Louise wanted to sail to Portishead for Friday night, back Saturday. Sheila and Vince would bring Alana, and Allan would bring Chausey, and meet Edwina at Portishead. The girls decided that they would sail together, and Vince and I would take Ishtar.
Bit of a panic to start. Louise was late getting to the club, having just done a night shift and cooked a curry, but we still made the 14:00 lock out from Cardiff.
It had been flat calm all week, with sailing hardly possible, but we raised the sails hust past the Outer Wrach buoy with a NE force 4. We were soon bowling along, 7 knots sog, and heeled at 30 degrees.
We stayed to the North of the shipping channel, skirting the Southern edge of the Middle Grounds. I backed off the wind a little, and we crossed to the Southern side of the channel. I think we should have stayed high, as we struggled to point high enough after that, but Vince helmed well, and we rounded the breakwater at 17:00, about 10 minutes before the next lock. Allan had made the previous lock, and the girls were about 5 minutes behind us.
Louise brought Alana in, and Sheila sorted the lines. Perfect.
We had beer aboard Alana, and curry aboard Ishtar, prepared by Louise. Edwina had joined us, and we all enjoyed the evening.
On the way to the pub, we met with Mark, from Gemini Girl. We'd sailed with Mark in May 2009, aboard his boat Cafe Seerose in the Ionian. He was taking a break back in Bristol before returning to the Canaries to take Cafe seerose across the Atlantic. It was great to catch up with Mark.
The alarm went off at 07:00. Louise made coffee and started up the eberspacher heater. We were soon up and about on a clear, cold morning. We took Tigger for a walk and readied the boat. Louise and Sheila wanted to sail Ishtar back, so I loaded my stuff onto Alana. I also loaded Ishtar's spinnaker. The winds were light, and Vince was keen to give it a try.
We locked out at 09:30. Tigger had joined the ladies.
Allan and Edwina got the crusing chute out aboard Chausey, and Louise and Sheila trimmed teh sails beautifully on Ishtar. The tide was running out and we hurtled downstream, in the light winds.
Vince and I tried to raise the spinnaker. Behind the genoa at first - that turned out to be a bad idea as it got tangled in the genoa when we wound that in. Then tried it without the pole, which didn't work. Finally tried it with the pole and up she went.
It felt great, and we got up to 9.3 knots. The wind held for an hour, then faded and died. We brought the spinnaker in just past Flatholm and reset the genoa. Louise and Sheila passed us, as did Allan and Edwina. The wind picked up again and we started to move faster in towards Cardiff.
We joined with the other boats just before the locks and headed in at 17:15.
Allan and Edwina prepared Chausey for the lock also.
The locks were 'interesting' and not everyone was prepared to wait their turn in the queue.
And a takeaway chinese aboard Chausey to finish. A thoroughly great weekend.
