Under Wide and Starry Skies – the book

For reviews and extracts please see below.

Cast off the lines and discover 50 of the most fabulous off-the-beaten-track sailing destinations on our planet.

If you own a sailing boat, chances are that you’ve wondered what it would be like to throw in your job, cast off and sail over the horizon.

Here are 50 out-of-the way destinations to encourage you to sell up and go (or enjoy a temporary escape) with practical tips including formalities, the prevailing weather and GPS positions. The selection of locations is based on over 70,000 miles of sailing. Some (St Helena, Cocos Keeling) are classic yet remote destinations that have been favoured by circumnavigators ever since the days of Joshua Slocum. Others (in Japan, Patagonia or the Pacific Northwest) have been chosen as perfect examples of the attractions of those regions. Common denominators are protection from the weather, scenic beauty and historic and/or human interest. And the fact that, while solitude is not guaranteed, you won’t be troubled by the arrival of a cruising flotilla or by a novice dragging anchor onto you.

Each anchorage is introduced with a lively account describing the place, its history and people (if any) as well as the author and his crew’s adventures. Each account is followed by a beautifully hand-drawn sketch of the anchorage and an information box.

Here are the destinations covered in the Pacific:

And here are the Atlantic/Indian Ocean destinations:

Under Wide and Starry Skies is published in softcover and electronic formats.

Both electronic and softcover are now (January 2025) available in the UK and Europe. The electronic version is available in North America, softcover to follow in May 2025. It can be ordered at most outlets, including Amazon.

Reviews

Currents Magazine, Bluewater Cruising Association, Vancouver – April 2025

THE Book for Every Offshore & Armchair Sailor

Mary Anne Unrau, Traversay III, Waterline 43′, Cutter-rigged steel hull, April 20th, 2025

Under Wide and Starry Skies: 50 Sailing Destinations in Seas Less Travelled. Nicholas Coghlan. Adlard Coles. Forthcoming Canadian Publication: May 6th, 2025.

This beautiful book is replete with colour photographs, maps and the narrative you need to sail – in actuality or imaginatively – to these most rarely visited places on the globe. You will gain the geographic knowledge, the formal knowledge (of charting, entry and bureaucratic formalities, weather information and reference books) as well as helpful insights into the history and provisioning opportunities in the destinations. You will also meet some of the inhabitants that Nicholas and partner Jenny Coghlan met in their travels to these diverse locales.

The book is helpfully organized into five large geographic sections: I – North Pacific and North America; II – South Pacific; III – Indian Ocean and Africa; IV – South Atlantic; and V – North Atlantic and the Caribbean.

In the Introduction Nick states the formula he uses to make the information easy to understand, even for a beginning Offshore Adventurer. He gives map and geographic information and recounts his and Jenny’s own adventures in getting to the destination; forwards a brief essay describing the place, history and people (if there are any); discusses any security concerns; and gives a story of their own adventures including “mistakes made and lessons learned”.

Of all the 50 locations highlighted, Traversay III had sailed to or stopped at only 13 of them. Of those places we shared, I discovered that we often had totally different – yet still memorable – experiences, demonstrating what makes offshore cruising always unique and exciting.

Nick and Jenny completed a circumnavigation part way through their travels at a location west of Mexico between Isla Guadaloupe and Clarion. I was fascinated to read that they saw elephant seals here – a species we had only seen in the much farther south and colder South Georgia in the South Atlantic.

We had been to see the gigantic bears in Geographic Harbor Alaska and had heard about the death of a self-styled ‘Bear Whisperer’, but in Nick’s book I read the definitive story of how he and his girlfriend lost their lives to a local ‘brown’ bear (Grizzly in Canada).

In Puerto Eden, Chile, we ate meals at Dona Maria’s and watched the inauguration of President Obama on her television in the company of a celebrating American family, but missed seeing the edible seaweed Dona had been drying – her alternative food source.

Caleta Brecknock, Patagonia, Chile, #16 of Nick’s 50 destinations, was also visited by Traversay III. The immensity of the landscape was so fantastic; you can barely see our little boat in the lower right side of the photo. We were alone for a few days, then a BBC-chartered vessel arrived. We shared our dive photos with the photographer and got ‘mud’ maps for Antarctica… then made our plans to sail to Antarctica.

We did not see Robert Louis Stevenson’s epitaph printed on his tombstone in American Samoa, the poem from which Nick’s title Under Wide and Starry Skies is derived. Nor did we encounter the women of Twin Waterfall Bay in Vanuatu performing their bespoke Water Music while washing their clothes under the falls. However, I feel lucky to never have had one of Jenny’s experiences: while she was off-watch and relaxing with a book in the cabin, a curious colourfully-striped poisonous sea snake slid along her bare thighs! It must have come up through the cockpit drains and then wriggled up the companionway and into the boat.

