due to its affordability and the fact that it is suitable for everyone. Whether you have sailed before or are brand new to sailing, this experience makes a great day out. We also saw an increase of the numbers of people buying vouchers as gifts for their friends and family – they can make ideal presents for the person who is so difficult to buy for. With Christmas around the corner, it might be worth remembering that we can send gift vouchers to be used any time (subject to availability) during the next sailing season. Suitable for all sailing abilities (including those with no previous experience).

#2 – Bareboat charters (Spellbound, Bewitched, Barbarossa and Troppo Bella)

For those with qualifications and experience of sailing in tidal waters, we now have 4 yachts available for bareboat charter. Devon and Cornwall are both accessible from our base location and boast vast sailing ground with beautiful destinations. We have received great feedback about our yachts and available destinations from our charterers this year, and hope to see some familiar faces return next season.

#3 – Weekend Skippered Charters (Bewitched)

With amazing locations such as Salcombe and Fowey within easy sailing distance for a weekend, this continues to be a popular experience. With no more than 4 guests per trip, there is space to enjoy the whole experience. Suitable for all sailing abilities (including those with no previous experience).

#4 – Exclusive Skippered Charters (Bewitched and Spellbound)

From a single sailing day to a 7-day family holiday, this method of chartering a yacht has seen a steady increase in bookings. It makes financial sense for a family holiday, where you visit such beautiful locations and your accommodation is included. Suitable for all sailing abilities (including those with no previous experience).

Payments

We can take payments for charters and sailing experiences by bank transfer, PayPal or card.

If you are bareboat chartering, we are now able to take pre-authorised card payments for security deposits. If you wish to pay your security deposit this way, please telephone the office ahead of your charter. We will need to take an administration charge of £10 if you choose to pay your security deposit payment this way. There will be no charge for direct bank account transfers.

Keep in Touch

Thank you to all the people who have got in touch with photos of their charters. We love seeing them, so if you’ve got some to share and you don’t mind us using them on our blog posts (including Facebook and Twitter) do keep sending them. We won’t mention names or dates in our posts, but they are great for us to use alongside our narrative.

Twitter and Facebook Accounts

Follow us on Facebook (https://www.facebook.com/devonsailingexperiences/) or Twitter (@devonsailingexp) to keep up to date with events and availability for bareboat or skippered charters.

Sailing Schedule

We have started adding dates for day and weekend sails to our 2017 sailing schedule. During the sailing season (April – October 2017) it will be constantly updated with new available dates. Details can be found here: http://www.devonsailingexperiences.co.uk/devon-sailing-schedule/

If you can’t see a date that is suitable, do get in touch and we will do our best to accommodate your requirements.

Returning Customer Discount Scheme

Don’t forget  – we offer a 5% discount to customers who re-book charters with us.

Looking forward to seeing you out on the water with us in 2017.

Nick and Katie Rich

We often asked whether we can provide RYA training (which we do not). This post is to address the question of why we are not an RYA sea school and why we also believe that the two compliment each other rather well.

It can be boiled down to two elements:

1. FOCUS: The products we provide are experience led and not course led.
2. EQUIPMENT: The equipment we use to support the product is of a higher quality.

Firstly,

RYA training is a prescriptive course which a group of up to 6 often sharing cabins follow in order to achieve a certificate which provides some level of yachting competence. Day skipper is by far the most common course taught and covers many aspects of sailing although it can’t go into much detail it is often used as the stepping stone to bare boat charter or buy your own boat.

We on the other hand look at what yachting *is* and build an experience around it. Apart from the obvious (that sailing is about being out on the water) we believe it’s much more than that.

We concentrate on the environment and how this is harnessed, so things like sail trim and sea handling are important to us.

We offer beautiful and interesting locations that show off the local Devon and Cornish coast lines. Our most popular destinations include Salcombe, Dartmouth, Fowey and Falmouth.

