Chelone floats!

Apologies for the delay on this post. I managed to type the title in on my phone a couple of days back, but I could not get it to accept any text......

Friday morning. The alarm went off at 05:45. A quick coffee and Louise, Tigger and myself piled into the camper van and headed off down to Pembroke dock to watch Chelone being launched. An hour and a half or so later, on a cool damp October morning, we approached the boat, hanging on straps in the launching cradle.

John turned up soon after, and before we knew it, the driver of the launch cradle was moving Chelone towards the slip. Around 16 tonnes of expensive sailing boat, dangling by a couple of nylon straps.

Just before going in, I grabbed a tin of antifoul and painted over the places where the pads of her cradle had been. I could only just reach.

A few minutes later she inched her way down the slip and into the cold waters of the Haven, at just about the top of the tide.

And that was that. Engine on, a short trip of about 50 yards and she was tied up on the pontoon.

Then we split up. The boat needed to be taken a couple of miles down river, to Neyland Marina. Our van, John's car and Ross' (the other crew member) car were parked at Pembroke dock. Someone needed to drive a car across the Cleddau bridge to Neyland Marina. I really wanted Louise to go with the boat - she's worked so hard these last few months, so many night shifts, putting money in the bank so we could afford to go. I jumped in John's car with Tigger and we drove the 15 minutes to the marina, leaving John, Louise and Ross to take the luxury trip.

As is usual when relaunching a boat, there were many checks to carry out. With a new engine, too, John spent an hour or so tightening glands, checking water and oil pressures and so on. Tigger and I were not that bothered, and, soon enough, I saw Chelone coming down river,

under the Cleddau bride and turning into Neyland Marina.

Louise was at the helm!

I was very surprised. She waved at me and didn't seem at all nervous. John then took over, and expertly turned Chelone around before going astern into her pontoon berth. Louise and Ross tied her up and they let Tigger and me in through the marina gate.

I had thought that was that, but there were still a few jobs that needed doing. The dinghy had been in John's garage for 18 months, so I set about scrubbing that. Louise did a bit of sewing on the sprayhood, and did some cleaning on deck, helped, or rather, watched, by Tigger.

Chelone's teak decks look beautiful in the sunshine. Tigger looks less happy. I wonder if he knows he won't be coming with us, and will, in fact, be parted from us for over 2 months, the longest time by far in the 10 years or so since we had him.

We spent Saturday evening in the van. Unfortunately, the leisure battery had given up the ghost, so we drank a few glasses of wine by candle light. we managed to get a new battery in Haverfordwest on Saturday. John and Suzie, the fifth crew member, had arranged a lunch at Neyland marina, and kindly bought us all a meal. Suzie's parents were also there, and a friend, Steve, as well as John's mother.

That evening, we went to Dale. Louise, Tigger and I walked up to WestDale beach. Then we had a bit of fun. We found a large (2ft by 2ft) block of a yellowish waxy substance washed up on the beach. I told Louise it might have been ambergris. When we got back to the van, she looked it up. Once she realised its potential value, she decided that she must go and get some. Now. She set off with a rucksack, hammers, knives and so on.

By now it was getting dark.



An hour later she came back up the steep cliff path, puffing and sweating, her rucksack full of the stuff. It didn't have the musty odour of ambergris. It didn't contain embedded squid beaks like ambergris does. It didn't burn with a smoky flame like ambergris doe, either. It was wax. We were not millionaires.

The following morning, I took a picture of Louise with her 'treasure'

So. Now we wait. John wants to do a 'shake down' sail and practice man overboard drill, and we need to pack the boat properly, but we just wait. The weather for Biscay does not look good at the moment, but may improve this week. It's strange. We can't wait to set off, and we know we will, but, as each day passes, we wonder when that will be.

So, we wait.

Working on Chelone

Last week, it was up at seven, walk to Stromness Harbour and go diving in Scapa Flow. This week it's up at seven, drive to Pembroke dock, work on the yacht that will soon be on it's way across Biscay.

John, the skipper had a list. I was given a tin of varnish and a brush

Whilst Louise was given various cleaning duties, and started packing some of our things into our cabin in the Forepeak. She appeared to be enjoying working on the boat.

