Currently...
May 2009 - After spending 7 months in La Rochelle for the winter we have now left France and started off again on our travels. We crossed Biscay to Gijon on the north coast of Spain and have meandered slowly around the north-west corner and are currently in the rias on the Atlantic coast.
First thoughts
We started thinking about living aboard a yacht and travelling around the Mediterranean around 2001. We had by that time owned our first yacht, a 28ft Trapper 501, for four years. Shortly after we decided we might as well go all the way - around the World.
Searching
We spent the next two years researching various models of yacht within our price range which we considered suitable for blue water cruising, i.e. the perfect yacht - around 36ft long, seakindly, fast, lots of accommodation, affordable to run, heavy displacement, not too beamy, easily handled by two people. It doesn't exist!
We looked at many boats and ended up with a shortlist of three - Westerly Conway, Scanmar 35 or an early Contest 36. Once we had seen a Conway we realised this was almost the perfect boat for us (a late model) so we then sold the Trapper.
... two years later
We had travelled the country looking at Conways, in varying conditions.
At last, in February 2005, we found the perfect boat - a 1981 aft cockpit, sloop rigged Conway with a bridge deck - only two ever built - and within two weeks she was ours.