scroby sands wind farm off-lowestoft at dawn

sailing home with a breeze and blue skies

sunset out at sea

ravenscar in the early morning sun with robin hoods bay under a grey blanket

whitby our beloved home port

the round britain shaggy haired sailors arrive home

lady h anchored off whitby

lady h coming through the pier ends

mum and dad wave us in

through the bridge

the welcoming committee champagne on the pontoon

We thought the ships were behind us after Spurn Point but it’s a busy night. Thank heavens for AIS – each ship glows turquoise on the computer screen on the chart table. Most of them are going North – South to seaward outside our rhumb line and you can see their red port or green starboard lights but one decides to turn across in front – I can see the green starboard, then green and red, change to red port light. I shine the high-beam torch on the mainsail but don’t know if she’s seen us. We both hold our courses as she’s going faster than Lady H and will pass in front. Phew!

Check with Lowestoft Port Control that it’s OK to leave the marina and proceed to the harbour entrance at 5 am. We’ve decided to start watches at 7am so that we can get our bearings in the dark, then it will be daylight and we can have bacon sandwiches together! The sea is calm – hurrah! – and the tide is with us (2 knots) – another hurrah! Log our passage plan with the Yarmouth Coastguard who asks what the visibility is like as it’s poor on the shore. We can’t see him either! But it soon burns off. We are making use of the strong tidal stream up the Norfolk coast as we follow the channel between the land and the offshore sandbanks and shoals which run parallel with it as far as Cockle Buoy, the taking off point for a direct route to Whitby. These sandbanks are now being used as bases for wind farms but before the days of shipping forecasts they claimed many lives. The Scroby Sands Wind Farm looks almost beautiful against the rosy dawn sky. It’s difficult to gauge the scale of the windmills which are actually 61m high with blades of 80m in diameter. Some blades are turning very slowly and some not at all in 8 knots of wind and it makes you wonder if they are economically viable.

On my watch I spot the distinctive red and white striped Haisborough Lighthouse, Norfolk’s oldest working lighthouse. It’s there to warn ships of the notorious Haisborough Sands thirteen miles out to sea, a historic graveyard for ships on this coastal route. Nearby Cromer was home to Henry Blogg (1876 – 1954), the greatest lifeboatman of them all. In his 53 years of service with the RNLI, Blogg and his crew rescued 873 people from these treacherous waters. When he began his illustrious career the lifeboat was an open boat with oars – now we are fortunate to have lifeboats like the one in Whitby with powerful engines and every possible aid to navigation and life-saving. It has been a constant comfort all round the shores of Britain to know that you are never far away from a lifeboat and its trusty volunteer crew.

As we start out across the Wash, off Sheringham, we pass a new wind farm still under construction. It seems to take hours to get past the rig, jack-up crane barge, guard boat and stumps of the new windmills – the tide has turned against us and we are battling 1.5 knots of tide. However we are sailing on a close reach, the engine went off at 9 am, with a constant NE wind of 8 – 12 knots and a calm sea – the forecast sea state ‘Slight’ could even be ‘Rippled’. A lone gannet plunges into the sea. Gannets have been our most constant companions all round the coast and we have grown to love them with their effortless gliding, huge black-tipped wings and yellow eye patches.

By 4 pm we are still sailing along under an azure sky with no land in sight – M says we could be in the middle of the Atlantic. Certainly no mobile phone signals out here! We observe a Russian ship approaching us from the NW on a collision course. We are the stand-on vessel which means we have right of way, quite apart from the fact that we are under sail. We monitor the ship visually and on the AIS but she makes no attempt to change course so we are obliged to bear away about 3 cables from her and let her pass. Can’t see anyone on the bridge – only a deckhand having a cigarette at the stern rail!

We have a hot supper – one I prepared earlier! – before it goes dark and pass a series of gas rigs to starboard. Malcolm is nearing familiar waters as he did the Dowsing offshore race with Keith Gowland (WYC Rear Commodore Cruise) and Mick Bond for two years running.

The wind drops and the engine goes on, M takes in the foresail and we put on our oilie jackets and our lifelines for night sailing. The radar reflector is aloft and the high-beam torch ready to shine on our mainsail if needed, to make us more visible. M takes the next watch to see us safely through the ships moored off the Humber. When I come on watch at 11 pm the stars are absolutely stunning with the Milky Way overhead and the plough leading us northwards. A red wedge on the Eastern horizon has me worried for a moment – but turns out to be the rising moon!

Malcolm has been keeping  a very close eye on the weather over the past few days to make sure we have settled weather for our long passage.  Time to refuel, fill up with water and shop for provisions.  We plan to leave at 5 am tomorrow morning to catch the tide and should be in Whitby for the bridge at 10 am on Friday.  It’s 158 miles from here to Whitby and we won’t be stopping – there isn’t really anywhere that’s directly en route or non-tidal.   The forecast looks good (Variable ENE 3 or less, occ. 4, sea state slight, visibility good) and we are all set.

Can’t wait to see Mum and Dad who have been marking off our progress every day on a large map of Britain.  Think they will be relieved when we are safely tied up!  So will our children – Morag says it’s like having teenagers to worry about!

Wonder when I am going to dress the boat overall for our entry into Whitby harbour?  Will there be anyone there to see it?  Plenty of time to think about this in the next  29 hours!

Evening at the Royal Norfolk and Suffolk Yacht Club, Lowestoft

The Warren family supper

Sue and I at Aldeburgh's Martello Tower

Megan’s 4^th birthday so phone to sing Happy Birthday!  A leisurely morning with lots of talking, walking and eating and then the train back to Lowestoft later in the afternoon.  Very pleasant indeed to catch up with more old friends – they have all been so welcoming and hospitable and made sure that we had every comfort during our stay!

From the train we see a herd of deer in a field of stubble, blackberries and conkers – feels like Summer’s coming to an end, although it’s very warm and sunny.  Orlagh and Megan both start school this week too – the start of the new school term and end of the holidays.

We are torn between a reluctance to end our travels and a strong desire to get home.  Perhaps we could go round again visiting different places like they do on ‘Coast’!  Or perhaps we could just get home and tackle all those domestic projects we’ve been talking about!

Lady Hamilton in Lowestoft

Lowestoft is a busy port with fishing boats, pilot boats, fisheries patrol boats and a noisy lifting  bridge over the river which leads eventually through an industrial wasteland to Oulton Broad.  It’s not a glamorous place to spend any time – but does have a hinterland of attractive seaside villages and unspoilt countryside.  This morning we escape to Aldeburgh (by train to Saxemundham and then car) where Malcolm’s uni friend Rick and his wife Sue have bought their retirement home.  AS it’s Bank Holiday weekend, three of their four children (and their partners) are staying in their spacious new home, along with their first grandchild, so it’s just like old times!

We go into town to buy fish and chips for lunch – the queues are unbelievable outside both establishments (both owned by the same person) and put The Magpie to shame.  Rick asks if we have fish and chip shops in Whitby? (!!!)  Think they might want to open a branch in Aldeburgh.  He patiently queues for an hour at the one with the shortest queue, whilst Sue takes us on a sight-seeing tour in both directions.