We offer a lower person to yacht ratio with a maximum of 5 on our day sails and anything from 2 – 4 on our over night / multi day experiences. Every person (unless they’re a couple) gets their own cabin, and in some cases we have en-suite cabins.

We also ensure we get to places in plenty of time to enjoy the shore side part of yachting, which usually involves adventuring out to local pubs and restaurants.

Secondly,

If you use the comparison of taking your driving test and taking your day skipper, one thing is true for both: you will not be using a highly specified machine. The reasons are rather obvious – you wouldn’t learn to drive in a Ferrari, so you wouldn’t learn to sail on a highly specified yacht. We pride ourselves on the quality of our yachts and while we encourage our charterers to take part in as much sailing and yacht handling as they choose, our commercially endorsed skippers do handle them with particular pride and care.

The yachts our customers enjoy are selected on their sailing ability, rather than their ability to just ‘do the job’. They are the types of yachts that you would personally choose if you were to buy your own.

In our opinion, our sailing experiences compliment RYA sea school training  in respect of the fact that they can be used as a ‘primer’ where guests have the opportunity to see if a training course is for them before fully committing to the time and effort required.

 

Our Fleet

Our fleet continues to expand! Our newest addition is a Bavaria 38, Barbarossa. This spacious yacht offers 3 double cabins, TV, DVD player, teak cockpit and side decks, 4 winches and Raymarine electronics. She is available for bareboat charter from Mayflower Marina, Plymouth.

Our Dehler 34 (Troppo Bella) is newly coded. She is our only yacht on the River Dart and is now available for bareboat charter – an ideal location for guests who wish to attend Dartmouth Regatta. We recommend accessing her from Kingswear Marina, where good value parking and a water taxi service is available.

In addition to Barbarossa and Troppo Bella, we continue to operate the following yachts: Jeanneau 409 (Bewitched), Jeanneau 36i (Spellbound), and Stefini rpd66 (Disco Volante – skippered charters only). All of these yachts can be chartered from King Point Marina, Plymouth. Details about each of them can be found on our website www.devonsailingexperineces.co.uk

Local regattas and events

8th July to 21st August – Nao Victoria

An exact replica of the first ship to ever sail around the world is making its first ever visit to the UK this summer and will be at Sutton Harbour. The Nao Victoria is an exact replica of the 16th century original at 27 metres long with three masts, four decks and 290 square metres of sail. Visitors will be able to board the Nao Victoria from 10am until 7pm every day with tickets.

7th to 12th August – Salcombe Regaatta

For up-to-date information and a build-up to the regatta (including photos of the amazing fireworks in previous years), check out Salcombe Town Regatta’s Facebook page – https://www.facebook.com/SalcombeTownRegatta/?fref=nf

20th to 23rd August – Torbay Royal Regatta

A spectacular event with races, displays, funfairs and fireworks. Timings and details can be found here: http://www.torbayroyalregatta.co.uk/

25th to 27th August – Dartmouth Royal Regatta

Another not-to-be-missed event! Music, food, exhibitions, shopping, fireworks and air displays. Further information can be found here: http://www.dartmouthregatta.co.uk/

Payments

We are now able to take pre-authorised card payments for security deposits. If you wish to pay your security deposit this way, please telephone the office ahead of your charter. We will need to take an administration charge of £10 if you choose to pay this way. There will be no charge for direct bank account transfers.

Twitter and Facebook Accounts

Got some great photos or video footage from your charter? We would love to see some so please keep in touch and send us anything you would be happy for us to share via our blog posts. Follow us on Facebook (https://www.facebook.com/devonsailingexperiences/) or Twitter (@devonsailingexp) to keep up to date with events and availability for bareboat or skippered charters.

Sailing Schedule

We are constantly updating our sailing schedule by adding day sails and weekend sailing experiences. Details can be found here: http://www.devonsailingexperiences.co.uk/devon-sailing-schedule/ If you can’t see a date that is suitable, do get in touch and we will do our best to accommodate your requirements.

