King's Ransom Delivery

Water and boat time was coming thick and fast, as no sooner had we delivered AmiLy, and bought Sparrow out than it seemed to be time to bring t'other Dave's boat round, "Kings Ransom"...

Dave keeps his boat at Port Solent but over winter keeps her in the same yard I do, so this would be a delivery from Port Solent to Langstone...  crew for the day me and Smithy, plus both of Smithy's loin fruit (or I think that's what he said 😁), Rodders and Dave were otherwise occupied but missed... a bit...

Nothing to extraordinary - not as much wind as we would have liked, but a god trip in warm'ish weather nonetheless.  

Left Port Solent at 09:30, locked out without incident, and departed harbour entrance roughly an hour later, out submarine barrier by approx. 11:15 and we were coming though Langstone harbour entrance an hour after that...  huge help from the tide as wind was up and down, but a quick trip...

Not immediately apparent but clicking on this for a bigger view will show the tide rip in shore at the entrance to Langstone...

Glorious day - this is looking up harbour from the entrance towards Portsdown Hill... ==>

Arrived at the club about 13:00 and plonked ourselves on the waiting pontoon to await the lifting crew and lift, and 15 minutes later she was out - half an hour later we were in the pub sinking pints as we watched the tide slowly disappear and the mud return...  that's it - all boats ashore and the winter can now start.

Thanks for the lift, Dave...

Log:

....and Dave's plot...  😀

Distance: 14.79 (cumulative total in the mileage tab at the top)
Wind (Speed; Direction):   F3 gusting F4 (occasionally) ; either side of SWxS
Sail Plan:  Full main and genoa
Speed (Max/average in knots):  6.5 / 3.5

Mast down, boat out, Ami-Ly delivery

Phew time for a catch up - October is always busy, busy, busy... 😵

So chronologically...

• 2nd October - after that slightly abrupt and bad tempered (the wind - not me😀) sail on the Saturday I was down on the boat the next morning in conditions that can only be described as 180' the opposite of the day before...! It was scorching hot and almost windless...  genoa off first before any wind turned up, and deposited in the dinghy for more careful folding away when on shore, I then moved to the boom and as usual just remove the whole lot, boom, sail, kicker with claw and the sail cover to wrap the whole lot together I left the reef in, so I will need to take that out sometime this winter when I have more time to unroll it and flake the sail more tidily..  That done there was only one thing to be done on a day like this ==>
  
  

  

  Days like this will feature long in the memory over the next cold damp miserable months

  
  
• 3rd October - chatting to Rodders the next day while sorting out dates for the mast drop, he mentioned he was off down to Ami-Ly (his boat - the scene and host of this years Jolly Boys Riot) to do the same as I had done on Sparrow the day before - with nothing else on the horizon that day I casually asked, 'do you want a hand to do it?'  After I managed to get my arm back with only light bite marks, I found myself down on the Whale Island pontoons. Bigger boat of course but pretty much the same rigmarole as Sparrow the day before, except Rod leaves the boom on. 
  
  Glorious day watching the various comings and goings...  two mahoosive cruise liners were in on the opposite side of the creek, and then the car ferry from France arrived and reversed parked between the two - fantastic bit of seamanship...
  
  

  

  Not small!

  
  
• 6th October - the day of the mast drop, and after a truly atrocious day weatherwise the day before yet another 180' turn - not a breath of wind when I first arrived, clear open skies with more than a hint of warmth - SO lucky...
  
  No Dave this year (he was on holiday) so we drafted in the "young" apprentice and thus it was me Rodders and Smiffy in the crew this year...  I arrived early, shot out to the boat and started to get stuff ready. Crutch roped into place, forward and rear lower stays undone, A frame locked into the forward lower chain plates, genoa halyard to the top of the frame with this year the main halyard as a secondary safety line, main sheet to provide the grunt and we were ready to go once the boys arrived. There then ensured the comedy that only the Jolly Boys together seem able to produce.
  
  I think it safe to say that I had suffered sleep issues on two counts this year - one was the mast drop itself, which despite having done it numerous times still causes a slight frisson of concern (all joking aside it's a big mast, things can go wrong, damage can be done, and worst-case, injury can ensue) but the other was how the hell I was going to get these two to the boat given that normally we rely on Dave, who has access to another (bigger) dinghy?!
  
  Anyhoo...  we had to rely on my tender which is small, and has a low freeboard - I will only say that it was a good job there was no swell or wind as I reckon we had no more than 2 or 3 inches of freeboard at times and that was with only two of us at a time in it... 😂 ==>
  
  

  

  The young apprentice gets a good work out, and an occasional grope, giving Rodders a lift back to shore after the main event...

  
  The drop itself was perfection, Smiffy in the cockpit, Rod on the roof, both to guide and keep the mast straight as it came down, me on the foredeck to play out the main sheet so as to allow a controlled drop - perfection, and a cup of tea and a biccie later and we were ready to disconnect the back stay and the uppers, the A frame was removed, halyards tidied away and we were ready to slide the mast forward so as to rest on the pulpit and crutch before finally tying it all down...
  