Towards Orford Ness in the South is a clover-shaped Martello Tower, the most northerly of these towers, built at the time of the Napoleonic Wars.  The shingle beach on one side, with crashing waves, is complemented by the peaceful inland waterway, with moored boats and river trips, only metres away on the other side of the spit.  We pass Rick who signals another 20 minutes, and carry on northwards, past the pretty Georgian houses, older cottages and Moot Hall of Aldeburgh, with its high street of upmarket shops and restaurants, to Thorpeness.  The distinctive chocolate box House in the Clouds, once a water mill for the nearby windmill, is now a private house.  In fact the whole village was created in the early 1900s as a holiday village.

Time to see if the queue’s gone down – nearly there!  I have to say that they are delicious and well worth waiting for!

Later in the afternoon Sue takes us to Snape Maltings, a group of Victorian red-brick buildings formerly used to process barley for brewing and now converted into an international centre for music and venue for the annual Aldeburgh music festival.  There are interesting shops, galleries, bars etc. too and a quay on the River Alde with beautiful old boats.

We have a superb homemade curry supper en famille and then slump in front of the new ‘Sherlock Holmes’ which we haven’t seen.  So much to look forward to when we get home!

Long, leisurely and delicious breakfast with John and Sandie! How comforting to see old friends and to share stories of our travels! Go back for mugs of tea on Antix to get some waypoints for the new Wind Farm off Sheringham (on the north Norfolk coast) and then change to Lady Hamilton for coffee and to show John the AIS on the Chart Plotter. Part in the early afternoon as they are driving back home today. They are hoping to depart from here for Whitby next Friday. We will watch the weather and may go earlier. The wind increases during the day and the rain periodically lashes down. Arrange to visit Rick and Sue, Malcolm’s uni friend, tomorrow for the night as they have retired to Aldeburgh. We then reorganise our Ruby Wedding party for the following weekend as we may not be back in time for the 5^th!!

Wait for the ferry to leave at 11.45 pm and then get clearance from Port Control to leave the harbour, having put up the mainsail. In spite of a nearly full moon in a clear sky, the overall impression is one of blackness with a confusion of red, green and white blinking and flashing lights. There are the red and green leading lights into Ramsgate, the quick white flashing cardinal buoys marking the various Goodwin Sands, the red and white lights of the Thanet Offshore Wind Farm in the distance off our starboard bow and the beams of the lighthouse on North Foreland. Quite a show!

We are following the advice given in Reeds Almanac: ‘The sandbanks shift constantly in the Thames Estuary …..Making N from North Foreland to Orford Ness or beyond it may be preferable to keep to seaward of the main banks, via Kentish Knock and Long Sand Head buoys, thence to N Shipwash lt buoy 14M further N.’

Our brave little boat points her nose North and picks her way past the lights and buoys, keeping on track on the Chart Plotter and tackling the ‘Moderate’ seas with determination. I begin to feel slightly queasy – the sea has a huge swell and seems quite disturbed. The waves go in all directions and seem to make deep holes when they meet, intensified by the blackness. M sends me below for a rest; we intend to do watches. The boat crashes through the waves as she beats into the NNW wind, shuddering with the impact of the seventh waves. Usually I love sleeping on passage, but I can’t sleep tonight; the motion is worse than the Irish Sea ‘washing machine’. Shut my eyes and feel guilty about leaving M all alone dodging heavy spray and large ships, although he says there’s no need for us both to be on watch. As dawn approaches we are both on watch, crossing the shipping lane and then negotiating our way through a fleet of anchored cargo vessels waiting for pilots. I eat an awful lot of ginger biccies whilst M tries to have a rest below but he only manages half an hour.

By the time we reach Orfordness, north of Harwich, the sea has begun to lessen in the lee of the land but the tide has turned against us. The sun has risen, we pull out the foresail and turn off the engine, and start to relax. Sail past the ‘jewels’ of the Suffolk coast, Aldeburgh and Southwold, and the flat landscape beyond, and eventually into Lowestoft itself, paying careful attention to the shoals just offshore. At 2 pm we tie up against a large gin palace outside the Royal Norfolk and Suffolk Yacht Club, have a cup of tea and some fruit cake and fall into bed.

Later we have showers, a meal on board, arrange to meet John and Sandie (Antix) for breakfast in the Club tomorrow and get an early night. Sleep like logs!

Wet and cold – the wind has gone round to the North. John Allen’s ears must have been burning as he phoned to see if we’d make Lowestoft by the weekend as he and Sandie were coming down for the weekend to see Antix!

Decide to make the most of the next weather window and head for Lowestoft tonight, leaving at midnight. Abandon our original plan to break the journey at Harwich as this would take us about three hours, travelling west from the rhumb line to Lowestoft, when Lowestoft itself would be only six hours northwards from that point. Went over the passage plan that Malcolm had worked on in such detail. The tide will be with us across the shipping lane (Traffic Separation Zone) out of the Thames estuary.

When it stops raining we go and look at the sea – which seems to be gradually calming down – and walk round to the other breakwater where desultory holidaymakers are dodging the spray at high tide. Send the blog from an internet café on the front. In the next café are two suntanned ‘Diamond geezers’, with similar large heads and heavy features, both in black with heavy gold necklaces, opposite a slight young man in shirt and tie with lots of files open in front of him. A reincarnation of the Kray twins! I want to photograph them for the blog and skulk behind a stand of postcards but M says it’s more than our life’s worth, especially as one of them is already giving him the evil eye! Have to make do with a trip to the lovely Waitrose instead where I dither over the delights of exotic readymade dishes and plump for shepherd’s pie instead – something plain and filling before our midnight departure.

View from The Royal Temple Yacht Club, Ramsgate

The Home for Smack Boys, Ramsgate

Pugin's home, 'The Grange', in Ramsgate

Malcolm has found another chandlers in Ramsgate!

A quiet morning doing jobs – housework, laundry and passage planning etc. and chatting to the neighbours – a couple from Port Solent and another from Belgium, both on their way home but stormbound like us. The Belgians are off to Waitrose to stock up on English goodies like Stilton, bacon and sausages!

Sightseeing in the afternoon: first the Seamen’s Church and Home for Smack Boys – two redbrick buildings on the harbour front. The home was founded in 1881 to lodge the ‘smack boys’ who worked on the fishing smacks to service the booming new fashion for fish and chips. Apparently the boys (aged 11 to 20) – almost 400 of them by the 1870’s – had become a bit of a social nuisance when on shore so the local vicar proposed the home as a solution. It was the only one of its kind in the country but closed in 1915 due to the dwindling number of smacks in the harbour and the boys going off to the front line.

Next is the Pugin Trail – Augustus Pugin was an architect and leader of the Gothic Revival in the mid 19^th Century, a great influence on William Morris and the Arts and Crafts movement as well as the architect Sir George Gilbert Scott and William Butterfield (remember St Mary-in-Castro, Dover). He is perhaps best known for the magnificent interiors, furnishings and fittings of the Houses of Parliament. Pugin loved Ramsgate and built his home ‘The Grange’ here, as well as the church next door and several other buildings. In his spare time he had a boat, the ‘Caroline’, in the harbour and used her to tow ships off the Goodwin Sands and to assist in saving lives and salvaging cargoes, as well as for trips across the Channel.

