Ed was a huge sailing fan and owned small boats for most of his life.

From his tentative first attempts to learn the ropes by trial and error chartering a 20-foot gaff rigger on Oulton Broad to achieving his ultimate dream of owning his own yacht, Tekwennie the Sonata, that he kept at Island Harbour on the Isle of Wight, it was hard to keep him away from fiddling with boats and boat bits.

Eddie passed away peacefully in November 2023. He valued the freedom and independence that comes from being on the water. We think he would be very proud to know that he has enabled young people with disability to experience this for themselves.

This is why we've picked the Disabled Sailors Association as our chosen charity for anyone wanting to donate.

In 1993, Mike Wood, MBE, a wheelchair user, founded the Disabled Sailors Association. Since then, the charity has enabled 40,000 disabled people to sail in specially designed dinghies, yachts, and their existing Catamaran, The Spirit of Scott Bader.

Around 70% of their sailors are aged 4-25. Demand has increased considerably for young people wanting disabled sailing places, including those with the most complex disabilities.

The charity now needs to fundraise for a new specially built accessible catamaran to continue enabling disabled people to go sailing. 2023 is their 30th anniversary, which makes this an even more timely opportunity to support them.