Double Spitfires

You're going to have to trust me
but that is a pair of Spitfires flying wing tip to wing tip

Snuck in a crafty afternoon off from work, as we had a 17:00'ish high tide...  only a neap but I had hopes of getting off the mooring early...

I reckon in the end I dropped the mooring about 13:15, and apart from sticking on a little mud bank between mooring and channel for  5 minutes I was away and clear three and a half hours before high tide..  on a neap.... astonishing - info stored for later as I think one of the last trips of the year will be a circumnavigation on lift out weekend and the sooner I can get away the better...

Grey miserable old afternoon, no rain, but an easterly  breeze made it feel colder than it actually was - the summer is drawing to a close....  there were no more than a dozen boats out all afternoon....

Winds were fairly light all afternoon, so having motored to the end of the Northney channel I proceeded down towards the sea/HISC under sail in what started off as a reach but ended up as a port tack...  wind must have shifted around about 90'... ??

Despite being neaps there were still vast quantities of water being shifted around...  look at the rooster tail on Pilsey, and I reckon that was only half an hour or so before hight tide...

One of the two was this one - a two seater
- picture courtesy Boultbee Flight Academy - Goodwood [clicky]

So a slow old trip down harbour, couple of knots at best, but the highlight of the afternoon arrived just off HISC with the arrival of a couple of Spitfires overhead, flying wing tip to wing tip - I've found out subsequently that they flew from Goodwood (Boultbee Flight Academy)...  absolutely amazing sight..

Having finally managed to get to the Pilsey buoy (and it took a couple of tacks due to meandering all over the place while I was watching the Spitfires, and having to tack!) I then cut inside the moored boats off HISC and ran back up harbour...  wind was dropping almost constantly and by the time I turned for Northney most of the forward momentum was tide, but I did manage to get a few 4+ knot surges when an occasional gust came through...  in the Northney channel it was so still you could hear people talking on shore...

HISC ahead...

Motor on as I passed Northney marina and 10 minutes later I was back on the mooring...  a good afternoon despite the grey, the cold, and the light winds....

The end of the season is approaching fast - some of the boats already have masts down - my lift out is scheduled for the 20th October, so at best I have 2 or 3 more sessions and I'm away for at least one of them...  at the moment I am still planning to sail Sparrow round for the lift out (my clubs slipway is the other side of the bridge from me so those of us in Chichester Harbour either drop the mast and motor under the bridge, or sail round) but all of this is weather dependant....

Log:

Distance: 9.49 miles (cumulative total in the 2013 mileage tab at the top of the page)
Wind: Both ends of a Force 3 - dropping as the afternoon went on.. Started E ended SE.
Sail Plan: Full jib and main - engine for manoeuvring and to get to Swearedeep on the way out...
Speed: GPS track says max speed was 4.1 knots (that was under sail, but I also saw bursts of 4.3 and 4.5 knots under sail) - average speed 2.4 knots