Officially stressed

The time is just disappearing. We leave for Scotland on a diving trip this Thursday. We travel back a week on Sunday when, theoretically, we could be joining Chelone and heading out of Milford and across the Atlantic. Weather permitting.

Meanwhile, the last week has been a nightmare. Suddenly, I have customers wanting things done before we go. We both had to sit our Intermediate Amateur radio exam. (Both passed, 2W0JYC and 2W0LWC). Vaccinations needed, Typhoid in one surgery and yellow fever in another.

All planned out. Then the fun starts. The Tuesday vaccination (Typhoid) is moved to Wednesday. Louise moves a shift and I swap a day's work. We both turn up to be told that there is no typhoid vaccination left - there is a shortage. I head West to Pembroke to help John with Chelone for two days and Louise gets back to work.

Louise then locates a surgery willing to give us some of their Typhoid vaccination. I drive back from Milford  Haven on Thursday and rush to two surgeries, to get Typhoid in one arm and Yellow fever in the other. Feel rough, then back to work in Abergavenny on Friday.

Nice easy day on Saturday. 'We should probably buy some clothes. Oh, and sun protection cream. Is there anything else we might need?' Really well organised, yes?

So it's Sunday. We're not packed for our Scottish diving trip and not packed for our Transatlantic trip. Desperately writing letters to inform everyone that we will be non-contactable so please don't take us to court if we miss a bill. Friends and famly to be seen. Cat and dog to be sorted. Neighbours to be informed. House to be tided (yeah, right). And so on.

And we're both working full time until we leave on Thursday morning.....

Think we'll just take the dog down the beach and try to unwind for an hour.

In the rain.

That's two!

Louise and I both passed our Intermediate Amateur Radio License at an Examination at the radio club last night. Much harder than the foundation, but a lot of reading and swatting and we got through it.

We still need to do one more exam, the Full License, before we'll be able to use the Amateur Frequencies on board, but our impending Atlantic crossing will delay starting that course until after Christmas.

Vaccinations this morning, and then a drive down to Milford for a couple of days work on Chelone. It's all go!

Chelone

The boat we are hopefully crossing the Atlantic on is called Chelone. She's a late model Hans Christian 38, long keel, cutter rigged, with a canoe stern.

John bought her in the States about 5 years back. Her teak decks were coming to the end of their useful life, and he spent three months or so, working with Teak Decking Systems, of Florida

http://teakdecking.com/

Fitting new ones. TDS manufacture the new teak decks on a panel by panel basis, and the teak is glued onto a waterproof backing before being epoxied into place, rather than using screws. The majority of the problems with teak decks then disappear.

John then sailed Chelone back, from the North East United States

up past Newfoundland, and the icebergs

To her new home in Milford Haven. In 2010 John sailed her back to the Caribbean , and then crossed the Atlantic back to Europe in June 2011, this time single handed.

I've been down to the Haven for a day or two this week, as well as last week, prepping her for her next transatlantic trip. More to come soon.....

Exciting news

A year or so back, I posted about Chelone, a Hans Christian 38, owned by a friend of ours in West Wales. John had then just sailed back single handed from the Caribbean, and I would have loved to sail back with him, but was unable to make it at the time.

http://ishtaryacht.blogspot.co.uk/2011/06/boat-i-nearly-crossed-atlantic-on.html

Well, John is taking Chelone back to the Caribbean this October, and both Louise and I are going with him!

We'll be leaving Neyland some time in Mid October, and sailing the whole way, probably to Trinidad, then flying back sometime in December, if all goes according to plan.

We're really excited about it, but there is a huge amount to do. Loads of things to organise, finances to be put in place, Tigger and our cat, Basil, to be temporarily rehomed, and ourselves to get in the frame of mind to cross the Atlantic under sail.

More details coming soon.........

Currently reading

This book:

The Seaworthy Offshore Sailboat, by John Vigor

Amazon

I've read, or rather, tried to read quite a few books about sailing boat design, but I really like this one. The way Vigor describes what to look for in an offshore yacht is explained simply, and it makes sense. It's very readable, explaining why things are important, rather than just listing techical details and hull shapes.

There is also a section called 'Test your boat' with simple questions, and pictures for you to choose which most closely resembles your own boat, and an overall score at the end for how seaworthy your boat is.

Chapters include The hull, Bulkheads, Deck, cockpit, rudder, keel, spars, rigging, ground tackle, engine, Navigation equipment, Galley, self steering gear and so on.

I've not finished it yet, but it's the best reading on this subject matter I've found so far.

Back to Cardiff

It was that time of year again. Time to bring Ishtar back to Cardiff Bay from West Wales. It always seems to come around too soon, this year more especially, given that my ankle injury saw to it that we only managed a couple of weekends using the boat.

We could have leaft it another week or two. Going to Scotland diving in late September, though, would mean that we could end up leaving Ishtar on an open swinging mooring until mid October, and as the weeks of summer fade into autumn and winter, the risk of strong winds increases.

So, we dropped one car off in Cardiff, for use when we got back, and set off West in the other. We arrived at Dale at the bottom of a spring tide. Mud.

We only had to wait an hour before there was enough water to float the dinghy, and we were soon on our way out. I noticed a black mark down the side of Ishtar as we approached, and then something curious. Our mooring buoy was missing. I guessed it must have deflated and sank. The truth was somewhat different.

