BEN WOOD MEMORIAL BUOY - SOLENT

13 January 2024 - UPDATE

Thank you all for your amazing and generous donations. As many of you may know (power of Facebook and all that), we've managed to secure enough to cover a mark for five years. I'm just in the process of finalising this with Mary at Cowes Week Ltd and making the payment. For transparency, I have set up a dedicated account in my name for all payments and will continue to accept any further donations via this page. Once the five years is up, I'll come back to you all with the balance we've not used and we can either extend the tenure, or make a donation / memorial else where in his name. I will leave that decision to the masses, however I wanted you all to know the money you all donated is safe and also pays some interest which I'll add to the donation pot.

As soon as everything is confirmed and we have the mark officially allocated, Led and I will be in touch with how best to launch it and if anyone wants to be involved we'll let you all know. The Protis team have some his ashes to scatter around the mark ; we thought that would be fitting. Sadly we can't call the mark Ben F***k, but we've gone with BEN F WOOD, but we all know what the F stands for!

Thank you all, he'd be hating all this fuss, but secretly chuffed to bits I'm sure.

Thank you all so much for coming to Ben’s memorial event last weekend and sharing your personal, and at times colourful anecdotes about the man that was Ben F**k. The love and admiration in the room for him was overwhelming. For those unable to come in person, your heartfelt messages of support and love were so kind, you were very much with us in spirit.

The mix of emotions on the evening were immense; sad, proud but overall, we smiled and laughed at his antics and truly celebrated how much he meant to us all. The evening will stay with us all, his family and friends, for a long time. We hope it helped you all as much as it did us.

Led mentioned on the evening, our wish is to arrange a racing mark (for non-sailing folks, a buoy!) bearing his name, to be placed in the Solent. We would like to ensure this lasts as long as possible. Cowes Week Ltd, who manage the marks, advise the cost will be around £1,200 per year, however they may throw in a few free years if we can fund 8+years upfront.

We are hoping that you all as Ben’s friends and family will be able to help us raise enough money to keep this memorial mark to him as long as possible.

Along with Led, as Ben’s sister, I will be taking responsibility for all donations that are made and the money raised will be kept in a separate account in my name and only used to pay Cowes Week Ltd when they invoice us for the placement of the buoy. Led is in charge (heaven help us all) for ensuring it is in a suitable place.

Thank you once again for your kindness and in advance, thank you for your donation.

With love,

Liz (Mum), Rachel, Hannah, Joe & Minh xxxx

BEN WOOD : 22 SEPTEMBER 1964 – 30 JULY 2023