We walk up the West Cliff to view ‘The Grange’ and St. Augustine’s Abbey Church (RC) but only from the graveyard, with views out to sea. The house is now available to let from The Landmark Trust and the church is closed (with squatters in the porch). Admire the pretty Georgian Spencer Square, spot a house where Vincent Van Gogh resided and walk back down the hill to the marina.

In the evening we call at the Royal Temple Yacht Club for a pint and delight in finding ‘Antix’ from Whitby Yacht Club up among the top names in the results for Ramsgate Week. We’re hoping to catch up with them in Lowestoft this weekend.

South Foreland - the white cliffs of Dover

Met Office inshore forecast: 0600 – 0600: SW 3 or 4 becoming cyclonic, 5 – 7 perhaps Gale 8 for a time later. Checked with other sources to verify that later meant later (‘later’ = 12 hours later) and felt confident enough to leave as soon as the lock gates open at 9.30 am: Ramsgate is only a short 20 mile hop from Dover and we will be there by lunchtime. Call Dover Port Control to get permission to leave the harbour and told to wait at the lighthouse by the eastern end of the breakwater for two cross-Channel ferries to come in and one to leave, feeling rather small in comparison. I rather like being called ‘Ma’am’ in our communications!

Pass a pretty place called St Margaret’s at Cliffe from where most channel swims usually start/end. Round South Foreland under motor and foresail as the tide turns in our favour. Dover Coastguard suddenly announce a Gale Warning: SW Gale Force 8 expected later. The clouds catch us up after a sunny start. Rows of wind turbines appear on the skyline ahead – the new Thanet Offshore Wind Farm – eventually there’ll be a hundred of them but it’s still under construction. The white cliffs of Dover peter out (no bluebirds spotted today!) and low beaches take their place as we pass Sandwich and Pegwell Bays.

Ramsgate has a Recommended Yacht Track parallel and south of the dredged channel for commercial ferries. We have to lay off 20 degrees to counteract the tide in excess of 2 knots sweeping us NE up the Channel. Short cuts are not recommended round here – the treacherous Goodwin Sands lie only 4 miles from the harbour entrance! A disturbed chop just outside the entrance but we feel relieved to be tied up before the gale arrives – later!

Ramsgate has a Royal Harbour – the only one in mainland Britain – because George IV decreed that Ramsgate should have the right to add Royal to its name after embarking here for Hannover in 1820. Apparently he was very impressed with the hospitality he received!

I go ashore to do a reccy and find Tourist Information very welcoming but Ramsgate’s Maritime Museum is closed indefinitely. What a shame! Come back armed with leaflets of things to do and see if stormbound in Ramsgate – not a lot now! The town centre has obviously seen better days but there are some lovely terraces of Georgian and Victorian houses along the elevated seafront. One of them houses the Royal Temple Yacht Club and there are a plethora of places to eat to suit every taste and pocket!

On the next pontoon there’s loads of activity around a gaff-rigged lugger, the very pretty ‘Privateer’ from Boston. A black rib full of men with furry microphones and cameras precedes the boat as it departs with James May off ‘Top Gear’ standing on the deck! Malcolm is more interested in the two French girls on the next boat and wonders if they need any help from a civil engineer as one of them is cutting up a kitchen sieve to mend something. They leave too in spite of the forecast – but ‘Privateer’ comes back before long. Heavy rain keeps us on board for the evening.

The Royal Cinque Ports Yacht Club, Dover

Lady Hamilton in Dover

Orlagh, our eldest grandchild is 5 today! She especially liked the ‘fossil book’ from Lyme Regis!

We watch three yachts depart in spite of the gale forecast and decide to walk up to Dover Castle instead. The castle is magnificently situated on the cliffs high above the town overlooking the English Channel – a frontier fortress, guarding the nearest landing point to mainland Europe. You can easily see the cliffs of France, even from the shore. The castle has been in use since 1066 up until the Cold War, playing a prominent role in both world wars. Admiralty Look-out on the cliff edge gives amazing views over the harbour and the Straits of Dover.

We visit the Saxon church of St Mary-in-Castro, restored by the famous Victorian architect, Sir George Gilbert Scott (of Houses of Parliament fame), and with an interior of brightly contrasting brickwork by William Butterfield, which stands right next to the Roman Pharos – the oldest building in the castle. Next is the Great Tower, a rectangular keep built by Henry II as a palace to welcome visitors to England, similar in style to the Tower of London. Inside the Great Chamber Henry II and Eleanor of Aquitaine are going at it hammer and tongs as to which of their sons should succeed to the throne of England! Their modern audience hang upon every word and even join in!

After that we are catapulted into the 20^th Century on a tour of the Secret Wartime Tunnels, from where, in May 1940, Vice Admiral Ramsey organised, directed and inspired the evacuation of Dunkirk. Emerging from the sights and sounds of wartime Dover onto a terrace we see three yachts coming into the harbour, and one is really struggling to make the entrance against the tide. The harbour patrol tug goes out to guide her in but the yacht is swept eastwards and is taking a huge pounding from the waves which have built up since this morning. We scramble back up to the Admiralty Lookout as the drama unfolds. It’s so windy up there you can hardly stand up. Fortunately the yacht eventually makes it into the east entrance whilst an outgoing ferry stands off. Back at the Marina the yacht in difficulties turns out to be one of those that left this morning – they got to Dungeness and turned back. We are very pleased not to be out at sea but it makes our own decision of when to go even more nerve-wracking. It’s true that the more time you spend in port the more apprehensive you become about leaving it!

Dover Harbour - beach with marinas in distance

Dover Castle - the church and Roman Pharos

The wind kicks in exactly on cue at 6am.

Dover is an extremely busy port with five ferry lines constantly to’ing and fro’ing to Calais, Dunkirk and Ostend. Lorries from all over Europe roar along the dual carriageway tucked under the white chalk cliffs overhanging the port, creating a terrifying barrier between the marina and the town. The town itself seems forgotten, no decent shops and no real centre. The inhabitants are a strange mix of tourists waiting for ferries, local Kent shoppers and people who probably got as far as Dover and no further. A ‘New Wave’ path along the shingle shore, with wavy embankments and new fancy lamposts are signs of a recent rejuvenation programme.

In the Inner Harbour there’s a new water sports centre with windsurfers, dinghies and swimmers in brightly coloured swimming caps who plough up and down practising for crossing the Channel. A bust of Captain Webb watches them. The outer breakwater was constructed at the end of the 19^th Century originally to provide a secure anchorage for the Royal Navy. The Royal Cinque Ports Yacht Club is situated along the front in a lovely old building – but is frequented (on a weekday lunchtime) by lovely old people! It doesn’t serve meals any more, only cheeseburger and chips and bacon rolls.

We retreat to the boat and write the blog, passage plan and read our books, before going out to the Premier Inn’s restaurant, on the recommendation of the lady in the Marina Office. Standards are slipping a bit!

Dungeness under a cloud

Sovereign Marina, Eastbourne to Dover (45 miles)

The marina is buzzing by 6 am as the forecast for ‘later’ (i.e. 6pm this evening) is for a Gale Force 8 or possible Severe Gale Force 9.  Our neighbours on one side are off to Chichester and the other side to Ramsgate.  We take the 7 am lock and charge up the Channel with both sails and engine, the wind and tide behind us, to get into port before the gale hits.  The forecast changes at 1pm delaying the arrival of the gale to midnight and we are tempted to keep going to Ramsgate, a further 20 miles, where we have planned to stay a day to prepare for the Thames Estuary crossing and the final leg.

