Bonny big waves

Crew training and a delivery trip provide an exhilarating start to the sailing season

- Marsali Taylor

Exploring unfamiliar territory is always exciting, and I started my sailing season with two good trips aboard Shetland’s own tall ship, Swan, a 75ft Fifie built in Lerwick in 1900.

This spring's crew training was an overnight voyage, and it was a great idea - we got so much more done, like anchoring for real, trying out the emergency tiller and cooking aboard.

Swan's winter berth is in Scalloway, on the west side, 10 miles south of my usual sailing patch. We used the morning to check out the engine, deck and galley, and the start of the afternoon doing man overboard drill. Then we cast off from the pier and headed into a clear patch of water between salmon farms to do man overboard again. After that we sailed north through Sandsound to the bay of Tresta, and spent the night there. That wasn't quite unfamiliar territory, as home was just over the hill, three miles away, and I pass that voe every time I go to Lerwick, but I enjoyed the passage in, and it was fun seeing Tresta from another angle.