I’ve been jammed full of great ideas (at the time) for many, many years. Since I could first talk, my mother might have said.

One of these great ideas was to buy an ocean cruising boat, just in case we could, one day, escape the rat race and retire at an age when we could manage the rigours of crossing oceans. Little did I know, the most taxing rigour, other than dancing around on the foredeck fighting a giant spinnaker pole, largely revolved around how best to keep one’s liver in decent shape.

Anyway, the “great idea” sprang from an event that you will best enjoy reading about in my “Forthcoming Book”. That event subsequently led to a lazy evening fiddling about on that amazing piece of time-wasting technology; the Internet.

It was while indulging in this invaluable research that I found the first Time Bandit, now known as Beige Bandit.

Long story, kept brief here so as not to spoil your future reading pleasure, in early 2008, we ended up buying Beige Bandit. It was all just perfect. The right spec, the right size, the right type of boat for our planned future endeavours and, most importantly, the right exchange rate. You see, Beige Bandit was a continent and an ocean away in Boston, USA.

Undeterred, we pushed ahead with the purchase and, come May 2008 we hopped on a flight across, “The Pond” to toss the boat in the water and sail it home to Scotland.

It was while we were somewhere over the aforementioned ocean that I glanced out the window. Down below, at sea level, there was mayhem. Even from thirty thousand feet you could tell it was absolutely honking. Huge foaming breakers leaving trails of spume and foam in their path.

“Oh oh.” I thought. “Maybe we’ve bitten off more than we could chew. Just four of us in our little boat in amongst that vastness.”

Obviously, we made it, relatively unscathed and it will make for a jolly good read. I hope.

Two days ago, on a flight to Puerto Montt, Chile, I once again looked out the window.

“Oh oh.” I thought. “Maybe we’ve bitten off more than we could chew.”

We were returning to South America to continue our attempt to motorcycle around its classic biking routes, power across miles of salt flats in Bolivia and zig-zag across the Andes, hopefully getting good weather to gawk at the Torres Del Paine and Aconcagua.

However, looking down, from horizon to horizon the mountains, through which I was planning to ride in just a few days were plastered in deep, freezing snow.

Another “great idea at the time.” So, here we go again. South America part ll.

We had a grand plan for this summer. First, check out the cruising in Vancouver. Second, join the Ocean Cruising Club 70th Anniversary celebrations in and around Long Island Sound. We'd then finish off with a cruise to Maine to gate crash more OCC festivities.

Vancouver went well from the wholly selfish perspective of getting out and about on a motorcycle, although, I have to confess, we didn't see much of the cruising grounds such where the weather forecasts.

New England went well, dropping in and out of Lo g Island's expensive yacht clubs. $135 per night for a mooring! Don't ask how much a gin and tonic cost.

When the time came to head north for Maine I thought I'd just check the engines.

I popped into the starboard engine, checked the oil. OK. Checked the coolant. OK. Checked the fan belt. All OK. Then, last up, check the oil in the Saildrive. Aaaarrgh. Would you flaming well believe it! The seals that I had paid "professionals" to replace in Grenada only in March and just a few hours on the engine were leaking. What should have been honey clear oil was a mush of emulsified oil and sea water. Aaaarrgh.

I was furious. I climbed out the engine room, shot into the cockpit to bend Anne's ear for no other reason than, as usual, she's the only one there.

"Would you believe it?" I yelled. "These idiots in Grenada have left the seals leaking". I was spinning around like a Tasmanian devil absolutely livid. However before I went any further I thought I'd better check the other engine. I opened up the hatch, climbed in. Unscrewed the dip stick and......aaaarrgh. It too was leaking. The oil looking more like yogurt than oil.

There went our trip to Maine as I'd have to absolutely minimise motoring.

Once I'd stopped spinning we formulated a new plan which was basically to find a flesh pot like Boston or Newport and, like the well-heeled of yesteryear, the Vanderbilts and the like, summer at the "cottage". Except our cottage was the boat.

And so, we whiled away quite a number of weeks watching the tourists, the classic twelve metres, schooners and luxury super yachts come and go. We walked for miles around Newport mansions a.k.a. cottages.