  I'd made some modifications to the mast crutch for this drop and have to say I think they worked 100% - one of the issues we always had before was that the arms of the crutch extended to the point where lifting the spreaders up and over them when moving the mast forward after the drop was a major PITA. This year I sawed them off shorter, but to allow for the crutch still to act as a crutch ie. for the arms of the crutch still to guide the mast, had put on new swivelling/swinging arms held in place by a bolt at the swivel end and a peg at the other end. Once the mast was dropped and the arms had done their job, you could then just slip the pegs out and swivel the arms down allowing for a much smaller arm to lift the spreaders over - and it worked exactly as designed, SO chuffed - in fact it prompted another idea (cheers, Rod!) to lock the mast in the crutch which I'll investigate further - either way, job done and off to the pub for beer and smuggled in pork pies! Big thanks to the Jolly Boys once again...
  
  
• 9th October - time to start moving boats for their respective lift outs, first on the list was to move Ami-Ly round from her home mooring on Whale Island to Port Solent where she was due to have a lift out first thing Monday morning - just over 6 miles - all under motor (as we'd taken the sails off already as above) and after a little sightseeing down harbour (Rodders had his son and grandson with him for this one, in addition to Smithy and I) we were up to Port Solent, locked through, moored up, and in the pub within a couple of hours - lovely afternoon out
  
  
  
  
  
• 17th October - not only Rod's lift out but mine as well - and as trouble free a lift as I think I've had. Got there early, cadged a lift to the boat on the club's workboat (to save getting the tender out and having to recover it later) and once on board got the tools out to see if I could get the top gear (ie. shackle/swivel/pick up chain and buoy) off my mooring - don't like leaving it on, as all that happens is that it gets trashed in the winter storms; it may as well live in my garage under a coat of oil for the winter as sit on the mooring rusting...  once again, the spray of white grease on the threads for the pin for the shackle holding it all together did the trick and one grunt and it loosened off (bloody brilliant - hacksawing them off is a major pain). Fired up the donk, and for one last time this year motored over the pool and then under the bridge before putting her on the clubs waiting pontoon ready for my turn.
  
  

  

  😍

  
  Sat in the cockpit in the sun, chatting with the other club members doing the boat moves, Rod joined me for a chat and to pick up a bag he'd left in my car the day before - most pleasant. Then after the big one's had gone in, it was my turn, three crew on board with me, motored over to the hoist, didn't cock up the entry, secured, engine off, lifted and 15 minutes later I was ashore and, on my blocks, the 2022 season is over...  😏

Jobs:

1. Centre mast support needs trimming - slightly too long for the current configuration
2. Pressure wash her bottom - no weed video this year as I started clearing the barnacles before I thought to do the video - but she is covered in a fine growth of sea weed, and the barnacles (I thought) were far more prevalent this year - the insides of the keels were covered with them, plus the forward part of the hull where she sits in the mud. Just need to wait for lift out to finish so I can get down there and give her a good going over..  this weekend hopefully.

Last sail of the season... soldiers wind!

Last sail of the season...  

The weather fronts are marching in off the Atlantic and up the Channel like a metronome - a cycle of westerly based (sometimes with some south, sometimes with some north) over the next week in varying degrees of strength, and with varying degrees of "dampness", mean that I have had to pick and choose carefully to get the last sails of the season in, and I reckon today was it...  

I have two windows left and they are allocated - one to take the sails off (tomorrow/Monday as I write) and one to drop the mast (Smithy and Rodders are rocking up Thursday morning), and then she comes out a week today...  the summer is over...  

Jumping ahead of myself though - looking at forecasts my best bet was Saturday for a sail, but even that was 50:50, as the forecasts looked a little 'brutal' for a 20-foot day cruiser (apropos of evidence, the club dinghy racing the same day had 5 DNF's out of 9, and by all accounts was a bit "full on" 😁). 

Winds were top end 4 gusting 5 all morning according to the weather station at the bottom of the harbour, but the clincher/decider for me was the westerly, as that brought with it the last warmth of the season, and it would be back to shorts/tshirt for this sail.

On the boat by 13:00, 16:00 HT and a big one, so once again there was a lot of water slopping about - winds were as per the beacon, so the reefs from the last sail were left in (and I toyed with the idea of putting some more in the main but didn't). Pausing only to top up the fuel, I dropped the mooring and headed for the ditch, putting the main up early, by the bridge as it was an almost dead westerly, straight down the ditch.

Something wicked this way comes...

I'd learnt my lessons - engine was on so it made sense to do the main then, rather than worry about getting it up later in a blow when the engine is off, and the genoa is rattling round your ears. Cracked 75% of the genoa as I bore up at the end of the Emsworth channel, and then tracked the starboard channel markers close reaching towards the bottom of the harbour, spilling the gusts as and when they came through..

...and then buggers off 10 minutes later!

The wind was pretty full on and was building the closer I got to the bottom of the harbour, looking over my shoulder I could see ominous black, and showers of rain running over the Downs, happily they all passed without dumping, but it was getting colder, and in the end enough was enough, and I headed back to the mooring,,. saw no more than half a dozen cruisers all day - surprising considering the forecast today!

Back on the mooring there was an interesting swell running - pretty rare and I put it down to wind over tide, both of which were high side..  fingers crossed there's none of that nonsense on Thursday when the mast comes down 😀

• oil checked and topped up (need to get that fixed before next season)
• 2.5 litres fuel added

Log:

Distance: 7.19 (cumulative total in the mileage tab at the top)
Wind (Speed; Direction):  F5; W
Sail Plan: Reefed main, 75% genoa
Speed (Max/average in knots):   5.9 (and that was under sail!) / 3.2