The pitfalls and pleasure of owning my classic yacht

Jason Beattie’s 1938 cutter Cumulus turns heads, but there are some costly realities that come with owning a beautiful piece of history

The motor launch headed towards us at speed across Chichester Harbour and then pulled up sharply alongside. ‘Can I just say,’ said a rather posh sounding man, ‘she’s a thing of rare beauty.’

A couple of days earlier we were sailing from our home port of Brighton towards the Solent when a yacht on the port tack began bearing down on us.

As...