As Trinovante settles into a straight run for England, we can think we’re not doing too badly, considering we only came together a couple of days ago, most of us with minimal sailing experience. Su and John essentially live on the boat from May until October, taking on up to eight paying crew to accompany them. Their sailing itineraries are planned on the basis of where they fancy going. This year, it was the Norwegian coast and up into the Arctic Circle. Apparently, this was a huge success and I was mad not to have sailed a leg with them: spectacular scenery, jaw-drop-ping fjords, remote fishing villages making them welcome, bitingly clear air. Jess enjoyed the trip so much, she signed up again for this Holland-to-England leg.

That’s typical of people who go sailing with Su and John: they come back. On this trip we also have Kim, a student, who is a friend of theirs and has been on board for a month. Peter, a teacher, and Mike, recently retired, both sail dinghies but want to learn about bigger boats. Chris, a fireman, wants to join the merchant navy. Both Mike and Chris had been out on Trinovante “taster weekends”.

Most crews are made up of people who want to do something a bit different and people who want to learn about sailing. And Su and John are excellent teachers. I write that as someone who has been on other sailing programmes as well as sailed other traditional vessels. Yes, as you’d expect, they run through the safety drills, escape routes, use of seacocks, life-jacket checks, knots and coilings... but their manner is such that you seem to be absorbing it by osmosis. It is because they are so laid-back in their approach. Hoisting the fisherman’s sail, for instance, means unfurling it the right way up on deck, attaching the right ropes to it (from the six or so on each rail) with the right knots and hauling it up into place. After we had been directed a couple of times, Su and John just left us to get on with it, and we grasped how to do it much better as a result. Similarly, I have never been very confident about holding a course, but left alone on the helm, I began to get a feel for it. With someone at your elbow constantly telling you as soon as the edge of the sail flutters, or the compass swings minutely off, you stop paying attention to the art of steering and simply respond to instructions. On Trinovante, I was on the helm for hours without any overbearing assistance and felt the more confident for it in the end. Given half a chance, Su will explain the working principles of blocks and tackles, and produce a model boat and some string to illustrate the art of mooring. Nothing is pushed, but if you want, you can learn a vast amount.

The conversation is enlightening, too. Unlike with friends or work colleagues, when you are eight relative strangers stuck together in close proximity, you can’t gossip or bitch, so you end up rediscovering conversation. The running themes of our trip w e r e w h a t sanction can an ethical system have w i t h o u t b e l i e f i n God? And w h a t i s the point of fashion? Or possibly, what is the point of fashion without a belief in God?... Sometimes I would take a book off to a quiet part of the deck.

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“Land ho!” someone shouted. I leapt up from my book, my feet flew from under me on the wet, heeling deck and I skidded on my back down from windward, only stopping when my feet jammed either side of the scuppers. There was a barely suppressed laugh from the helm. I opened my book again and lay there, pretending I preferred reading flat on my back on a wet deck, before looking quizzically back at the helm and thinking perhaps this is why (as you’ll discover when you sort out your holiday insurance) offshore sailing is classed as an extreme sport.

We had sailed about the IJsselmeer and moored in Hoorn before setting out to cross the North Sea. Now, back in England, we perused the east coast, checking out the River Blackwater before sailing back up to Ipswich – pretty much the area where the ancient Briton Trinovante tribe lived in Roman times. What you learn is to work with the elements, the run of the tide, the vagaries of the wind, and you feel the boat respond to them.

On the helm, as you come about to tack, you feel the boat start to lose its way as you shift the wind to the other side, then the sails fill again and it lifts away. Just as satisfying is releasing the staysail so that it can swing over on the tack and, in fact, just as pleasing for me is hearing the same terms that have served for hundreds of years - “Helm’s alee,” “Let fly!” - and to know that my undoing one particular knot is called “letting slip the lizard”.

John might be indulging me by throwing in some antiquated terms, but boats, especially traditional ones, are romantic. I was out in the bow bundling up the smaller jib when Su revealed that John had bought it at auction and it had come from Sir Francis Chichester’s Gipsy Moth. Imagine that, handling the sail that made that historic voyage. It’s quite something.

Travel details Trinovante starts sailing again next May, with three-night “taster weekends” from Ipswich for £345pp. The summer voyages, May to July, explore the Norwegian fjords and the Arctic Circle; nine-night passages cost £895, 14 nights £1,395. Trinovante then sails through the Western Isles down to the east of Ire-land, across to Wales, around the West Country and back to Ipswich in September. Various passages of six and seven nights are available at £545 to £695.

The full itinerary and more about Trinovante can be found at www.schoonersail.com , along with an indication of the type of sailing expected on each leg, from sheltered day sailing to offshore overnight passages. Contact 01702 463356 or info@ schoonersail.com.

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