About Us

The Gullivers

We met in the late 1980s at 1st Houghton (St. Michael’s) Venture Scouts, Tyne & Wear (UK), becoming engaged two years to the day of our first date. I (Bob) graduated with an IT degree in the summer of 1990, heading to Edinburgh to start my first IT job with GEC Ferranti Defence Systems. At the same time, Deborah headed south to Teeside University.

Five years to the day of our first date, Deborah having moved to Edinburgh, we married in April 1993, shortly after which we moved down to the Lanarkshire town of Biggar before starting our family.

Honi was born in Law Hospital, Lanarkshire, on May 1996, while Feni joined Team Gulliver 20 months later at St Antonius Hospital, Nieuwegein in January 1998, 4 weeks after we had moved to the Netherlands on a one-year job-related assignment.

Having met in such an environment we have always had a love for the outdoors.  A holiday doesn’t quite seem like a holiday unless it involves a tent and a day feels incomplete unless it involves something adventurous.  Our most passionate pastimes include skiing, cycling, sailing, hiking and scuba diving, but will throw ourselves at almost anything… although heights above about 2 feet of the ground tends to give me a nose bleed!

Bob Gulliver

Having spent the past 30 years working in IT for companies from GEC Ferranti Defence Systems, to United Distillers, Sun Microsystems, Galliford Try and Ricoh acround Europe and across the US, to PwC, Majid Al Futtaim, Ali Bin Ali and Leejam in the Middle East, I think I may have now retired from the industry… possibly… maybe… probably!

I am a PADI IDC Staff Instructor, Emergency First Response Instructor, RYA Coastal Skipper, and trying my best to at least catch Deborah up in sailing qualifications in the next couple of years… catching up with her from an experience perspective is already a lost cause, so I’m not even going there.

Since Deborah has supported my career since the early 1990s while bringing up Honi and Feni, I figure it’s payback time… so I am now proudly assuming the role of Britsail’s Admin and Chief Galley Maid, in addition to taking responsibility for always having another adventure or three in the works.

Deborah Gulliver

Starting her career in banking in Edinburgh and with a degree in mathematics, Deborah stayed at home to bring up Honi and Feni until they reached school age. We bought a delicatessen in Biggar shortly after both girls had started school which was fun for a while, but not something that Deborah could get passionate about.

An innocent family day out to take photographs of the Forth Bridge one cold February morning resulted in us buying a Topper Topaz Omega sailing dinghy. The sequence of events from that one purchase saw Deborah on RYA dinghy courses, an RYA Competent Crew course, a four-month RYA Yachtmaster Course, a sail from Fort William to St Lucia, becoming an RYA Cruising Instructor, sailing from Barbados to the Azores, becoming an RYA Ocean Yachtmaster Instructor, buying a 42ft yacht and founding our own RYA Training Centre, Britsail, at Kip Marina on the west coast of Scotland.

Deborah has been owner and Principal of Britsail since 2010, during which time she was also the Chief Instructor at Dubai Off-Shore Sailing Club between 2016-17.  Deborah is a PADI Master Scuba Diver, so is also more than qualified to join me in scrubbing the bottom of the yacht!

Countries Visited… so far!