When residents of Apple House care home set sail yesterday and steered a course to fulfil a dream, it was aboard Knoticat catamaran from Poole on a grey day with turbulent skies.  Spirits, though, were high and smiles evident as the ten metre vessel took to the water, steered by a cheerful skipper and his crew and with plenty of hot tea!

Knoticat is owned and operated by the charity Sports Forum for the Disabled with the aim of giving all disabled and carers the opportunity to sail and enjoy the beautiful waters in and around Poole harbour.

“We sail every weekday when the weather allows from early April to late September and all trips are made under the watchful eye of highly experienced and qualified skippers.

The day starts at Poole Quay Boat Haven entrance on Poole Quay, where we pick up our passengers and help fit life jackets before entering the marina. Once on board a short safety briefing is given and any questions you have can be answered. We leave the marina and once into clear water you are welcome to help with sailing or just sit back and enjoy the ride. The trips usually last 3 to 4 hours around Poole harbour, out to Studland and along the Jurassic coast or towards Bournemouth. We normally anchor for lunch and make tea or coffee.  

Twice a year the boat goes on deployment for a week to Lymington or Weymouth.

As far as we know, Knoticat is the only FREE, seagoing, modified sailing boat for disabled use in Britain.

Everyone who works with Knoticat is a volunteer. Our sailing trips are only made possible by the generosity of those who support us with donations. Every penny goes towards keeping knoticat on the water for our disabled members to enjoy.” — Sports Forum for the Disabled.

What an amazing day it was, our sincere thanks going to the skipper and crew of Knoticat. We look forward to next time!

— Jayne Jackson, Registered Manager, Apple House Care Home.

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We are thrilled to be able to benefit from a quite remarkable charitable organisation called New Forest and District Sailability.

NFDS state on their website:

New Forest and District Sailability (NFDS) is based at Spinnaker Sailing Club, Ringwood and enables people with disabilities to enjoy the exciting sport of sailing. You can learn to sail a dinghy, sit back and relax whilst someone else takes you for a trip, take part in races.

All this within the safe confines of our beautiful lake in the heart of the New Forest.

As you can see from our photos, (kindly shared with the permission of those featured), Sailability is quite simply FUN!  D and J once again demonstrated their prowess in steering and navigation, while C supervised the entire operation from HQ (café).

In addition to sailing, D will also be undertaking waterskiing lessons with Sailability during the summer.  This is not the first time that he has mastered this very difficult challenge so we look forward to cheering from the lakeside again!  Our very own ‘James Bond,’ D will also be taking to the air in a helicopter to celebrate a milestone birthday, having previously had a flying lesson in a light aircraft.

— JM