Channel 16 is full of French voices as we are so close to the French coast – only 20 miles away.  Dover Coastguard give very regular updates on navigation and visibility in the Channel as well as the usual weather forecasts.  It rains and we take turns to sit outside on watch for crab pots, other yachts and the occasional fishing vessel.

Visibility is very poor as we pass Pevensey Bay where William the Conqueror landed, Hastings and Rye – home of our family friends, the Butlers.  The strange shingle promontory of Dungeness has a low cloud shrouding the power station and the top of the lighthouse.  In the end M decides that the poor visibility – echoed in the CNIS broadcasts on Ch 11 – is a greater threat in the busy shipping lanes around Dover and Ramsgate than being stormbound in Dover.

Two miles away from Dover Harbour you have to call up Dover Port Control to get permission to enter, which is granted.  The Outer Harbour is huge and we can see the huge P and O cross-Channel ferries on the far side.  The marina is tucked well away from these down a dredged channel leading into the old docks.  Once tied up M logs on to discover that the gale is now forecast for 6 am tomorrow morning!  Perhaps we should have gone to Ramsgate after all – but no, visibility was a real issue and we have taken the right decision.  The Frenchman who was going to Ramsgate this morning comes in just behind us so he has also changed his mind.   Find out that Antix is stormbound in Lowestoft on the way back from Ramsgate Week to Whitby.

Have a sleep and then phone uni friend Jo in Canterbury – we were intending to meet them too but agree that it’s just too rushed.  Jo is off on a residential tomorrow to train (or be trained by?!) her new guide dog, Poppy.  We’ll arrange a land-based trip later in the year.  My brother phones from the family Sunday dinner table wondering where we are and informs me that I left some cheese in the fridge at home – yuk!  Eat on board, read the Sunday paper and wonder what winds tomorrow will bring.

Beachy Head

Leaving Brighton

The Seven Sisters

Brighton Marina to Eastbourne Marina

Departed Brighton at 12 noon to make the most of the tide around Beachy Head.  Sailed a beam reach, making 7 ½ knots past the very white chalk Seven Sisters (there are actually 8!) and Beachy Head.  We have the whole scene completely to ourselves, stripey red and white lighthouse at the bottom of the cliff and all!  Not a single yacht or ship in sight!  Extraordinary feeling!  As we round Beachy Head, we realise that we are now heading North – this is the last southerly headland on our journey – and we are homeward bound!

(The Normans named Beachy Head ‘Beau Chef’ (beautiful headland) – hence the corruption of the name to Beachy. It’s 163m tall and is quite a landmark from the sea.)

Sedate Eastbourne is just round the corner from Beachy  Head and we arrive about 5 pm.  Sovereign Marina is pretty new and part of an out-of-town development with a whole (rather ugly) village, shops, restaurants built around it in the last 10 years or so. There are two locks side by side to enter/leave the marina – and Jenny and her grandaughters are there to meet us!  Yet more small visitors who are getting a feeling for boats – can’t be bad!  They do a very thorough exploration of the boat, trying out  Grandad Chris’ bunk when he sailed with us in Scotland, and having snacks in the saloon.

Malcolm has to mend the GPS connection, which failed again when extended to the cockpit, so we delay our visit to Bryony and Bob’s by half an hour.  Last seen on Lady H in Whitehills harbour on the Moray Firth whilst they were on holiday in Scotland, this time they whisk us back to their home in Hailsham for a wonderful meal.  We are certainly having a social time on the south coast!

Lewes and back to Brighton Marina

June, another good friend from our Pocklington gang, came down from London by train for the day to see us.  Jenny’s daughter, Tamsin, also arrived, bringing her little girls to stay with Grannie for the weekend.  Had a very lively lunch in the local pub catching up on all the news and gossip of families and friends.  Staying with Jenny in the comfort of her home and meeting up with old friends has only emphasised our feelings – mutually admitted round about the Isle of Wight – that we were both rather looking forward to getting back to our own home and local circle of family and friends!  Lady Hamilton has been our floating home since mid-May – apart from our short trips home – and she’s done a wonderful job of getting us safely round Britain but it will be quite nice to wander out into the garden and have a proper bath!

In the afternoon M and I took the bus back to Brighton and then another bus to the Marina, which is about 2 miles from the centre of town.  Another trip to Asda, for perishables this time, and a meal and a DVD on board.  Back to the simple life!

Lewes

Malcolm earns his keep with advice on a leaky roof – very useful being a Civil Engineer!  He also does lots of passage planning for crossing the Thames Estuary and the last leg of our voyage.  I just wander up and down the High Street admiring the shops whilst looking for birthday wrapping paper for our grandchildren: the presents purchased in Cornwall and stowed away in a locker can now be wrapped and posted.  After our jobs and Jenny’s Pilates class we do some more sight-seeing (although I’m not sure if the Rose Cottage pub is actually a sight or not!) and are bowled over by the stunning views of the Cuckmere Valley and Cuckmere Haven, the gap in the cliffs where the Seven Sisters start.

In the afternoon we have a good tramp up and down Lewes itself, although our aim to visit the Priory is thwarted as it’s closed for refurbishment and will have to be visited in the winter.  We pass a plaque informing us that Dr. Richard Russell lived here: he wrote a ‘Dissertation Concerning the Uses of Sea Water in Diseases of the Glands’ which recommended bathing and drinking (!) seawater for the prevention of a wide range of ailments.  This work was very influential in persuading people to take up sea-bathing in the late 18^th and early 19^th century and thus ensured the flourishing of seaside resorts such as Brighton, Weymouth and even Lyme Regis!

Jenny and I in lovely Lewes

Brighton Marina – shore leave in Lewes

Jenny, our close friend who has recently relocated to nearby Lewes, came down to the Marina for coffee and helped me with restocking the stores with non-perishables (plenty of tins ready for our last leg home to Whitby) from the huge Asda.  After lunch on board Jenny took us to see what we had missed at Newhaven marina, our original choice  – not a lot! – and back to her lovely home right in the centre of Lewes.  Lewes is the most delightful town, dominated by a Norman castle with the original Medieval street layout still in tact, full of beautiful old buildings and a myriad of interesting shops, cafes, restaurants – even a brewery!  The town is surrounded by the rolling South Downs countryside – some of England’s finest.

Settled in for a couple of days R and R with a delicious home-cooked supper and ‘Coast’ on the TV – all about the Caledonian Canal!!

We spend ages debating the various weather forecasts for the next two days – there are some strong wind warnings around. Decide to depart today as tomorrow looks as if the wind will be stronger. In retrospect we decide that the forecast of the wind speed can always go one higher as by lunchtime the new forecast is giving a Force 7. The sea over Chichester Bar is churned up as the tide is on the ebb, but this is only a foretaste of what is to come. To get to Brighton we have to go round Selsey Bill. There are two ways – the inshore Looe Channel or by going 7 miles out to avoid the various shoals and overfalls. In view of the sea state and strong wind we decide to go the long way round at which point the GPS suddenly flickers and dies. This also affects the Chart Plotter which no longer shows our little blue boat moving along the rhumb line!