John has been very busy whilst we've been in Scotland, and Chelone is just a few cosmetic jobs away from being ready to tackle Biscay and the Atlantic. She may be in the water as early as Friday, with a shake down sail for us all planned soon. There is even a possibility of us leaving port on Sunday, so we watch each weather forecast with a keen interest.

So, sanding, three coats of varnish, cleaning, scrubbing, refitting metalwork removed for sanding, and the day flew past. Another crew member, Ross, joined us around 4pm, after finishing work on one of the Range boats.

Louise and I left at 17:00. A brief stop to walk Tigger, who'd been very patient all day, at Carew Castle.

And we watched a Heron and a couple of shags hunting fish which swam up the river with the oncoming tide, as the sun set.

Struggling

Just sitting in the house. We never seem to have any free time. There is always a huge list of things to do. Every penny that comes in has to be carefully assigned to pay for some more work to be done. Will we be able to afford to do the conservatory this year, now that the attic, garage and bathroom are done? Should we pay as much as we can off the mortgage whilst the rates are so low, and leave spending on the house until we've paid it off?

Meanwhile, we want to go diving. We want to go sailing. We want to go away in the van, drink wine, eat good food, enjoy ourselves. We knew it was going to be hard. We're approaching the halfway point in our plans to move to West Wales, and everything is according to budget, and going really well.

Then our friend Tom visits, from the Phillippines. It was Tom that first got us interested in sailing, and, with whom, we got our first taste of what it could be like, crusing from Italy to the Greek islands in his 44ft ketch 'Perky Puffin' in 2007:

Here was a boat that we could live on. Long term. Here was a boat that we could travel on, cheaply. I've always wanted to dive in the Pacific. Rangiroa is near the top of my list. There are so many places we want to travel to, Galapagos, South Africa, back to Sudan, and, it keeps calling me, the Pacific.

Through Tom, we met John, from Tenby. John bought a boat in America, Chelone, and sailed her back across the North Atlantic:

The next year, John sailed down through Portugal, Morocco, the Azores, across the Caribbean, past beautiful islands where we ourselves have since cruised and dived, and then back to the UK. We often pop down to Tenby to visit John - he dives, too.

Then there are Brian and Sue, on their 33ft yacht, 'Blue Bear'. They left Cardiff in October 2010, sailed  the same way as John, but then went through the Panama canal and out into the Pacific. They are currently headed for Fiji.

These are not dreams. These are not adventures one reads about in magazines. These are friends of ours.

We need a boat, a scuba compressor and some time. We have three or four years to finish messing about with houses, and then we may be able to have those things.

Meanwhile, we work, and read about others who do. We plan, and talk. It's hard, and we're struggling.

I read this, earlier today:

"We shared meals ashore and on our boat in the Marshall Islands, drank kava with groups on several islands in Fiji, played with children, sang with locals, taught school children in Indonesia, picnicked with locals in the Cook Islands,  learned how to collect shellfish and prepare them the local way  in Kiribati, traded clothes for local produce in Guadalcanal, sponsored a model outrigger canoe race in the Louisiades, and repaired a solar power system and other equipment in Tikopia. We took locals aboard from several islands for overnight fishing trips, to visit their ancestral atoll in New Caledonia, took a family for two weeks to a Melanesian Arts Festival in Vanuatu and slept on crowded ferryboat decks on the Irrawaddy River in Burma"

http://www.arctracer.com/

The countdown is well underway.

The boat I nearly crossed the Atlantic on......

She's called Chelone, and she's a Hans Christian 38. We met her owner, John, through another friend, Tom. John was taking Chelone from Neyland to the Caribbean last October, and returned to Neyland just a few days ago, after crossing back single handed.

John had spoken to me when he'd been looking for crew, and I'd loved to have made the trip, but finances and timing were not right, so I didn't go. We met up with John yesterday, to hear tales from his trip, but need to see him again when we have more time, to hear much more, and, of course, to pick up tips and tricks, if we ever hope to do similar ourselves one day.