In part 5 of their move to sail around the world, Rosie and Brian describe the house clearing and fitting out. Rosie writes:

I finished work at the end of April with a big night out send-off which was great fun. However it was a relief to know that I was now free to spend all my time preparing for our big adventure. The task and shopping list rapidly grew to 3 pages classified into boat stuff, house stuff and all the administrative things that have to be done. We are spending about 3 days at home mid week and 4 day weekends on Alixora.

Rosie & Brian have decided to sell up and sail the world. Sailers is following their big adventure. This second installment, written by Rosie, describes the choosing of their yacht.

How do you decide what to call your first boat (or any boat for that matter)? We went through all sorts of options – sisters’ first names (too corny); Greek Goddesses (none original enough or pronounceable); culling from our favourite science fiction (Clear Air Turbulence was an option but a bit of a mouthful for radio comms); and then finally decided that we would keep the name she has – Alixora. As it turned out, it was a good decision.

Rosie & Brian have decided to sell up and sail the world. Sailers is following their big adventure. This second installment, written by Rosie, describes the choosing of their yacht.

The two week Christmas break was spent scouring the online advertisements for boats, making lists, and preparing ourselves mentally for the big change to our lives.

Compiling a shortlist of potential boats was hard work – both mentally and physically – hours and days scanning specifications and filling in a spreadsheet with the details we had decided were important to our selection. Some of the basic information was easy to locate but it took some digging to find the rest that we needed.