What you should know before the voyage

The following is more likely to put you off sailing with us before you book, if you are not the same sort of people we are. If you know how historic tall ships work, or if you read these lines carefully, we can spare some of you needless arguments and others needless disappointment. Put simply:

Anyone after a powerful experience will love La Grace. Anyone who mistakes us for a five-star hotel should please look elsewhere.

What we consider to be the differences between travelling with us and any trip you might take with travel agencies elsewhere

If you decide to sail on a ship, the first thing you have to come to terms with is the age-old rule that the captain's decision is law. He will of course try to accommodate you, but you need to bear in mind that the captain sees things in context — the safety of the ship and crew, the weather, the needs of the ship and of everyone else aboard. His decision is final and cannot be overruled.

Just as we are not a travel agency, generating profit is not our aim either. Yes, from the point of view of the law and taxes we were forced to set up a limited company, but we don't behave the way one would expect in these capitalist times. Our aim was to bring together people with the same interest, to build this ship together, to sail her across seas and oceans and to raise only as much money for her operation as La Grace needs in order to live. That is why we do a great many things ourselves and with the help of hundreds of volunteers. It may surprise you, but we don't know how to do it any other way.

A sailing ship is not a bus. Although we plan our routes carefully so that they are realistic, we can never guarantee in advance with complete certainty that nothing will stop us reaching the planned destination, or reaching it on time. It can also happen that the sea is running so high that crews cannot be changed over at the intended place. Be prepared for the possibility that you may have to make your own way to or from the ship.

When choosing how to travel to the ship, think carefully about whether the airlines will stress you out and whether, in your haste to buy a cheap ticket at once, you will then find yourself buying a new one. If you really are in a hurry, at least book a flight to the main airport for the region; you can always arrange the last leg locally. Travel to and from the ship is always at your own expense.

A chapter of its own is people who book not only their travel but their accommodation on the spot a year in advance. We live in a world where booking.com will find you a bed anywhere in ten minutes. There is no need to worry about losing your accommodation because the changeover point has moved. Our advice is not to do it.

A big problem is the size of La Grace, for which many ports may not have room, and so we simply change crews at anchor and ferry people by dinghy. We know how to do it, it's not a problem.

If we expect a change, we will let you know as soon as possible using the contact details you gave us. If everything is going to plan we do not call, and we confirm the changeover point only to those who ring the ship themselves, the day before or on the day of the changeover. Many of you follow us on AIS (the ship's position online) or read the Captain's Log, so you keep track yourselves.

La Grace has her limits. She is certainly not a luxury yacht. If you have come here to experience what an 18th-century sailor felt, you will be pleasantly surprised. But if you mistake our ship for a five-star hotel, you may be disappointed. Glass and marble are far easier to keep clean than wood, and although the ship is cleaned every day, it will never look the same. Which is really just as well. Even so, if you are unhappy with how things look, please tell the captain straight away. We will all roll up our sleeves together and get it into a state that is acceptable to everyone and, of course, achievable.

We plan the routes of our voyages carefully in advance, on the basis of many years of experience, so that they can realistically be completed in the time the ship is available to you. We do not chase nautical miles for the sake of an entry in a logbook. Night sailing is only part of a passage or an experience in its own right, never an attempt to wear the permanent crew into the ground. Much also depends on your abilities — in other words, we set only as much sail as you learn to handle. And not least, the weather has the final say in the choice of route. La Grace is not just some chartered boat to us, and because we want to preserve her for future generations, we do not needlessly batter her in gales just for the thrill of it. Anyone who happens to catch a strong gale will simply lie in a sheltered bay or a safe harbour and make trips around the area. We sail safely and at an easy pace.

There are people on board who look after your safety and take care of the professional running of the ship, including your training. There are yachts where, for entirely different money, you hire servants; with us you get a command. On La Grace we will teach you everything and help you with everything, but you are this ship's driving force. Without you it will not work, because, as we like to say: on La Grace there will be only what we take care of together.

A voyage on La Grace is for people who live actively, or for those content to be lazy in the role of guests. At the same time you need to realise that keeping this complicated ship in good technical order means working on her continuously. Each day one of our four watches takes the bosun's duty, which acts as a working party assisting the permanent crew. We do not expect you to slave away all day, and we naturally try to make it interesting shipboard work, such as sail repairs or splicing rope. But who knows what will be needed at the time. This too is what sets a voyage on a historic ship apart from an ordinary luxury charter.

