As much as I love this boat, I've always wondered what the "Ray" in Ray Class meant. Regular contributor John Simpson gave me my answer. He writes: "Also read your boat blog on the Alan Buchanan's 'Ray' class, lovely boat. Funnily enough when I started offshore yacht racing when I was seventeen, his boats were all the rage and very sucessful and the 'Ray' is a deeper water channel out in the Thames at Leigh, where I was bought up!"

I am the proud owner of the Ray class yacht Julia, gaff-rigged centreboarder built in 1951 at Wyatt's yard, by John Milgate. Unfortunately at some stage her cabin was cut in half (!), making the accommodation cramped to say the least. We sail mainly on the Alde in Suffolk, and associated estuaries. I was told the name comes from the Ray channel or the Ray sands, as the centreboard version is ideally suited to creek creeping. She lives on the Alde at Slaughden, and in a mudberth in the winter. Upkeep is ongoing!