In my teens, I dreamed of sailing all day and arriving in the early evening in some isolated cove, with a sandy beach, palm trees, a freshwater spring – and all the other things teenage boys dream of.

Well, these days, reality is slightly different but no less interesting.

On Friday, I sailed out of and arrived back in Plymouth – the sun shone, the wind blew hard enough, there were few boats around, Blue Mistress flew along – a fantastic sail. I didn’t arrive back to palm trees waving in the breeze but to a view that countless seamen have had reason to appreciate.

I took these in quick succession.

Before me was the Royal Citadel, with the Royal Plymouth Corinthian Yacht Club in the foreground.

Over there was Plymouth Hoe, where Sir Francis Drake was given news of the Spanish Armada – the lighthouse is Smeatons Tower brought ashore and rebuilt when it was replaced with the new Eddystone Lighthouse, ten miles offshore.

And, to starboard, was Mount Batten. My course lay in this direction.

The aim of this post is not to act as a tourist guide to Plymouth (although I’m happy to do so), but to note the excitement of coming to a mooring in the evening through waters that generation upon generation have used before – and generations will continue to use.

We must keep it right for them.