Man Sailing and Gunships

Last Sunday's sailing was tough and I have classed it as proper man sailing - apologies to all women sailors!

The Barman and I had the boat going to Brightlingsea and once the estuary opened up we got the Xenon going like a speedboat. Now the forecast said it was going to be a managable F4 wind which was perfect; unfortunately it was much stronger. On return and checking the Brightlingsea Sailing Club website (see above) we had been out in a F6 gusting +30 knots.

When we started to plane off Brightlingsea, I have to admit I was starting to get a little scared, not necessarily because of the wind but the size of the waves that we started to hit and the fast approaching shoreline directly ahead of us. To add to the man-sailing day an Apache AH64 gunship flew overhead as we were bombing along looking cool.

Now the real challenge was getting 8km back up river and maintaining control (i.e. not capsizing); as a result my tacks became real girly (I've made my apologies already).

Problems came when we found a mud bank opposite Arlesford Creek and came to a sharp halt; I had managed to get the nose pointing back down wind before both centre board and the rudder had to come up.  We then found ourselves on a very difficult to control run in a foot of water, all lines on the rudder snapped again(!) and the tiller looked like it was going to break as I tried to keep us straight - it started not to be so much fun. I wasn't able to get the rudder back down properly so we had to limp the last 4km back in to Wivenhoe. All in all an exciting and challenging sail.

Update on dress in the boat - it is time for wetsuits.

Brave 3rd Sail

Sunday, 17 May 2009

"Er...Captain Hook, have you seen the weather report?", my new sailing buddy asked on the phone.

"Of course! Of course! I checked and it was a F5 and I'm positive that it is going to die down by this evening"

"Er...okay as long as you're happy...Ray who knows at the club says winds are 50m.p.h...."

Pah!...Seemed fine to me when I checked on the net a week before.

In between meeting my buddy at the club house I took the wife for a driving lesson and found a beach further up the coast at St Osyth. We parked and stepped out to look over the sea wall. HOLY COW!! - it really was blowing a gale and there were massive waves crashing into the beach. This was no time for cowards or to show any fear!!!

Launch time 5:30pm (high tide of course!!). Main sail reefed and jib furled (not for long though).
No problemo!!!.
Well I say no problem but because of the wind we were restricted to a 500 yard run in front of the club house.

It was brilliant though. We raced up and down that stretch like a speed boat and for the first time, I really was able to put the boat through a few of her paces - and she through mine.

Getting out the water...there's a challenge when the F5 gusting F7 is blowing straight towards the slipway. The answer is to come in as slow as possible, turn at the last moment and make use of all that lovely mud to land on - then dropping the sales as fast as you can.

Special note - New race-sailing buddy found. He knows what he is doing which helps on this machine.