On Sat, 19 Feb 2005 08:18:06 GMT, "Martin Woolwich"
wrote:

But wife is Canadian and kids have Canadian nationality and won't hear of us
going anywhere else. At least we both agree that we have to get out of the
UK

B.C. is your best bet then, but facilities are either scarce or
overcrowded in many places. If you want less rain and no complicated
tidal patterns, I recommend the lower Great Lakes. You can have
challenging sailing in summer if you go out on stormy days, secure in
the knowledge that it never lasts long.

If you have heat in the cockpit and a steel hull, you can get
"bubbler" slips here in Toronto that stay ice-free and conceivably get
a nearly 12 month season. I know a steel ketch owner who logs New
Year's Day without fail, and I've had excellent sails on the lake in
March and November, when the wind will push even heavy displacement
full-keelers easily.

Ice is primarily inshore and the increasingly frequent warm spells
means only close inshore or in boat basins does it form any sort of
thickness...it's mostly "brash" ice.

My boat is put on a cradle at the end of October and dropped around
May 1st, but I take my Zodiac out most months excepting January and
February.

R.