 That small piece of blue plastic was all that was left of it. It may have just sheared in bad weather, but the mark on the side of Ishtar made me think that a collision had caused the damage, to the boat and the buoy.

I'd intended to drop the mooring to the bottom to overwinter, anyway, to save wear. Within an hour, I'd dropped ours, and our friend Vince's leaving marker buoys for next year. Hope they don't end up like our main mooring buoy.

With no mooring, we tied up on the pontoon, and began cleaning all the weed and mud from Ishtar. Servicing moorings is always messy.

We met Dave from Cardiff Yacht Club on the pontoon, as well as a very nice chap called Ray, who'd sailed down from Newquay on his Sabre 'Golondrina', which is Spanish for 'Swallow'. Quite apt really, as the summer was ending, Ray was heading South, first towards St Ives, and then round to the South Coast for a bit, he hoped. Ray has been sailing over 50 years, and was familiar with many of the places we've dived in West Wales over the last 20 years or more.

We spent a quiet night on the pontoon. Louise made a curry and we drifted off to the sounds of lines creaking, and fenders squeaking against the hull.

Saturday was overcast, with around 25 knots from the South West. We left at 09:00, big swells coming into the Haven as the tide ebbed. The effect of the wind on us was less as we passed Linney Head and turned Eastwards, although the patch of sea between there and St Govans head is often confused and rougher than usual. Louise lost her breakfast, but carried on sailing. She wanted us to sail all the way back, even though we were on quite a tight schedule, and not use the autopilot either, if possible.

So we did watches of an hour each through the day. The sea picked up, and then calmed off before picking up again. The wind did the same. It was lovely. Cloudy, moderate, lumpy seas, but we ticked off the hours and the miles, and reached Oxwich around 19:00.

There were 'overfalls' marked on the chart. I figured they'd only be there in wind over tide situations. I saw some white water just ahead as we turned into the bay, but just carried on. The 'overfalls' were only about a metre or so, of breaking waves, but it was enough to cause Ishtar to surf, and slew slightly. I was glad to be through them, and will pass further away from the point next time. I would not like to pass through them with any real sea running.

We were soon swinging at anchor. When the radio crackled, and I heard our name being called, I was shocked. There was another boat at anchor in the bay from CYC - Moonstruck. We didn't know them, but they had travelled down from Cardiff that morning, beating into the seas we'd been running from. they were  tired. We agreed to speak in the nmorning, and maybe travel back up channel together.

The forecast for Sunday was drizzle, with the wind starting at about 20 knots, and dropping off to just 8 knots by the afternoon, when it was scheduled to clear up. This concerned me, as we wanted to sail, and with 45 miles or so to cover, we would have preferred the stronger winds we'd had on Saturday.

I inched my head out of the hatch at 07:00. Not nice.

We didn't want to leave until about 11:00. That would give us still around 3 hours of foul tide, but if we could reach the Western end of the Scarweather sands by that time, we'd have the full flood tide to take us up channel then, and would hopefully be able to sail the whole way, and still get back to Cardiff in time to pick Tigger up from my Mother's at a 'reasonable' time.

As we waited for the time to pass, Louise did some studying for her upcoming Intermediate stage of her amateur radio exams

The Lobster pot men went about their business

I was amazed to see a small pod of harbour porpoise playing in the anchorage. we were in around 5m of water, and seemed quite at home with people on their boats, and fishing going on.

It's amazing what you can see, if you just look, sometimes.

We set off at 11:30, and, with full sail up, we managed nearly three knots agaisnt the sprng tide as it ebbed. That was great, although it did take us well South of the Scarweather sands. Gradually, the rain stopped, the wind eased until it dropped below 10 knots, and we even had an hour of sunshine, before that was replaced by broken cloud. As the flood tide picked up, our genoa began to flap, and our speed dropped with the wind. We still had over 30 miles to cover, so, reluctantly, switched to engine power.

Suddenly, it became far less enjoyable. Instead of sailing along, blown by the wind, we were back in a motor boat, and it became just miles to cover. Unfortunately, when you're sailing to a schedule, this has to happen. We passed Nash point lighthouse about 4pm.

It was sunny over the sea, but it looked like it was raining inland. This led to some lovely contrasts in the light, especially looking Westwards at Aberthaw power station.

On we chugged, speeds above 9 knots over the ground at the height of the flooding tide. We were soon passing Lavernock point, and turning North, past the Ranie Buoy, Penarth pier and the last of the racing dinghies for the weekend. Finally, we knew we were 'home' when, at 20:15, we entered the locks. A couple of friends with motor boats had been to Watchet for the weekend, and joined us in the lock. Dominic,

And Steve.

Steve is such a nice chap. When we joined the club, someone told me his name was Martin, and I called him Martin for two years. He was too nice to tell me off over it! We chugged across the bay, tied Ishtar up on C Pontoon and headed home. Picked Tigger up from my mother's around 22:00hrs and managed to be tucking in to a takeaway by 23:00.

We were up early on Monday, and back at Dale by 09:00 to pick up Louise's car and the dinghy. Just under 2 hours by car, around 40 hours with a stop, by boat!