First trip with guests

Summer and Lotus accompanied me on Wednesday afternoon, we planned a beach trip to East Head Sands and a little sailing.
The weather was disappointing, chilly, bit grey and very light wind.
we motored to the anchorage, Summer dropped the anchor beautifully, and then she rowed ashore with Lotus, taking towels and snacks. I was going to swim. We were about 20 yards off the beach. The tide was about 2.5 hours after high water, and I saw it flowing fast past the anchored boat, but estimated that the stream would carry me onto the uncovering sand spit at the western edge of the anchorage. Although it pulled, at first I thought, "I can manage this", however, as I got nearer to the beach, the current increased hugely and I felt myself being swept round the point. "Help" I shouted, I was only about 2 metres out, and Summer thought I was making a big deal of nothing, luckily remembering the sand bank, I put my foot down, and was immensely relieved to find that I was only in about 2 ft of water. Even so, it was hard to stand up. My first thought was to get Lotus away from the edge. I could see how the contour of the beach indicated the swiftness of the stream, it was steep, almost undercut at that point, we moved to the shallow sloping bay and the water was much kinder.
Later in the day I saw people swimming from the same place, but after the tide had slackened considerably.
Phew!

Before hauling up the anchor!

Sailing with a quiff, 

Next day we had stronger NE winds and still iron grey sky, we did a little sail up the Emsworth Channel and back, Lotus and her bubble mix cheered up the few sailors that were around.

Out to Sea!!!

The weekend, and we need to test the work on the oil leak.
Was it all the fault of a dodgy dipstick? Saturday sees us watering at the visitors pontoon at Chichester Marina, mooring up was a better job than last time, but still only 5/10, at least we were unobserved this time.

We want to set out of Chichester Harbour and sail to Bembridge on the Isle of Wight, I have done the Passage Planning

and also added a GPS to the gadget collection. This is a Garmin 12 handheld that was a gift from my mum when we started doing geocaches several years ago. Combining it with the Power Monkey Extreme to keep it on charge, it works well.

Here I must thank the people at PowerTraveller, my gadget had developed a fault the previous weekend, and they sent a very nice lady down with a replacement to meet us at Dell Quay before we set off.
Check them out: http://www.powertraveller.com/

The engine looked great, no oil was leaking, the tides were accomodating, but the wind was a little stronger than either of us would have liked. Instead of heading south at Sparkes Marina, (the entrance of the Harbour) we turned north and had a pleasant sail into Emsworth.
Once again we failed to get to the pub because we misjudged a marker and speant a few hours on the mud.

However an early start next morning got us down the Emsworth Channel and out to sea!

Leaving West Pole Beacon and off to the Solent

We never actually got to Bembridge because we needed the same tide to come in on. Coming into Chichester Harbour on Spring tides as it was, and with South or South Westerly winds the window is 3 hours before and one hour after High Water. We guessed that turning back towards home at 13.00 would give us the last opportunity to get in with that window.
We slightly overran, and also the wind had picked up, this illustrated  the importance of  local
 advice. Because it is so shallow here, and the tide floods out at over 1 knot, with the wind against it the sea can get very choppy. We enjoyed the exhilaration of it, but wouldn't want to get caught out.

There wasn't enough time and tide to take us back to Dell Quay, now, so we repaired to our favourite anchorage East Head Spit, for lunch and rest. I was getting a bit grumpy because I was developing an ache in the back of my left knee which J later diagnosed as Baker's Cyst, he's had it and I now know I wasn't quite as sympathetic about it as I should have been. Sorry.

The wind continued all afternoon and by evening we observed an extaordinary caper; one of the few yachts left dry attempted to sail off. It was one of those big sleek shiny ones that Chichester Harbour is full of, they hoisted all sail even though the entire stern was clear of the water, suddenly they lifted and flew off heeling towards an anchored catamaran, the helmsman must have bottled it because she swerved sharply and hit the bottom again with a thud. From our perspective it looked as though they would have cleared the catamaran if they'd held their nerve. Anyway it was a sight to see. sorry, didn't have the camera to hand.

Hoping to be home by midnight, we set off up the Itchenor Channel by moonlight, the wind had completely dropped and it was a magical, quiet night, not really enough water under us to get home, we scraped and bumped the last bit as the tide caught up with us.

Sleepover with the girls

Can't stay away too long.
Introduced Tiffany and Lotus to Mahaska on Wednesday evening. They were exemplary guests, even to the extent of using the boatyard's adequate but unluxurious loo for "number 2s" before getting the tender out. On the boat they were thrilled by everything, although Lotus did ask me where my "big boat" is. (I think she is referring to the screen saver photograph of Jand I on a 100ft pilot cutter.)
There wasn't time to do more than eat and sleep, and I was slightly disappointed that they didn't enjoy the contrasts of high and low tides because it was high when they went to bed and high when we left next morning. but there will be time for all that!
They are ready for their next adventure.

No sailing this weekend....

