CADOHA
CADOHA
About Us
The 'about us' page is going to be in the context of our sailing adventure, how it came to be, why we decided to see the world this way and what our goals are with it. If you want to know more about us as individuals, then there is a 'Crew Page' which will tell you more about us, if you're interested that is.
Ever since Carly and I met, the goal was to try and have as many adventures as possible. Originally we planned to buy a huge camper van and tour around Europe, in fact we came very close to pursuing that option when one day, back in July 2018, Carly booked for us to stay on someones boat for a few days as a romantic break, a bit like an Air BnB listing, but specifically for boats (through a site called beds on board).
(The boat we stayed on)
The boat was moored up in a marina down on the river Hamble and we possibly turned up to the very best weather we had that entire summer. It makes all the difference in the world when the sun's out, I'd say it's a bit like camping in that respect, when the weather is on your side, camping is epic, when it's not, it can be fairly miserable, so we got extremely lucky with five solid days of glorious sun, in England!
After a couple of days basking in the sun like salamanders, enjoying a few G&T's, exploring the lovely little village of Hamble and walking Hank along the river, we got to meet the owner of the boat, 'Captain Edmund' (Eddie).
Eddie was an old sea dog who'd likely forgotten more about the subject of sailing than we'd probably ever learn. We asked him if it'd be possible to go out for a sail one of the days we were down and he said 'yes of course'.
Capitano Edmundo showed us how to tie a mooring line, then how to remove and attach the fenders, after which we cast off and set a course for the Isle of Wight, where we anchored up, went for a swim and had about the most perfect of first sailing lessons. We raised the sails, learned to tack (which we were horrible at ) and even took it in turns to steer the boat around the solent, all in the most amazing weather, zipping around in the sea, completely captivated by the experience. It was about the most romantic and idyllic introduction to sailing that anyone could have ever asked for. Perhaps if we'd had dreadful weather, some sea sickness (which would come months later) and were cold and wet through the entire experience, well, perhaps we'd be writing up our VW camper van website right now. We all had such a great time that Eddie kindly agreed to take us out again the following day, and so began our tutelage and friendship with the great and powerful, Capitano Edmundo.
As time went by, Eddie took us under his wing in many sailing contexts, we helped him deliver yachts from the west coast of France, back to the Solent. Eddie also took us racing with him and gave us the kind of experiences that we just likely never would have experienced, had it not been for this amazing chance encounter.
This was the seed which would eventually grow to become the Cadoha story, our sailing adventure.
Some Photos of that first trip
Finding Our Own Boat
By the end of that summer, we had fallen hook line and sinker in love with the idea of seeing the world via a sailing boat. We still didn't have a huge amount of experience under our belts but that didn't put us off, perhaps it was the case that ignorance is bliss, regardless, we threw caution to the wind, decided to sell the house and find our very own adventure machine.
We spent months looking for a boat, we didn't really have a clear idea of exactly what we wanted, we only knew that we had a limited budget (as most of us do) and we didn't want to spend all the money we had buying the boat, we wanted to keep a reserve fund for essential work, plus we needed to have some money to actually live off of whilst we adventured. The reality was that we'd need to come home from wherever we were, periodically, and start work again when the sailing funds run out. Our jobs are both very hands on, we can't really work remotely, so we always planned to kit the boat out to be able to sustain us off grid as long as possible, to keep the need to head into expensive marinas to a bare minimum, so that we can prolong the adventures for as long as possible, before having to put our big boy pants back on and fly home to graft for six months again to refill the pot.
Whatever boat we found needed to be 'blue water purposed' (we had no idea the rabbit hole of sailing forum debates this subject would lead us down, we only knew we wanted something tough, certainly tougher than us), we hoped it would have as much of the off grid kit on its as possible (solar panels, water generator, modern anchor etc), and it needed to feel spacious enough for us to live comfortably on, and hopefully not needing too much work right away.
That was it, and so the search began.
How we found our specific boat
One night Carly showed me a boat that she found on Facebook Market, of all places. I didn't really take it seriously at first as I was busy looking around brokers and specific boat sale search engines. I don't know why, but for whatever reason, I didn't take a boat for sale on Facebook as serious.
Carly got in touch with the owner, regardless of my initial lack of enthusiasm and they talked about the fact that the boat was now moored in the North East of Scotland, in the port of Peterhead, which was a hell of a journey from our humble abode in the south of England, and I was convinced that there would be plenty of boats for us to choose from less than an hour from where we lived, we really didn't need to go all the way up to the furthest reaches of Scotland, in the winter, just to look at one boat, we have the entire south coast right on our doorstep!
Over the course of the week, Carly kept saying that the boat ticked most of the boxes on our wish list and I began to agree that it looked good, but it was still so far away, I wasn't convinced that it was worth the trip. Then we discovered that the couple selling the boat had a YouTube channel and had documented everything that they'd recently done to upgrade the boat. This was potentially a game changer for a couple of reasons. Now when buying a second hand boat, we knew a survey would let us know of any major issues, but you'll only ever know so much, these videos really gave us an insight into this boat, and we ended up feeling that this could give us a clearer picture as to what we were getting ourselves into, than just a survey alone, we get to see what's been installed and updated, we saw the amount of work and effort that had only just gone into the boat, this old boat became just slightly less of a mystery.
Shortly after discovering their channel and binge watching all the footage involving this boat, YouTube started suggesting videos to us, and that's when we discovered the Trident Warrior renovating legend that is 'Mads' and his YouTube channel 'Sail Life'. Now this guy also bought a Trident Warrior 38 (from Scotland too as it happens) and has spent the last couple of years totally stripping it down and rebuilding every last bit whilst documenting the entire process in meticulous, OCD (in the best way possible) detail. This was also really encouraging, as two people with exactly ZERO boat maintenance experience what so ever, these videos were a step by step 'how to' for dismantling and rebuilding just about any part of these boats!
Naming Our Boat
As many of you probably know by now, we did indeed head up to Scotland. Carly's persistence paid off, and we're both really happy she's not the type to take no for an answer too easily. We met with just one of the owners initially and agreed a price subject to our mentor 'Capitano Edmundo' approving. We flew Eddie up to take a look at the boat for us a couple of weeks later, after which we agreed a sale with the owners. The only condition was that we had to change the name, as they wanted to keep the boats name for their future sailing plans, and I guess it was their brand, so we agreed to their terms and then had a couple of months to try and think of a suitable name, which of course, Carly came up with.
For anyone who's not sure, 'CADOHA' is an acronym of Carly, Dominic and of course, Hank, the first two letters of each word.
So there you have it, the genesis of our adventure and our goal is to see as much of the world as we can, to learn and develop and grow as adventure explorers, to visit the more remote places this amazing planet has to offer, to have a colourful adventure, one that you never tire of remembering or sharing with the generations who come after us. It was never our goal, but as a consequence, it'd be amazing if we pull this off, just two regular Joes, (plus an awesome dog), daring to do what we never imagined we could or would. Perhaps there's someone out there reading this, or watching our videos, just sat on the fence about if they can actually head off on their own adventure, too? If that person is you, just know that if we can do it, you almost certainly can.
Be strong, be brave, live your dreams, whatever they happen to be.
Cadoha Crew.