Until 2026 La Grace could not produce drinking water herself, and we managed all the same. It regularly happened, especially in the summer months off Elba, that water was short and none was to be had. Today we can make our own, but we still go easy on water aboard. It is no hardship. We wash the dishes and ourselves in salt water and use fresh water only for cooking — and it works. The ship's bathrooms have both salt sea water (filtered) and fresh water. You can comfortably wash from head to toe in salt water, and those who really need to can rinse off with fresh. That saves the most drinking water. If, however, drinking water consumption is too high during the week, the crew will be forced to switch to the so-called Atlantic system, where fresh water runs only in the galley. Salt water remains available at all times. Asking you to save water is a matter of common sense, not a wish to restrict you. Please respect it.

There is no hot water in the ship's showers, neither salt nor fresh. Thank you for understanding.

La Grace faces the same problems as every hotel and guesthouse, including the luxury ones. There is never any guarantee that someone will not drag some sort of vermin aboard in a rucksack — fleas, cockroaches, bedbugs and the like. We cannot disinfest all of you from head to toe, rucksack included, before you step aboard, so we fumigate the whole ship regularly. What we would very much like to ask is that you take care where you sleep on your way to the ship and where you put your bags down. In the case of cockroaches, something as silly as buying a case of beer in the local supermarket and then quite naturally wanting to stow it aboard, cardboard box and all — please do not. Those little beetles live in shop storerooms, and a moment's inattention by the permanent crew is all it takes for us to have them on board. It does not happen, but it cannot be ruled out, and dealing with it afterwards would be extremely unpleasant for all of us. It happens in the best of families. If we do not find the culprit who brought the vermin aboard, we are all affected equally, and it is therefore, logically, not regarded as grounds for complaint.

We are not a hotel and it is beyond us to have your bed linen laundered. We are sorry, but you must bring a sleeping bag or a clean blanket to the voyage, and above all a sheet for the bunk and a pillowcase. At a pinch a T-shirt will do for the pillow, but a sheet is essential so that we can guarantee the most hygienic environment possible for the cadets who come after you. Please respect this.

Every country has its own laws, often silly ones, and we are obliged to obey them. In Italy, for example, a ship may not anchor closer than 100 m to a rocky shore or 182,5 m from a beach — yes, that far out. In trying to protect swimmers from the shore, this rule endangers swimmers from ships, who then have a long way to swim. If swimming is dangerous in a given spot, we deal with it by bathing from the ship or landing on the beach by paddleboard, because not even our motor tender is allowed near the shore.

Possession of any drugs, including soft drugs such as marijuana, is strictly forbidden aboard. After past experience we reserve the right to search any participant and to expel with immediate effect and without compensation anyone found with drugs. Maritime law has zero tolerance, so it is not permitted to carry drugs even for personal use. If a drugs inspection finds drugs on board, the sentence is 10 years for the person who had them, an unjust 10 years for the captain as well, and the ship is confiscated. You will understand, then, that we have no intention of risking it. Please respect this.

These are difficult times. Everything is going up in price to the point where some of the things we buy for the ship cost twice what they did a year or two ago. We keep our prices at the lowest level of any tall ship we know, because we want to keep La Grace available to everyone and to hold on to the people who have been coming to us for years. With a few economies aboard we more or less manage. But unless the economics of this world change, it will catch up with us eventually. Until then we are choosing the gradual route in raising our prices. Even though inflation in the Czech Republic runs at between 15 and 20 %, our prices rise by only 5 % year on year, which is also written into our terms and conditions. Please allow for this.

For the same reason we cannot afford to give discounts on voyages. Please do not ask us for them.

Although in 16 years of sailing La Grace we have had barely any experience of complaints, and those who know us and sail with us would consider these lines needless scaremongering, we would rather avoid sailing with people who would not be happy with us aboard a historic ship. So we would ask you, finally: if anything above strikes you as a problem for you personally, we quite understand if you do not come. We are trying to point it out before you book your voyage. You hereby acknowledge that we do not regard any of it as grounds for a complaint afterwards.

Thank you for understanding.