Mr Wise and his wife Linda sailed from their home in Dubai

I had just bought the catamaran two days before and this was its maiden voyage.

We'd looked at the electronic charts which indicated that it was a marina and offered safe anchorage, we'd looked at the admiralty charts that indicated it was perfectly ok and we'd consulted three or four local so-called sailing experts.

We motored into it at 3.30 on a Friday afternoon in Ramadan. I suspect that everybody was asleep at that stage.

We were looking to drop anchor, and suddenly two gun boats came roaring out at us, slammed into both sides and we had about 10 armed men on the boat shouting at us and informing us that we had done some sort of crime.

We were apprehended, tied to the quay and put under guard.

We were never accused or charged with anything for the full period of our detention Rupert Wise

To be frank, we were treated fine. We were treated courteously, we were always given food, and I have no complaints whatsoever.

At the individual level, I have no complaints at all about the Iranians we came into contact with.

We had about five or six interrogation teams - from the navy, from the ministry of information, the judiciary, the ministry of foreign affairs, the judiciary in Tehran, the navy in Tehran, etc, etc.

I'm never too certain [about why they apprehended us].

Spies?

I think they thought this was some subtle form of spying, perhaps. But that went away in the first half hour of questioning.

Then they thought it was some subtle probe, perhaps as to the ownership of island. Again, that went away.

Rupert Wise said the worst moment was being seized for a second time

We were never accused or charged with anything for the full period of our detention.

[We had contact] with our family, but were repeatedly denied access to the Foreign Office and indeed we were forbidden to say where we were.

We were kept under lock and key, not allowed out, armed guards outside, guards inside, for the full period of our detention.

We were hostages.

Initially they had the impression that we had infringed Iranian territorial waters, but if that is a crime then 10,000-plus ships and boats are going into national territorial waters all around the world without permission, but clearly Iran would have its own particular view on that.

No charges were ever put against us.

High-speed escape

The worst moment was when the ministry of foreign affairs said we could go last Monday.

We had the ticket, we were at the airport, we were in the charge of the British Embassy and then the judiciary from Tehran intervened.

They took us off the British Embassy, overruled the ministry of foreign affairs and put us on a flight to Tehran.

We landed in Tehran, and carted straight into a mini-van with curtains round the windows.

We went out at very, very fast driving speed. About four minutes out we screamed to a halt, changed vehicles - presumably to throw off the British ambassador and team who were in the airport building waiting for us.

'Clueless'

And then we went to where we were being put up which was ironically a five-star hotel, one of the finest in Tehran, although about 30 years out of date.

They treated us fine, but with absolutely no information as to what we were doing there, what was happening and repeated denial of access to our embassy.

The guys looking after us were always very courteous, but always referred to higher authority and looked completely clueless when we asked what was going on.