However we have a handheld GPS that M rigs up in the cockpit. It’s a long way round Selsey Bill – and we jibe tack for eight hours (40 miles). The sea has a big swell with a following wind. We put our safety harnesses on and sit either side of the boat – each time we tack the foresail one person lets out the sail and takes over the helming whilst the other one winds in the sail. Visibility also becomes poorer and the coastal towns of Littlehampton and Worthing disappear under a cloud. What has happened to all that southern sunshine?

The entry into Brighton Marina is pretty scary as it’s a man-made structure (there are no natural all weather harbours between Portsmouth and Dover) with a large concrete breakwater made of cylindrical caissons. The seas are breaking heavily over these into the narrow entrance channel so we get a further soaking on the way in! The main GPS springs back into life once we are tied up – obviously had just had enough! Decide that next time there’s a 6 in the forecast we’ll go sightseeing!! Feel much better after a hot shower and a very nice meal in one of the many restaurants overlooking the marina.

Sunset in Chichester Harbour - note mudflats

The Bar Beacon off Chichester Harbour

Angie and Albert's house from across the river with their boat (blue Fisher)

Fiona and Steve visit us at Port Hamble Marina

Shore leave continues with a welcome visit from my sister Fiona and partner Steve from London.  Angie makes us all breakfast and then we depart for a walk, taking the pink ferry from Port Hamble to Warsash on the other side of the river.  The path takes us along the riverbank opposite Angie and Albert’s house, spotting an egret and lapwings,  and up to Swanwick, where we have a delicious picnic provided by Fiona.  Cross the river to Burlesdon and then back to Hamble through woods and fields – I really appreciate the fresh greenery after being at sea for a while!  We have sailed from here a few times so enjoy looking at the various marinas and even stop at the Mercury Marina for icecream and chocolate brownies.

Arrive back at our hosts’ just as they are dishing up fresh trout – caught by Albert and Andrew that morning.  Then they all depart for London leaving us to a quiet evening in front of the telly  – a real treat!

Gardening - makes a change from sailling!!

Woken by sound of drilling in our heads which turned out to be the gardener chopping down shrubs and trees.  After much tea and coffee we turned our hand to gardening (me) and advising on the new extension (M) – I even went up into the treehouse, on the wobbly bridge and abseiled down a giant oak tree – but declined to follow Angie on the flying fox!  Had a great day, ending with a BBQ with daughter Anja and fiance Andrew newly arrived from London.  Anja was in my playgroup which I ran in Oman!  Watched the old video of our wadi-bashing days together and admired our younger selves!!  (Although we didn’t seem to be very good parents as all the kids were busy lighting fires in caves!)  Ended the evening with our initiation into the delights of Wii – bowling, skiing and flying!  Must get one!

Malcolm with Angie at the Royal Southern Yacht Club

The Solent - looking back at The Needles with overfalls

The cliffs near Lulworth Cove

Old Harry Rocks from our anchorage in Studland Bay

Lulworth Cove

Weighed anchor at 7.30 am to catch the tidal gate for the Solent.  Last night we had a fireworks display in Bournemouth but retired to bed before the natural display of a shower of meteorites – although I looked out at 1 pm and couldn’t see any.  Rather jealous when Sandie texts me to say that they saw about 25 an hour as they sail Antix non-stop from Plymouth to Ramsgate!

Sailed in a flotilla of yachts heading for Hurst Point and the North Channel to avoid the Shingles.  The Needles and the Isle of Wight look quite near as we round Hurst Point  and we experience up to 4 knots of tide with us – and unexpected overfalls.

Sail up the Solent and cross over to the River Hamble in between the Isle of Wight ferries and many other yachts tacking up and down, power boats and gin palaces – and it’s only Friday afternoon!  Very glad we’ll be on shore over the weekend!  Tie up in Port Hamble Marina (one of five on the River Hamble) and washed the boat down ready for our visitors, refuelled and watered ready for Monday’s departure.  We were last here about 14 years ago so things have changed -  even more boats and the old ‘Squarerigger’ pub has gone.

Angie and Albert arrive at 4pm to look over Lady Hamilton and whisk us off to their lovely characterful home (built by a retired Admiral) only a couple of minutes away on the riverbank.  Our families were all very good friends when we lived in Oman (1982 – 84) and it was just wonderful to rekindle that friendship after so many years of Christmas letters!  Went down to the Royal Southern Yacht Club for drinks – Angie has been very involved in renovating and extending the clubhouse as Chair of the Ladies Committee, even meeting Prince Philip!  We met loads of their friends and even brought two back for supper, with wine flowing very freely to celebrate getting together after so many years!  Fell into our double bunk – the Admiral built a very nautical house! – and imagined we were still rocking on the boat!!

Evening in Weymouth from 6 boats out!

My only footfall in Weymouth is to the Londis shop for emergency rations of bread and milk!  As we leave the sea front of elegant houses stretches out along the bay.  A primitive man on a horse etched into the hillside seems to be setting off for the white cliffs ahead.  The dinghies are out in force again with young Olympic hopefuls trapezing out at crazy angles with  their coaches in ribs egging them on.  We sail on a broad reach to Lulworth Cove and do a tour of the bay but decide to press on to make the tidal gate round St Alban’s Head.  The Jurassic Coast of East Devon and Dorset must be some of the most stunning coastal scenery we have seen on this trip.  The chalk cliffs with arches, coves and pillars, and the strata and caves of the Purbeck peninsula between Kimmeridge and Durlston Head are just magnificent.  It is fascinating to try and identify places visited when accompanying a primary school residential to Swanage with Jonathan and Alex 24 years ago!

Malcolm has planned to pass close inshore of St Alban’s Head to avoid the ‘considerable tidal race’ which extends 3 miles eastwards.  Motor-sailed from Lulworth Cove to St Alban’s Head to make sure we make the tidal gate. There’s plenty of deep water and it feels safe.  From west to east there are five headlands to round today – each with a tidal race and overfalls (lots of wiggly lines on the chart!): St Alban’s, Anvil Point, Durlston Head, Peveril Point and Handfast Point (Old Harry Rocks).  Today we have a NW 3 or 4 gusting 5 or 6 and the sea state is smooth so none of the overfalls pose a threat, although you can still see and feel the troubled waters.  Sailed on a close reach all the way to Studland Bay.

Anchored in Studland Bay under Old Harry Rocks with Bournemouth and the Isle of Wight in the distance.  We can see the entrance to Poole Harbour – a huge catamaran ferry shoots out too close for comfort as we enter the Bay – and Sandbanks, the most expensive real estate in Britain, on the other side.  We are careful not to anchor in the protected area for seahorses and settle down for a quiet night in before we stay with friends in Hamble over the weekend.  Re-anchor when the depth meter shows less than 2 metres with another half hour to go until low tide – don’t want to end up on our side in Studland Bay in font of all these Southerners!

Rounding Portland Bill

Creep out and sit on The Cobb before the tourists and fishermen arrive and have it all to myself – feels very special.

Leave with the high tide and pick up a mooring buoy outside the harbour entrance to wait for the favourable easterly flow at Portland Bill.  As we sail on a broad reach past Chesil Beach I’m reminded of Ian McEwan’s ‘On Chesil Beach’ and the ill-fated honeymooners.  Discover from my on-board library that the story of smugglers ,‘Moonfleet’, which I read to my class at school, was based on the lagoon behind Chesil Beach called The Fleet.

