Every cruiser has niggling boat maintenance jobs which you can live with, but when you're about to make 1,000 nautical mile passage you need to attend to. Yes, you heard correctly, the countdown has begun towards our next destination...
🤙 PATREON | FTB...
Our "Casting Off" video podcasts are a no-holds-barred and unedited look at sailing and travel. They are our way of keeping up with YOU in as close to real-time as possible.
This week we continue with more boating banter and balderdash. We talk about wha...
What happens if you are sailing outside your country and you get injured or have an accident on your boat? Does your boat insurance cover you? Or should you take out foreign health insurance?
Hiking Kamunsu Hill at the Sabah Tea Resort through an etherea...
Casting Off is a no-frills podcast from the cockpit of our sailboat, SY Esper. We talk about what's happening in real-time, and we answer our favourite comments about the most recent followtheboat episodes. Or anything else that takes our fancy.
So, what...
Alone at Sipadan with the whole island reef-system to ourselves, we are grateful to experience the best diving in the world. We had close encounters with sharks, turtles, schooling jacks, bumphead parrotfish, as well as thousands of reef fish and macro cre...
Welcome to Casting Off, the new video podcast series from followtheboat!
Each week we will be chatting in the cockpit about what's happened that week in real-time. And we'll answer our favourite comments about the most recent followtheboat episode, this we...
Fed up with being dicked around by hotels...
With Malaysia's state borders and Sabah's district borders open again, we set off with joyful hearts on a road trip across Borneo. But finding hotels that were ready for us or staff who gave a toss turned out ...
Q. Was 2021 a good year?
A. On the whole, no. BUT it did give us some of the highlights of our cruising career.
Now it's coming to a close, we discuss plans for 2022...
🥂 PATREON | FTBMates | Rum Fund - https://followtheboat.com/pub/ 🍻
00:00 ...
Armed with two legacy lenses, the Olympus Zuiko 24mm f/2.8 and Nikon Nikkor 85mm f2, we set off for a trek through Kinabalu Park, Borneo. Then into the valley where Jamie tested two more lenses, the SMC Takumar 28mm and f2.8 Pentax 135mm f3.5.
This stunnin...
What should be done with plastic rubbish? Is it OK to burn it? We discover the most plastic bottles on one beach we've probably ever seen. Since heading east from the Mediterranean and arriving in India back in 2010, we've become used to the smell of burni...
A last minute cancellation at the dive school meant Jamie could take the PADI Open Water Dive course with Big Fin Divers at Kota Belud. Oh yeah...
🥂 PATREON | FTBMates | Rum Fund - https://followtheboat.com/pub/ 🍻
00:00 A new dawn, a new day
0...
The waves were hitting two metres and a big, heavy front was making its way along the coast towards our cosy anchorage. Wind isn't the problem, it's the swell whipping around the headland you have to worry about. Jamie explains why he did not predict this ...
Why did the sea go orange, and is it safe to sail there?
While we're diving, someone bombed the reef...
🥂 PATREON | FTBMates | Rum Fund - https://followtheboat.com/pub/ 🍻
00:00 Out of the marina after the storm
03:50 Scary orange water
05:56 ...
One of the biggest issues with living on a sailboat is equipment failure. And it's not just video equipment like cameras and laptops which succumb to the pressure of living in a harsh marine environment, everything on your boat will fail.
Add termites, tr...
Don't ever put davits on your boat, they'll ruin the beautiful lines! So why did we?
00:00 The reason why we have davits
01:09 Our davits set-up
05:52 Dinghy exploring around Dinawan island
🥂 PATREON | FTBMates | Rum Fund - https://followtheboat.c...
Theft is uncommon here, so when we catch a thief taking stuff through one of our portholes, we are shocked. Poverty and desperate times endured by many people here since lockdown in March 2020 has taken its toll...
🥂 PATREON | FTBMates | Rum Fund ...
This is how we sail SY Esper, our Oyster 435 cutter-rigged ketch. The principles apply equally to most sail plans...
🥂 PATREON | FTBMates | Rum Fund - https://followtheboat.com/pub/ 🍻
00:00 Sailing basics
00:43 Stowing, planning, weighing
02:0...
The sails are out and we are sailing! It's been a while since we had any sailing days out...
🥂 PATREON | FTBMates | Rum Fund - https://followtheboat.com/pub/ 🍻
00:00 Sailing - day 1
03:54 Sailing - day 2
05:06 Submarine surfaces in front of u...
We've been sailing on SY Esper since 2006, thousands of miles and lots of places. But after all these years it's never easy to say goodbye
🥂 PATREON | FTBMates | Rum Fund - https://followtheboat.com/pub/ 🍻
03:38 Gaya Island - fishing platforms...
Six things that annoy us about living together on our sailboat: declared, shared, compared and repaired. The court is now in session, but who won and did we learn any lessons? In our most intimate insight yet into life aboard SY Esper, we undergo self-ther...
You've had some luck and caught a tasty fish, in our case a Spanish mackerel. The weather is far too bad for a barbecue, but you want that BBQ flavour. So Liz came up with a method that really works. Follow along and print the recipe below...
🥂 P...
Do you really live off-grid if you are sailing and living on a sailboat? Sailing channel cruisers, swanning around in their smart sailboats, "living the dream", telling everyone in their videos how "awesome" it all is, or crying about their latest "disaste...
How far do you get involved in local politics? Follow the rules and make friends in the country where you are a guest can mean a smoother sailing and travel experience.
🥂 PATREON | FTBMates | Rum Fund - https://followtheboat.com/pub/ 🍻
00:00 ...
Jamie's underwater photography advice for beginners on a budget comes from first-hand experience and practice. Look for his THREE TOP RECOMMENDATIONS for successful photography coming up...
🥂 PATREON | FTBMates | Rum Fund - https://followtheboat.c...
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