One of their opportunities, which even well-travelled world sailors rarely get to, was Alkwasir Island near Khartoum Sudan in mid-Africa. This was during a posting with the Canadian Diplomatic Corp. Nick and Jenny relaxed with sailing during a continuous and terrifying spate of ‘terror-tourism’. His experiences are described in his earlier book entitled Collapse of a Country. We owe thanks to our diplomats who carry the burden of extending Canada’s good name and the possibility of a new life in our country to some war-torn and murderous postings. Nick describes the relief of leaving work and getting to the Blue Nile Sailing Club (established in 1926). The Club is poised at the junction between the Blue Nile and the White Nile. Here they competed on a Khartoum One Design – boats designed by Morgan Giles and fashioned from recycled galvanized steel to include buoyancy tanks, a retractable centreboard, a Bermuda-rigged mainsail and a jib.

Do not be like us and regret missing some of the many special places listed in this book. We had concentrated more on the cold and windy places and by-passed the world’s warmer and more accessible beauties!

The index makes it easy to reference the destinations that are of particular interest to you and your shipmate(s).

The book will be released in Canada on May 6th, 2025, so keep an eye out for when it is available in a bookstore near you! I don’t recommend getting the eBook version, because much of the book’s information is in the maps, and inspiration comes from the colour photos. The publisher, Adlard Coles, is feted in the nautical community for publishing the best information on a variety of marine subjects.

Nick is offering a special discount to BCA members: to get the Promo Code and place the order, one will need to log in to the BCA website, go to ‘Tradewinds Buy and Sell’ and then to ‘Discounts Offered to BCA Members’.

This book would make a wonderful gift to parents, family, or friends who are mistrustful of your ambition to leave your job, house, and belongings in order to sail your little boat off into the large and possibly dangerous world. They may well spend hours contemplating possible adventures you want to take, and which they can now share in the comfort of their smaller world!

Under Wide and Starry Skies will create dreams; if you are fortunate enough to own a sailboat, it will inspire you to GO. If you think your boat is too small, take courage from Nick and Jenny’s experience of having completed the described experiences in two small 27-foot sailboats: first Tarka the Otter, and now their current boat, Bosun Bird. As Nicholas states: “Don’t dally too long. It’s always later than you think.”

Nick and Jenny, July 2015, when we had the pleasure of meeting them at Amook Island on the west coast of Kodiak Island.

Royal Cruising Club (UK) – April 2025

Under Wide and Starry Skies is certainly not your average cruising guide. It comprises part sailing autobiography of its author and his wife in successive 27 foot cruisers over almost 40 years and 70,000 miles, and detailed descriptions of fifty very remote anchorages spread literally all around the globe.

Each of the chapters covering the destinations include interesting details of when and how Nicholas and Jenny Coghlan came to it, with an occasional cautionary tale of disaster narrowly avoided. The reader can chart the progression from celestial navigation (including attempting a theoretical method of obtaining position from a single sun sight when the sun was directly overhead) to electronic methods.

As the voyages described cover almost 40 years, many of the experiences and characters described will no longer be in existence, but they give a flavour of the location. In some cases the potted history of the area revealed fascinating snippets (e.g. how Thousand Islands Dressing was invented) and give useful background information.

The book includes entry formalities as at the time of writing but acknowledges that requirements change often with little or no notice, and current details are usually obtainable from the web. Equally health and security considerations may need to be updated before setting off.

This is, primarily, a very enjoyable read to while away the “off” season and dream about locations for future cruises. I am sure some of the more intrepid RCC sailors will say “Been there – done that” for some of the destinations, particularly the South Pacific and South Atlantic, but perhaps the Commodore might consider a special award for the first member to sail to Alkwasir Island , negotiating 6 cataracts on the Nile! The book is available from Adlard Coles at £19.80

W J C L

Sailing Today – April 2025

Coast (UK) – April 2025

Book Hub (New Zealand) – February 2025

Cruising Association (UK) – January 2025

Having sailed over 70,000 nm with his partner, Jenny, Nicholas Coghlan is well qualified to write about these 50 Sailing Destinations in Seas Less Travelled as the book is sub-titled. Split into five sections the destinations are numbered on the maps of a) North and South Pacific Ocean and b) North and South Atlantic and Indian Oceans. The following introduction clearly explains his reasons for encouraging sailors to expand their horizons to include a selection of places they have visited during the 40 years of sailing in their two yachts – both 27ft long.

The layout of each destination follows the same pattern which is well arranged. Each stopping place has an introductory story, starting with their very first offshore experience forty years ago. Nicholas calls these stories ‘essays’ but I think that is too staid a word as I was occasionally caught laughing out loud during my reading sessions; all well written with anecdotes and information in equal quantity. There are maps with the anchorage/marina noted as well as other points of interest visited, many pictures and a few sketches are also included which adds to the appeal of each area. The sections are completed by a page or two entitled ‘If you go…’ which contains the detailed information regarding the destination under headings such as Entry Formalities, Getting There, Distances, Weather etc.

The 327 pages of narrative are crammed with interesting stories and loads of informative material, even if some of these ‘essays’ are a bit dated the information in the panels is not. There is an Appendix, A Note on Charts, which makes for interesting reading covering as it does the decline in the production of paper charts and the rise of the use of Google Maps/Earth, plus charting information used within the book.

Reviewed by Sandy Duker