Portland Bill is at the end of the Isle of Portland, a huge wedge-shaped block of Portland stone, higher at the north end than the south.  We had debated whether to try the inside passage but as it’s Spring tides, and the crab pot markers get dragged under in strong tides, and therefore become even more of a hazard than usual, we decided against it.  Lady Hamilton, stately as a galleon, rounded the Bill 3 miles off in brilliant sunshine!

The vast man-made Portland Harbour along the East side of the Isle has been chosen as the venue for the sailing events in the 2012 Olympics.  As well as the usual battleships there are hundreds of dinghies charging about in races.  Apparently Ben Ainsley is here, controversially helming a large yacht instead of his usual single-hander.

Weymouth, our port for the night, is very quaint with lovely old houses and warehouses along the quays, and a mix of cross-Channel ferries, fishing boats and yachts.  It’s very popular so we are rafted six boats out!  The chap on the next boat tells us of today’s top stories about the tidal races off the Bill – a French boat sailing under genoa which turned turtle, and a woman screaming on Ch 16 for help but the nearest fishing boat wouldn’t go to their aid as it was too dangerous and the Coastguard advised turning off their engine and letting the tide take the boat out of the race.  Glad we went the long way round!!

The steps Louisa jumps from in 'Persuasion'

Early morning on the Cobb with the Undercliff behind

Drying out at The Cobb

Cobb Harbour looking south

Dried out very successfully, according to the Harbour Master. The boat settled on an even keel and I slept like a baby – Malcolm only got up about four times to check the lines!

Persistent drizzle all morning so consoled ourselves with scrambled eggs on toast and a visit to the Marine Aquarium on the Cobb next to our boat. Local fishermen bring unusual catches here and we hand-fed grey mullet, ‘ a very shy fish normally so this is the only place in England you can do it’ said the owner.

We are tied up in the tiny harbour full of small fishing boats and leisure craft sheltering within the curving arm of The Cobb, a 600’ long stone breakwater, constructed originally in the 13th Century and then clad with Portland stone in the 19th. One cannot imagine that as a port Lyme once outshone Bristol with ships trading all over the world.

Strolled along Marine Parade to the Museum which has very informative displays about Mary Anning who found the first complete ichthyosaur in 1811 when she was only 12 years old, Jane Austen, who stayed here and described Lyme in ‘Persuasion’, and John Fowles, who lived here, was curator of the museum and based ‘The French Lieutenant’s Woman’ in Lyme. Buy a children’s book on Mary Anning for our granddaughters who are very into fossils and Tracey Chevalier’s novel ‘Remarkable Creatures’, a grown-up version of the story, for me!

The narrow streets are lined with colour-washed houses (and interesting shops of course!) which climb steeply up from the sea front. There are wonderful views across to Golden Cap, the tallest cliff in Southern England, and the fossil-bearing cliffs between Lyme and Charmouth.

Showered at the local sailing club and walked back along the Parade – now with Gymnastics Display for the Regatta – to meet Nathalie for the Jane Austen walk. Stop outside the houses she stayed in, the locations of the scenes in ‘Persuasion’ and other places she frequented when staying here with her family in 1803 and 1804. Jane loved Lyme and we do too!

Fish and chips on board for supper whilst the brass band plays for our entertainment. Watch the tide going out, leaving us high and dry again – the stars are very clear tonight.

Dartmouth Castle guarding the entrance

Ocean Princess leaving Dartmouth

(from Devon to Dorset)

Round Berry Head and into Lyme Bay – we are now most definitely in the second big ‘bite’ of the South West peninsula. ‘The English Riviera’, of Paignton, Torquay and Teignmouth, momentarily bathes in sunshine to keep up its’ reputation. The forecast is SW 4/5 inc 5/6 so we phone the Harbour Master in Lyme Regis to check that we can berth inside the sheltered harbour rather than bouncing about on a buoy outside. He is very welcoming and calls me ‘My Sweet’ – now I know why Libby Purves had such a thing for West Country Harbour Masters! We’ll have to dry out against the harbour wall so that will be a first on this trip.

Sail under foresail past the distant pink cliffs of the East Devon part of the Jurassic Coast towards our little man-made harbour. This bay, unlike the first one with Falmouth, Fowey and Plymouth – and others not visited – has few natural harbours so there are no boltholes if the weather turns bad. We can only get into Lyme two hours either side of High Water so have to time it just right as the Force 6 kicks in with 24 knots maximum – not weather to be bobbing about waiting to get in!

Arrive on the dot at 4.45 pm and the Assistant Harbour Master is waving us in and takes our lines. There’s only one other visitor on the wall, a bilge keeler (two keels so can dry out easily). Malcolm sorts out the mooring lines, fender board and strop for the mast to ensure that we lean into the wall when the tide goes out. I go on a very long walk to find food, climbing up above the harbour and then down the main street. Feel quite relieved that there are none of the yachtie shops here and lots of families and fish and chips, it feels more real somehow! Perhaps more like Whitby too! It’s Regatta Week and tonight there’s a fancy dress pub crawl with barrows.

I spot a board offering literary walks – including a Jane Austen one, the main reason we are here, so book one for tomorrow evening. Watch the end of the ‘Girl with the Dragon Tattoo’ (don’t think Jane would have approved) and feel the keel settle into the mud, leaving us high and dry.

Start Point - scene of the wreck of the Gossamer

The ‘Gossamer’ was a China tea clipper, 181’ long and 4 years old in 1868. She had recently come 2nd in the great sea race from China. Her young skipper came home, proposed to his wife and two weeks later they sailed for Australia. He had been on deck for two full days and nights, battling in gales, and as their neared Start and Prawle Points he had said ‘I think she’ll clear it’ and gone below. The 100’ masts created windage and the Gossamer began to drift crab-wise towards the rocks. The Captain, warm in the arms of his young bride, refused to come on deck. The ship foundered and 13 of the 30 on board were lost. Barbara and John died in each other’s arms, an embrace that remained even with their lifeless bodies. They share a grave a mile or so inland. ‘Young hopes, young dreams ended forever under the gentle Devon soil’.
After lunch we set off to round Start Point under sail but the wind drops. It’s very calm today with negligible overfalls and the tide in our favour – the rocks are still fearsome, but no drama for us today.

Dartmouth has a spectacular narrow entrance between two castles. Rounding the corner, without warning, a car ferry from Kingswear to Dartmouth swings out into the river ahead of us, but even more surprising is the sight of the cruise liner ‘Ocean Princess’ moored in the middle of the river. Like a floating block of flats, she dwarfs the pastel-coloured 3 and 4 storey houses along the old quayside. As we approach her mooring lines disappear into her stern and she starts to move upriver, under the (surely disapproving) eye of the Royal NavalCollege. The quays, balconies and boats are lined with onlookers as she turns on a sixpence, gives three long blasts and disappears round the corner and out to sea! Meanwhile we have found the Visitors’ pontoon of the Dart Haven Marina on the Kingswear side of the river. This is placed directly under the terminus of the Dart Valley Railway  and fish quay with much loading/unloading of luggage onto passenger ferries and smelly crates onto refrigerated wagons. No wonder it’s cheaper than the marina in Dartmouth itself! (But still £31 a night!)
Pay a visit to the Royal Dart Yacht Club, which looks very comfortable, overlooking the river, but is empty apart from the stewards and it’s the chef’s night off on a Sunday. Sound familiar? Repair to the pub and sit looking out at the red night sky and the twinkling lights of Darmouth.

