Three Years with Sylvia

The author fully expects the title of this book to lead the reader to expect an account of the goings-on between a man and his mistress. In a sense, that is what it is. Sylvia is a large ex-Baltic trading yacht who made outrageous demands on her lover's heart and pocket. For three years Mike Hoare and his family made her their home, sailing round the western Mediterranean in Sylvia and visiting many ports in Spain, France and North Africa, seeking and finding romance and adventure, strange places and great people.

Three Years with Sylvia is written in a lively style, and interspersed in the narrative are many anecdotes of the sea and sailors, and of earlier voyages undertaken by Hoare. Scattered here and there are also golden nuggets of truth about sailing and life.