Dedicated dinghy sailor Ken Fowler from Mudeford will complete a circumnavigation of every island off the coast of England and Wales today (Wednesday) with a lap of the Isle of Wight.
Raising funds for Lymington’s Oakhaven Hospice and Cancer Research UK, Ken will complete the 12-hour voyage around the isle in a single-handed dinghy called Yoda which is the “size of two bathtubs”.
It will be the 262nd island off the coastline Ken has circumnavigated in this way and is the culmination of a four-year fundraising odyssey covering more than 1,200 miles.
Ken set himself a target of raising £50,000 for charity after losing his father and other relatives to cancer. He has already smashed that fundraising target, having raised more than £64,000.
Ken said: “It’s been incredibly challenging. Not just the sailing but the driving very long distances to get to each location.
“Most of the time you can’t just launch and land – it’s not like setting off from a jetty as you do in Lymington.
“I usually have to carry the dinghy over a footpath or something to get to a beach.
“There have also been times when the weather just wasn’t right for sailing, so I’ve had a wasted drive, or I have to sit on an island for four hours waiting for the tide to change so I can complete a journey.
“At Lindisfarne, for example, I had to drive onto the island at low tide, set off when the tide was high again, and on my way back round I’m sailing past road signs that I drove past a few hours earlier.
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