Who Are We?

Baileys Int’ Wild are a family of three who have long been outdoorsy types and who know the outdoors helps us to remain sane, but who have been struggling the last few years with physical health problems. These issues have been exacerbated time and time again, especially when we have tried to make recoveries, and this has then led to us having mental health and anxiety troubles (which we want to be honest about).

Personally I (Emma), have climbed multiple mountains in the UK (Yr Wyddfa/Snowdon over 40 times), camped, run, hiked, canoed, abseiled etc. I have water-skied on Windermere, done charity drives in the Lake District, cycled 20 miles (32.19 km), to swim in Yorkshire lakes, and spent not only a significant proportion of my young adult life outdoors, but I worked outdoors and spent most of my childhood outdoors too. You know the type, bin liners over my socks, so I could play in the snow blizzards in the Pennines a little longer in the 80s, swimming in the canal, hide and seek in ferns and making dens everywhere. I even started to learn to fly, and I’ve played the drums since I was 11.

My children grew up similarly. We used to go to local forests to splash in puddles and hunt for faeries, and we went to the beaches in terrible weather to see dramatic surf, play in the wind and enjoy having the beach to ourselves. We used to paddle and cycle for miles, and we’d pick up tree dead fall in the Autumn to do home crafts with.

Then I ended up in a wheelchair because of lung problems. For about 15 years, I have been struggling to move, and my daughter Cerys has been doing what she can to take care of me (caring for me from the age of 13). Our family as a whole stopped being able to be outdoors, and ultimately we all suffered. We had lost our happy place. Wheelchairs are not particularly nimble when it comes to mountain trails, fine sandy beaches and sand dunes, and gravel tracks with the slightest of inclines, can cause havoc, and further injuries.

My arm strength had withered to nothing, and I could barely even move myself about on anything but a perfectly flat surface. Cerys and Jacob usually do all the work to get me to the ends of breakwaters, or into forests. Something I am thankful for. Powered chairs cost many thousands of pounds, and only a rare few I’d be able to take with me in the car (if we can lift them in).

Cerys and Jacob also struggle. Cerys has Crohn’s, which has been causing havoc with her body, such that Jacob had to take over supporting me, so that we could both together, support Cerys. Jacob also has a few learning difficulties, and problems socially. All in all, it makes for a family that society tries to condemn to sit in our home, never truly having any more adventures ever again. That feels hopeless.

Luckily, we think we have found a few ways to solve what we feel to be an endlessly hopeless situation. In 2022, we stumbled onto a charity called SEAS Sailability that operates in North Wales, on the Menai Strait (now SEAS All Afloat), and so we went along to have a look. SEAS offer a range of activities that allow people with physical impairments, and their carers and family, to come along and experience being out on the water. Having someone come up to you and ask, “what would YOU like to do”, nearly made me cry with happiness. They have teams of people lifting and supporting people onto, and back off, of a range of watercraft.

So, we tried some Canadian Canoes, and their Wheelyboat (think D-Day landing craft for wheelchairs), and Cerys played on a Kayak for a while. But, it wasn’t until I asked if we could go on one of the 20ft (6.1 m), sailboats I could see, did we find our one of our new passions.

Quite simply, sailing blew us away. Wow.

We motored out the first time, the engine was cut, the sails hoisted by the volunteers, we picked up the wind, and they handed me the tiller. From that moment on, we knew it was the solution. Cerys and I, that day, came away smiling from ear to ear. Unfortunately, as wonderful as SEAS is, however, they are volunteers, and are obviously subject to staff numbers, and the tide. We could only actually get onto the pontoon when the ramp was at its least steep, which meant high tides only. That combination meant we might only get out three times in the year.

It wasn’t enough to satiate our cabin fever at home, and our need for adventure, so we needed another solution. So, in October 2022, we bought our very first sailing boat, called Firefly. She was moored in Conwy harbour at the time, and was in not just in a dire state of repair, but had also previously been sunk, too.

So now we are restoring her (slowly), and our ultimate aim is to sail from North Wales, up the west coast of the UK, into the Caledonian Canal, through Loch Ness, and on to Inverness. Where we go from there, we have no idea, but there are bound to be smaller trips before and after, in and around North Wales, over to Ireland and the Isle of Man.

Firefly has given us a sense of purpose. She gets us outdoors, even if we’re just pulling barnacles from her, and she allows us to use some of our skills as we restore her. When she’s done, we’ll learn to sail her, and we’ll be exploring perhaps the only outdoor space left for us all to enjoy together.

Addendum: In the years since we have been restoring her, we have also fallen in love with kayaking. Sea kayaking specifically, and while we do paddle our fair share of lakes in an effort to not just get out of the house, but try to manage our conditions, it’s the sea that we love the most. Two of us have joined a canoe club, progressed through pool sessions, and are now pushing on to gain our Sea Kayak Awards.

Hopefully that explains our motives for this website and our social channels. Our little adventures give us hope, and while it is nice to share them with you all, one day the pain will be too much, and the conditions too difficult to overcome, and on that/those day(s), these adventures will bring happiness, and peace.

Baileys Int’ Wild