Circumnavigating Ireland is hardly an unusual thing. Yachts do it every year, many of them in the Biannual Volvo Round Ireland race. In 2016 63 yachts took part in this, travelling 704 nm non-stop. The fastest (a multi-hull) got round in under 39 hours with the first monohull managing it in just over 50 hours. Rough weather meant that 15 boats retired, but all finishers were over the line inside 6 days. These are all big boats, and I am sure their crews had a good time, but racing round is not something we would do in our own yacht. For a start Robinetta is small, just under 7m on deck, and slow. She is also old, having been built in 1937. We like to take care of her, which means not putting her, or ourselves at risk. When we set off from Largs in April 2016 with the idea of cruising round Ireland we gave ourselves nine weeks to do it. Due to work the nine weeks were split up through the spring and summer, which ended up giving us much better weather for the trip than we dreamed of! Day Sailing Round Ireland is the perfect description of what happened during those nine weeks. This is the 5th in the series recording our sailing adventures in Robinetta, but is a standalone book of a major trip.