In The Bag, Salcombe

Locked out of Sutton Harbour Marina and sailed down the Sound, but not a submarine or battleship in sight. Sailed all the way to Salcombe, averaging 6.5 knots, on a broad reach. Could get used to this sailing lark! Dartmoor glowered in the distance behind the high cliffs along this stretch of the Devon coast and black clouds followed close on our heels.

Salcombe is ‘one of Britain’s yachting meccas’ according to the guide book. It’s another fine natural harbour and is absolutely full of boats from dinghies to ferries, classic yachts to huge plastic motor cruisers. We eventually find the visitors’ pontoon in The Bag, just round the corner from Salcombe itself, but not before going half way to Kingsbridge at the top of the estuary. The huge number of boats on moorings – sometimes three to one buoy – and others careering up and down from ship to shore make it difficult to spot this small pontoon in the middle of the channel. It’s a bit like being in a lay-by on the M25!

We raft up alongside a family with three argumentative young children, behind a boat with three noisy girls throwing themselves in the water and in front of a large motor yacht with a crying baby on board. Add to that BBQs, dogs and noisy pre-dinner drinks and it begins to feel like camping ‘sur mer’! The scenery on either side is very pastoral though, sheep on one side and cows on the other, grazing in green fields with trees lining the water’s edge. And eventually the neighbours go to the pub or to sleep and the river traffic dies down and we have a peaceful evening watching ‘The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo’ and eating chocolate!

Smeaton's Tower, Plymouth Hoe

John Allen and I at 'The Watering Hole', Plymouth

Sir Francis Drake and admirer

A steady drizzle delayed the start of our sightseeing. I caught with the blog and writing invitations to our Ruby Wedding family party on 5th September. Got to be home by then! Malcolm browsed the Whitby Yacht Club newsletter emailed by Nigel and discovered that Antix, Whitby’s lead boat in sailing events around the UK, was in Plymouth too! And what’s more, skipper John Allen was on board! So we arranged to meet up this evening at a local hostelry.

The rain ceased and we set off to expore the sites of Plymouth, fortified by a Cornish pasty on the hoof. Waylaid by a little shop selling traditional sailing clothes and bought trousers for M and sailing gloves for me to replace worn ones.

In the Barbican area we visited the Elizabethan House up a narrow cobbled side street and the Mayflower Steps, where the Pilgrim Fathers set sail from. Then took the South Coast Path past the Royal Citadel, a 17th Century fortress still in use as a garrison, and arrived at The Hoe, a grassy expanse overlooking Plymouth Sound where Sir Francis Drake reputedly finished his game of bowls before sailing to meet the Spanish Armada. Here too is Smeaton’s Tower, the third lighthouse to stand on the Eddystone Rock, moved here in 1882. Continued all along the front, past two open-air swimming pools (both empty – Plymouth now has a big new indoor arena), as far as the Royal William Victualler’s – a most imposing suite of stone buildings finished in 1834 to supply the Navy, now being sold off as apartments, shops and restaurants.

Joined John at The Watering Hole and caught up on the adventures of Antix and Lady Hamilton and the delights of the Irish Sea Chop! It was really great to meet up so far from home. Antix will make one hop from Plymouth to Ramsgate for the next regatta leaving on Thursday, whilst we sedately call at every port of interest along the south coast!

Serious mix of commercial shipping and yachting in Fowey

The arrival of the Harbour Master’s launch disturbs our lie-in with a demand for payment – £14 for the night. The wind has come back at 6 am and we disentangle ourselves with help from our friendly neighbours on the Bavaria and set sail for Plymouth. We are still in that first great bay – like a giant’s bite – on the South West Peninsula.

The winds are variable today – anything from 3 to 20 knots – so we sail with the foresail fully out, only occasionally having to put the engine on. Pass Polperro and Looe, full of tiny dinghies, and spot the Eddystone Light in the distance, 8 miles to the south. Then round into Plymouth Sound, one of the Channel’s greatest natural harbours. The Pilot Book tells us that ‘From the days of Hawkins and Drake to nuclear submarines, the city has found a large part of its prosperity in the business of war. Great fishing fleets have sailed from here, as have voyages of discovery and colonisation’. We have chosen to go for Sutton Harbour Marina, one of four in Plymouth, because it’s right in the middle of the historic Barbican and we are having a day ashore tomorrow to explore this historic city. Have a quiet night on board in readiness – tortilla with Mary’s eggs and a DVD.

St Anthony's Head, leaving Falmouth.

Broad reach from Falmouth to Fowey

50 08’.61N 05 01’.48W to 50 19.65N 04 38 .54W

Just leaving the boat to buy fuel and bread before departing Mylor when greeted by Kate (nee Bee) and Graham, who used to sail out of Whitby and then moved their boat to Mylor. We bumped into them in Mylor when we were last here nine years ago! They had watched us come in last night from the comfort of a huge motor cruiser moored nearby – they have now sold their own boat but still have (useful!) friends here. Retreated out of the rain to the coffee shop and caught up on family news – Katy was friendly with my sister Fiona when they were at Robin Hood’s Bay.

We sailed all the way to Fowey with two reefs in the genoa and no main, averaging 6.5 knots! The strong wind seems to have created a busy day for the Falmouth Coastguard – helicopters, engine overheating and a rope round the prop plus a cliff rescue. If you ring up for a radio check or a passage plan you get a curt, ‘Ring back later. We are casualty working.’ We’ve only filed passage plans on the longer legs so didn’t bother them today. Sail past Mevagissey, eating more Cornish pasties in the sunshine, and note fewer boats out today but still more than we’ve been used to anywhere else on our trip, with the exception of Oban perhaps.

Fowey is a much narrower estuary than Falmouth and much more picturesque, with old houses lining the quay. Hilaire Belloc wrote in 1925 that ‘Fowey is the harbour of harbours. It ought to be in a kingdom of its own. In Fowey all is courtesy, and good reason for the chance sailing man. For your provision, or your transport, or your mooring, you may pay no more than you should, and whatever you may need in gear is to be had at once. In Fowey there is security from all winds, good holding and, best of all, an air in which all other places may be forgotten.’

We are directed by the Harbour Master to tie up on a pontoon in the middle of the harbour opposite the town quay and end up rafting on a sparklingly new Bavaria 42’ whose owners rush out to put giant white fenders between our boats. It’s the Fowey Classics this week so there are loads of classic boats dressed overall on the trots further upstream, and then suddenly a large commercial vessel steams up the river to the Cornish Clay works, through all the racing dinghies, classic yachts, water taxis, ferries and small hired cruisers!