Returning Customer Discount Scheme

Don’t forget  – we offer a 5% discount to customers who re-book charters with us.

Enjoy the rest of the sailing season. We hope to hear from you soon.

Nick and Katie Rich

Web: www.devonsailingexperiences.co.uk
Tel: 01752 424514
Twitter: @devonsailingexp

Fancy a Sailing Experience along the beautiful south-west coast? One of our fully-qualified and highly experienced skippers, Gail Wright, will be running a 5-day cruise from 19th – 23rd September.

This sailing experience would suit people of all levels, and the aim is to meet like-minded people and just sail! Whether you are an experienced sailor looking to build some miles or just looking to have a fun week on the water – this is an ideal opportunity.

Our 2015 Jeanneau 409, Bewitched, has 3 double cabins, 2 heads and all the latest electronic equipment. She is based in King Point Marina, Plymouth.

Gail comments, “She is a lovely yacht to sail and to stay on.” And she should know – she has stayed on-board many times! “The trip is for 6 people plus myself as Skipper. I am keen to get people sailing and am happy to teach or pass on some tips for those wanting to learn more. The general idea is to meet on the boat on Sunday evening, go out to dinner and discuss possible destinations that we would like visit during the week and what we would like to do. We will leave the marina on Monday morning following a safety briefing and general introduction to the Yacht.”

There is paid parking available at King Point Marina. Alternatively, you may wish to take the train to Plymouth and get a taxi from the station – it is less than 5 minutes in a taxi to the marina.

Gail is a highly experienced sailor with a commercially endorsed Yachtmaster Offshore certificate. She has sailed in the Solent, West Country, Mediterranean and further afield for many years.

The cost is £420 per person which includes fuel, food on the boat, 2 evening meals on-board, soft drinks and marina fees. Contact info@devonsailingexperiences.co.uk for further information.

With sterling at it’s lowest for a number of years, it makes sense to look at alternative sailing destinations that you might otherwise have overlooked. Whilst the Mediterranean has very hot weather in the summer, here in Devon and Cornwall we enjoy comfortable low 20’s making pleasant day sails and comfortable nights sleep.

With arguably a better coastline for interesting and rewarding sailing, the south west has it all. Devon and Cornwall boast a variety of exciting destinations which are absolutely buzzing around regatta times. Alternatively, outside the peak season you can enjoy the tranquility, peacefulness and beauty that can be found in one of the many anchorages close to our base at King Point Marina in Plymouth.

Never sailed before? Not a problem! We offer skippered day sails, weekend sails and exclusive charters to suit any budget and level of experience. If you have something particular in mind, do get in touch to discuss your ideas. We specialise in bespoke charters to ensure you and your family/friends have the best sailing experience possible, visiting the southwest destinations of your choice.

Experienced bareboat charterer? We have a selection of yachts available for you. Being based in Plymouth, we are able to offer immediate access to both the Devonian and Cornish coastlines. King Point Marina is easily accessible by train (mainline station is less than 5 minutes away in a taxi) or by car (car parking is available at the marina).

Who says you need to travel abroad to enjoy an exciting and varied sailing experience?

 

 

See Devon Sailing Experiences in the summer edition of Devon Life magazine, where we share our enthusiasm and ethos with feature writer, Chrissy Harris.

Although she was an inexperienced landlubber, Chrissy took to the water with energy and enthusiasm and appeared to have a wonderful time hoisting sails, pulling lines and working the winches. You can read her report on page 205 of Devon Life magazine.

We still have places remaining on our 2-day midweek and weekend sails for this season. Check out our sailing schedule for availability. If you can’t see a suitable date, do not hesitate to contact us and we will do our very best to accommodate your requirements. Price includes 2 nights accommodation on-board our yacht, a fully-qualified skipper, mooring fees, breakfast and a light lunch whilst underway.

We also offer bareboat charter for experienced sailors. We are pleased to announce that we have now added a Bavaria 38 to our fleet which is ready to charter this August. See our charter prices page for details.