Cheerio Will👋, hello waves 🌊

Another double update, time in harbour and WiFi is hard to come by!

Friday was a fairly chilled day, with a fair amount of motoring in light winds and some snoozing on deck (for Will). It definitely felt like a restful way to travel round the coast. Things got a bit more interesting as we headed into Exmouth harbour. The tide runs very strong here – that means a channel that constantly shifts, and a weird beach where the water drops to about 7 metres right from the edge of the sand.

We picked up a visitor’s mooring buoy, this needed a bit of concentration with 4 knots of tide flowing! But once you know which way it’s going you can use it like a virtual anchor to ‘hover’ the boat while your crew lasso the buoy.

Then Will got packed up for what turned into a very complex departure. It was a bit like the riddle with the fox, the goose and the cabbage and the boat (or whatever it is). To get his lift home Will had to negotiate a water taxi about to finish for the day, and a cash-only ferry service back across the river. I ended up getting a water taxi man to take a tenner to Will!

I had some minor engine trouble seen to by a friendly local engineering firm.

The boat felt more spacious with Will away, but I soon missed his company. Now I have to wash my own dishes! I was also feeling a bit daunted by Saturday – my first solo day in this boat, and a very long sail round a notorious tidal race at Portland Bill. I don’t mind saying that I wondered if this was such a wise plan after all…

I took my mind off things by tackling a few maintenance jobs, including fitting a new nav light and battling with a few bits of rigging.

The river Exe by moonlight was very beautiful.

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Saturday – solo epic to Portland

Another fairly early start, swooshing down the Exe on the tidal flow into Lyme Bay. The day started well with some ‘champagne sailing’ – sunshine and fair winds. If this persisted it would be a smooth 13 hours to Portland.

With a passage of this length, you can’t avoid hitting bad tide at some point, so my plan was to take the worst of the tide out in the bay where it would be weaker.

As expected, things got windier and lumpier through the afternoon, building up to F5/6 with big waves pushed up by the tide. Helming became a bit of a full-body workout that lasted for about six hours. I hove-to occasionally to take a break and sort out food. Despite the lumpy conditions, the boat sailed brilliantly, even as we hit some bigger waves off Portland Bill.

I saw very few other boats out in the bay, not surprising since I was about 12 miles offshore. I was hearing radio calls from the English and French coastguard at one point.

I’d planned things to hit the start of the tidal gate, reaching the Bill just as the tide turned in my favour. I was bang on with timing, but it took a good hour or so or the sea to properly settle down. But once it did, I got about 4 knots of favourable push from the tide, right towards Portland. My top speed was 9 knots, not bad for a wee boat! As things flattened out I was able to cut the corner a little and head directly for the harbour, rather than taking a big detour round the tidal eddies.

Just as I was taking in the sunset and congratulating myself for getting through a big day nice and smoothly, the engine sputtered to a halt about 20 metres off the dock. I hoisted the main and sailed alongside, luckily another friendly boater was there to grab my lines.

A downside of long days at sea is that when you arrive, everywhere has ‘just closed the kitchen’. So I scarpered off to Lidl to grab the makings of a feast about 10 mins before they closed (I have some solid but basic tins on the boat, for any worried family members reading).

How did I feel overall about the day? Well pleased that I got through a big day of testing sailing feeling fine and with no major dramas. I think my slight apprehension was justified, but it helped me keep focussed.

Portland is a funny place – a massive harbour and marina, a Royal Navy gunnery range, Chesil Beach, and then a no-mans-land of container parks left over from the Olympics sailing venue.

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Sunday – and rest

Today Sunday was chasing down a marine engineer, and hopping on a bus to Weymouth to get some more supplies. Realising that I can give myself a rest day (or two) while I sort things out has been a relief. My stubborn self was trying to think of ways to keep pushing on, but now I’ve taken a step back and remembered that this is supposed to be fun!

We’ll see what tomorrow brings with an engineer and time to rest in the meantime.

(PS if you’re interested in some stats, we’ve sailed over 115 miles / 16% of the way to Fisherrow)

Thanks again Will, you’ve set a very high bar for crew! ☕️ ❤️