In warm sunshine and light winds, one captain, two crew and four visually impaired sailors met up on Sylvia at Southampton marina. The plan was to cross to France, maybe get to the Channel Islands, and return safely home over the course of the next seven nights.

Chris:

I had done a bit of yacht sailing before around the Solent but never really “gone to sea”. I was so excited about the idea of sailing out of the sight of land and going to another country.

After mooring up near Lymington on the first evening we were perfectly placed to catch the tide at 6 am the next morning. The day was beautiful though a little light on wind so we had to use the engine to help us on our way. It didn’t take us long to get to The Needles and then land started to recede behind us with our target of Cherbourg due south. Other boats clearly, had the same idea and there were around five of us within sight of each other all on the same heading.

John:

I was impressed straight away by the ambition of this short sailing
trip: I have crewed on a few South coast yacht trips before, and these
have often simply involved bobbing along the local coast perhaps
visiting Weymouth, Poole and maybe even the Isle of Wight…

So when the skipper Rick, outlined the plan to sail both across to
France and also to the Channel Island and perhaps to return via the Isle
of Wight too, I was suprised.

In the end we managed to reach all these destinations and even to spend
a couple of nights in each. This was very welcome as the distances and
weather conditions required some long motor sails of up to 15 hours
continuously.

The ports of St. Peter Port, Guernsey and especially Cherbourg, France
turned out to be quite atmospheric with some cobbled streets, old
buildings and cafes – all very distinctively French.
The beer and food available in Cherbourg was also aninteresting change
to standard British fare.

Towards the end of the trip, we had time to sail up the Medina river
[that almost bisects the Isle of Wight] and spend tiem at the famous
Yachtsman’s pub The Folly.
This gave us some experience of River sailing, which is a very different
sensory experience to Sea sailing for me.

The VI crew were complimented by the three sighted crew; Rick,Andrew and
Andrew, who all semed to be very experienced Yachtsmen and it was clear
that the VI crew were carefully overseen in order to keep us safe in a
sighted world whilst giving us the chance to takle as much of the
business of Yacht Sailing as practical [which included washing up in
addition to helming and changing the sails etc]

I also found the whole trip to be unusually comfortable with a large
boat, good quality showers and toilets available when in a marina, and
good home cooked food prepared onboard when at Sea .

Mark Hague:

Cross channel VI sailing 2024 report by Mark Hague

For me the most memorable and thrilling part of our sailing cruise was the occasion when I steered our yacht down the river Medina to an mid river anchor point on the Isle of wight near the Folly Inn. Our sighted crew, skipper Rick and the 2 Andy’s gave me audio feedback to ensure I was on a good and safe course. It sent a shiver down my spine wehn I remembered that 50 years ago I had actually lived on the Island. At that time I was a shy and nervous teenager who sat in front of the blackboard due to my extreme short sightedness. I never imagine that one day 50 years later I would have the opportunity of steering a yacht on my formative home ground. I have found that all though my progressive sight loss has made life very tough at times this has been mitigated by opportunities provided by charities such as Visa which have brought me great pleasure and friendship. Bravo Visa!
Mark Hague.

Here are some photos and videos taken by Rick Smith (Skipper) during the trip crossing the Channel.