One day, for reasons I don't remember, I thought I'd check the engines again just to see if magically they had fixed themselves. And would you believe it? The port engine had!

Or, perhaps not. It seems that while I was spinning around like a dervish, cursing the engineers when I went to check the "other"engine, I'd actually checked the same engine twice!

Ooops!

Here's a bit of what we got up to - definitely Time Bandit holiday snaps as, once again, absolutely nothing of real interest has happened.

I think I wrote in an earlier blog that we're all a-dither about what to do next. There are a number of options...

- Join the Snowbirds and do the east coast USA to Caribbean / Bahamas shuffle. 1,800 and 1200 miles each way, respectively. Back and furrit as my brother would say. But we've now done that for the last two years.
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- Head for Europe, but what can us poor and soon to be heavily taxed Brexit folk do in ninety days. We'd no sooner get there than we'd be off hiding from immigration officials.

- Cross the Pacific. A very long way "back and furrit."

- Transit Panama and turn north for British Columbia and Alaska. Interesting, but such a hard slog north that some folk do the 4,000 mile circuitous route via Hawaii and we're not sure we're up for that amount of pain.
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- Or, to save all that effort, buy a trawler type thing and cruise British Columbia and Alaska.

So many choices.

In the end, we decided we'd check out British Columbia. Well, I did 'cause I had another cunning plan. Rent a motorcycle and whiz around for a while.

It's not our best video; but here's a look at what we got up to. Sailing content will resume shortly. Tomorrow morning actually when we up anchor from New York and head for the CheesyPeek, all the time dodging that pesky Gulf Stream.

One of the issues with sailing around on a “performance” catamaran is that its performance is directly proportional to how much stuff you carry onboard. Stuff, over and above the minimum required to sail the boat.

When anything new comes onboard we look for what we can chuck out of an equal weight.

On passage, we work out how far from land half way is, how many hours we’d have to motor in a disaster scenario, i.e. mast down, out of pies and the like, then carry that amount of diesel to get us to a place of respite. Preferably one that serves beer. We do the same with water. We do the math based on the recommended two litres per day times the maximum number of days we’d be lost at sea, less what’s already in the liferaft, and then take away the number of litres of wine, beer etc on board and that’s what we aim to carry.

Coastal sailing we’re being extravagantly careless if we have more than half tanks.

Last year, suddenly presented with an empty basement at the new home of the “Boston Lettons” we firstly dumped our spare genoa then sneaked in our Jordan drogue. On our passage south to Grenada the difference was amazing. It wasn’t really, in our usual thirty to forty knots, getting more speed isn’t usually the challenge. I don’t think we even noticed but we felt better.

However, for the last few months we’ve been gazing into the crystal ball trying to work out what to do next. Pacific north west - too wet. Europe - what can you do in three months? (thanks Brexiteers); Bahamas - a possibility. New Zealand and Australia. Jeez, that’s a long way but we’ve pals there.

We’re all a-dither but we did feel that in case we make a snap decision to head west, a long way west, we should have all the gear on board so, back came the genoa, that’s about 35kg and back came the drogue, another 25kg.

All that weight. What could we do to compensate?

And then it struck us. We were watching the Olympic gymnastics and all these wee girls dashing across the big matt, a quick hop, skip and a jump and then they’re twirling about in the air for what seems like endless minutes, apparently weightless.

So, like the athletes, if we were to jump up and down alternately, so one of us is in the air at all times, we’d immediately save, what, upwards of a massive seventy plus kilos?

Genius. Problem solved!

Meanwhile, the unanswered problem is, “what to do next”. Any preferences?

Let us know.

My old dad, while a very experienced sailboat racer, was never entirely comfortable on his many cruising boats - thirteen at last count. Out cruising, every morning he’d be up at the crack of dawn twiddling the knobs on the VHF.

When making enquiries from the warmth of her bunk as to what the problem was now, my poor mother would be sternly told to “shush” as the Shipping Forecast was broadcast over the crackly radio. “Malin, Hebrides - northerly force four, backing northwest six later”.