Motored to Chichester Marina to have Mahaskah in deep water for the engineer from Bukh to have a look at the oil leak, the diesel drip and the lumpy exhaust sleeve.
In spite of forgetting the keys and the oars for the tender, we had an uneventful and pleasant short trip, walked back in the evening light along the coastal path for a surprisingly good supper of fish and chips at The Crown and Anchor.


The spire of Chichester Cathedral is on the horizon



East Head Spit anchorage

The dropping anchor part was not exemplary, and the anchor has to be pulled up by hand every time it's dropped in the wrong place, which was twice.

Drying out at East Head Spit

Anyway, once we got ourselves sorted  J spent time going through all the lockers and cupboards to discover dozens of spanners, boxes of spares (some of them in original 70's packaging) assorted screws, coils of ropes of different thicknesses....

I unraveled the mystery of the stuck compass. Not stuck, in fact, massively deviated by the magnetic force exerted on it by the music system speakers.
The previous owner's priorities are becoming clearer.
Taking away the speaker still results in about 17 degrees of deviation, this is surely too much.

Sorting out the compass is now added to the list of jobs to do:

• fix the oil leak
• replace or repair  the log
• service the outboard engine
• a new clock

I must get J to contribute to the blog as Chief Engineer, he has already begun to get intimate with the engine.

One problem solved to my great satisfaction is how to recharge devices away from shore power. we are relying on phones and downloaded tide timetables for knowing tidal heights etc, so it's important to keep the phones and ipod charged. I have bought something called a Power Monkey Extreme. it stores enough charge for all the gadgets to be replenished, and can be reloaded with juice by solar panels tied onto the boom on a sunny day.

It will also recharge the hand held VHF, and if we decide we want one, a hand held GPS. 

Although maybe the smart phone can stand in for that? I am currently researching how useful the phone can be. I have just installed an app called Navionics, which is practically a chart plotter, and is highly rated by many on the Yachting and Boating World Forum.

More first adventures

So keen we are! Back on the boat in a tidal/daylight window of about 1 hour on Friday evening; beginning to feel that loading the tender with food and bedding and rowing across the river is a part of our regular routine. We stowed our gear and went to bed.
The mission for the next day was to collect water from the pontoon at Itchenor.

During the morning, while waiting for the tide John discovered the Tomahawk Plaque.

Disappointingly we discovered that the oil leak hasn't been cured by replacing the seal on the water pump.

At Itchenor pontoon, John moored up nervously but without incident and we filled the small tank with fresh water. The pontoon is very busy with cyclists taking the Ferry over to Bosham for the Salterns cyle path, with yachts waiting to pick up guests and with the water taxi, so we were glad to have got in easily enough. 

However, on the way out, not so good: I threw off the bowline too soon, without waiting for J's shout and as a result Mahaskah started to drift into a large shiny yacht, J was able to push her away but then had to motor out and circle back to pick me up. 

Learning curve: communication and response.

The next learning curve was even more dramatic. Motoring into Bosham Channel, dinghies everywhere, J asked me to take the tiller. There were a couple of Toppers or Lasers heading towards us across the channel. Their sails obscured their view of our approach, I should have swung out behind them immediately, but hesitated too long, and the upwind dinghy collided with our bow. 

The safety boat driver took our details and we expect a bill for sail repair. 

We were very shaken up and shocked by this, and took ourselves off to Pilsley Island anchorage for pause and reflection.

Learning curve: the person holding the tiller has total responsibility in a situation like this, and needs to be completely with it. 

When we had recovered from our self-imposed exile, we set off for Northney Marina. Sailed up and into the furthest western point of Chichester Harbour. I had phoned ahead to get a berth, but it was occupied, luckily the next door one was empty and we slipped untidily into it.

We went for a walk, and then had dinner.

In a Marina, one of my favourite things is to have an early shower, and enjoy the large, warm, institutional facilities before the crowds.

Before leaving the berth next morning, we spent considerable time in assessing the conditions: tide- against, wind, quite brisk-on the bow. The manouevre would need reverse gear which is very unresponsive and also the neighbours were sitting on deck, waiting for entertainment. 

In the event, it was a beautiful, slow and apparently excellently controlled tight reverse circle out, all by fluke!

Pleased with ourselves, we thought the next thing to do would be to enter Emsworth Yachting Marina at high tide to visit the chandlery.

Emsworth is hard!, there was not quite enough water, it was very busy, we retreated to a buoy and had coffee, then watched as others moored up by the ferry's pontoon. Giving it another go, we were beaten to the best spot, and then blown into the wrong part by the wind, a helpful lad took the rope, and then helped push us off when we started to jam into the piles. We changed our minds and left, I dropped a fender on the way out. However, we returned and retrieved it successfully. One small achievement in a morning of unsatisfying activity.

The wind had changed to south westerly and we had a lovely sunny beat down the the channel, tacking often, avoiding other craft and sand banks effectively and building confidence again.

We  planned to anchor at East Head Spit for the evening