“Right, that’s it” he’d cry, “Time to head back”, hauling my poor mother out her bunk and the anchor from the kelp, where it had lain undisturbed for a day or two as gentle summer breezes wafted through the anchorage.

“But Fred”, mum would protest. “It’s very settled”.

“Four rising to six. DIDN’T YOU HEAR WOMAN?” and off they’d head at dawn in a dash for the sanctuary of the marina…… where of course, mum would catch up on her lost sleep as the gentle summer breezes wafted through.

So, how come, years later, in these days of high tech, satellites and with decades of experience can the forecasts be so wrong?

Fourteen knots on the GRIB. Forty two outside.

Having just listened to the latest forecast, I’ll tell you why. All the resources at the Met offices have been put into marketing instead of forecasting.

Nowadays, instead of a bit of bad weather coming your way, we get “yoof speak”. “Pulses” of rain”. “Weather bombs” “Amber warnings” and the like.

Give us a break.

Two countries separated by a common language. How true it is.

No sooner have we left the Caribbean and Bermuda where the local patois is yet another language I'll fail to master, than we arrive in the US where their version of English, makes communication really quite difficult. Asking a simple question will, more often than not, bring a blank stare and you may have as well just have landed from the moon.

However, we're only in Gloucester, New England, just 20 miles north of Boston. Gloucester Harbour is America's earliest, fishing port. The folks here, from Boston and North have quite a broad accent and ordering food, drinks or trying to find an item in the shops, sorry, stores, is like an exercise in Wordl.

- Water is wadder
- Breezeway is back passage
- Back passage is, well
- Pavement the road
- And as for Pants.....

It was a stroke of luck we found "Glosta" as we haven't seen the front of the boat for days as it's been another New England pea-Souper most of the way.

However, we are in the home of New England's fishing fleet and, of an evening, we can sit in the cockpit and watch the skoonahs and yahts sailing across the wadder.

Lovely.

(Gawp:- to stare with incredulity)

Once again, we’re on the Ocean Cruising Club cruise around Long Island Sound, and I’m sure that will bring back some memories for a few readers. Once again, the locals are showing us around their home ports and favourite anchorages.

As some readers will know, our “home port”, Bridge of Allan, is a small village of around five thousand souls just outside the city of Stirling in Scotland.

The village was first mentioned in 1146 when those in charge, at that time the nuns of North Berwick, were in a bit of a to-do with the monks of Dunfermline Abbey over who should get the taxes from the, no doubt, poor, impoverished villagers. Some things never change.

Later, much later, the village became famous as a spa town where the wealthy would come to “take the waters. Robert Louis Stevenson, the prolific but poorly author, had a splash around but ultimately opted for the somewhat better, all-year-round climate of Samoa.

From the mid to late eighteen hundreds, the village’s fame, its waters and its proximity to Glasgow and Edinburgh made it an ideal commuter town for Glasgow’s merchants and shipping magnates.

Consequently, Bridge of Allan boasts a few grand estates and a sizeable number of what can only be called mansions. However, the extensive estates, like the shipyards, are now essentially given over to housing for the riff-raff, and the grand estate houses have been converted into apartment blocks.

However, many large, sandstone mansions sitting majestically among their rhododendron bushes and Douglas Firs remain.

Of an evening, before we took to the waters in our own way, Anne and I would often enjoy a walk along Kennilworth Drive where most of these mansions sit at the end of their long, paved driveways.

All in all, right on our doorstep, we have a plethora of beautiful homes.

The difference between home, the Bridge of Allan, and where we are now, Long Island Sound, is that at home, we walk down just one road to see all the grand houses. Out here, you can gawp at similar-sized grand mansions costing several millions of US dollars, with their lawns rolling down to the sea, but you can do this, not for one street but for hundreds of miles. And half of them are holiday homes.

Isn’t it just lovely to see the colony doing so well.

Getting online is always a challenge, especially in the far-flung Islands. And when you find a Wi-Fi spot, uploads are depressingly slow and coffee decidedly expensive.

So, we are a bit late and a bit out of sequence with our videos and blogs but finally, here's Antigua race week. Hope you enjoy it.