Arrange to meet Suzanne again as her husband Nico couldn’t make Padstow and radio up for a water taxi – £3.75 return each to the other side of the river! The Esk Belle was cheaper at £1 when Whitby bridge was broken! Enjoy a good pub meal in the blue-painted King of Prussia (moules marinieres for M again!) as the very best restaurants are fully booked. Fowey is certainly very busy – don’t think I have ever seen so many active yachties in one place before. One bloke – having been enjoying the local hostelries – attempts to step into his dinghy from the pontoon and falls in, bloodying his nose. Nico and Malcolm haul him out but not before he’s managed to put the bottle of wine in his hand into the dinghy!! You know what they say about more accidents at sea happening on the trip back from the pub in the dinghy than actually sailing – must be true!

Wave goodbye to our visitors and walk to Readymoney Bay near the entrance, where a house belonging to Lenny Henry and Dawn French has recently been sold for £9 million. The views are superb and the walls very high, but even so! The sea is flat calm now after all the white horses – a beautiful evening in a beautiful setting. One can just imagine the smugglers’ ponies ‘Trotting through the dark – Brandy for the Parson, ‘Baccy for the Clerk’ so ‘Watch the wall, my darling, while the gentlemen go by!’

Goosewinging to Falmouth

The autohelm takes the strain

Set sail out of Newlyn just as the lock gates opened in Penzance, so were pursued across Mounts Bay by a veritable armada of yachts –mainly flying the French flag and mostly bigger than us! Nothing like a bit of competition so, engine off and sails trimmed on a fine reach, we took on the Harlberg Rasseys and Beneteaux and raced towards the Lizard. Dolphins were spotted twice – about 20 or so in a pod – making their way very purposefully towards Land’s End.

The Lizard is the most southerly point on our circumnavigation but today it was wreathed in bands of sea fog and the horn was blaring forth, just like Whitby High (or Oscar Bull as I thought it was when I was a child, having misheard Hawsker Boom!). Poled out the genoa as we turned the corner and goosewinged towards Falmouth. Tied up at Mylor Yacht Harbour on the River Fal, just past Falmouth itself, noting all the changes since our last visit in 1999 when we came down to wave off Mike and Mary on their round-the-world voyage in Meriva, their 42’ classic yacht. We enjoyed some wonderful holidays with them during this time, including sailing down the coast from Northern Spain to the Algarve in Portugal, round Grenada in the Caribbean and from Ecuador to the Galapagos Islands. Fantastic to see them here again – they drove down from Morwenstow especially – and to have dinner and chat over all our adventures. Mary brought homemade lemon drizzle cake and fresh eggs from their hens – most welcome! We even had a nostalgic peep at the beautiful Meriva, now with new owners wishing to travel the high seas, having a refit in the yard.

Newlyn statue to seamen lost at sea

Newlyn with old Whitby trawler

Wake up to a beautiful sunny morning after yesterday’s dull grey mizzle. It’s a shore day but one without any facilities – the shower and toilets are broken as are the electricity sockets on the pontoon! We shower on the boat and set off to explore Newlyn, finding an extensive fish market, some pretty old houses, an art gallery, a statue to seamen lost at sea and a fantastic view of the mythical St Michael’s Mount. Return to the boat for lunch with a huge cooked crab which Malcolm dresses, using the winch handle as a hammer!

Feeling rather full we totter off to get the bus to Mousehole, flashing our bus passes which work here, back in England. Mousehole is a picture book village, where Dylan Thomas spent his honeymoon and which may have been the inspiration for ‘Under Milk Wood’. He called it ‘the loveliest village in England’ and it is certainly a close second to Robin Hood’s Bay, my own spiritual home. The harbour walls encircle it like loving arms, leaving a narrow gap for boats to enter and even this is closed by huge timber baulks from November to April.

I’ve always loved the children’s storybook, ‘The Mousehole Cat’, which tells the story of Tom Bawcock who is said to have sailed in a great storm, when no one else would venture out, to save the starving village. He returned, given up for dead, on 23rd December, with ‘seven different sorts of fish’ – sufficient for all. These were all baked into a ‘Star Gazey Pie’, decorated with fish heads sticking up through the pastry crusts, staring at the sky.

You may remember the terrible tragedy of the Penlee lifeboat in December 1981. Eight Mousehole men manned the lifeboat, Solomon Browne, to go to the aid of a stricken coaster, Union Star, in a dreadful storm. Just as they eventually succeeded in rescuing four survivors, the radio went dead and it was realised that the crews of both vessels had all lost their lives. The current cox of the Penlee lifeboat is the son of one of those lost.

Spent an interesting evening in the Red Lion overlooking our boat, eating yet more fishy dishes and chatting to some sailors from Chichester on their way to the Scillies.

The relieved sailor rounding Land's End!

A welcome Cornish pasty!

What a grey day!  Overcast with mizzle and sea fog along the coast so not good for spotting well-known places on the coast, such as Newquay – much loved by our boys – and scenes of memorable past family holidays, such as Perranporth and Mawgan Porth.  Manage to sail – a beat – from 11am to 11.45am when the wind goes round on the nose.  Have excellent Cornish pasties from Presto Pasty in Padstow for lunch to keep us warm as it’s chilly and wet.

I become increasingly anxious about going round Land’s End – especially on the inside passage between the Longships lighthouse and the shore.  It’s all psychological as it’s very calm with a slight swell – but my head is full of images of storms and shipwrecks!  Anyway Malcolm punches new coordinates into the GPS and we go the long way round – just in case I jump ship!  Send texts to the family as we round this memorable landmark and talk to my Mum!

Round into Mount’s Bay where St. Michael’s Mount can be seen in the distance, a carbon copy of Mont St Michel, and motor past the pretty little harbour of Mousehole.

Thirteen hours after leaving Padstow we are tied up in Newlyn, a very busy, noisy fishing harbour with new pontoons (mostly filled with smaller fishing vessels).  Great to see that at least one port is still functioning although the refrigerated lorry loading up on the quayside is Italian.  It’s 9.30pm and I heat up a Fray Bentos meat pie for supper, with fresh courgettes and tomatoes and tinned new potatoes – what cuisine!  Don’t tell Rick!

In our goldfish bowl,  we carry out our domestic tasks at first – showers, washing, food shopping, fuel, gas etc. whilst we await our visitors.  Malcolm’s younger sister Jill and husband, Denis, are staying in St Austell with Denis’ daughter, Suzanne, who lives there.  It takes them ages to find a parking place as Padstow is heaving but eventually we meet up and retire to an Italian restaurant overlooking the harbour to catch up on all the news.  Suzanne has brought her daughter, Lily, aged 5 and Hugo, a French visitor, aged 14, so we have a jolly bilingual family party!

Haven’t time to write any more as the rest of the afternoon was spent most happily shopping with Jill and Suzanne – buying Christmas and birthday presents from all the lovely clothes and interiors shops.  Also bought a pair of Musto shorts for myself and a Crew polo shirt for Malcolm ready for our trip along the south coast of England – can’t let the side down with our scruffy clothes!

Phone to try and book a table at one of Rick Stein’s many establishments in Padstow but they are all booked up so we make do with Fish and Chips from Rick Steins’s chip shop on the boat instead.  I have to say that my hairdresser was quite right – the Magpie in Whitby has nothing to worry about!

Happy shoppers - Jill and I in Padstow

Lady Hamilton berthed in Padstow

Visibility is poor as we approach Hartland Point, the right angle corner where Devon and Cornwall meet.  We visited this stormy headland in December with Mike and Mary, our round-the-world sailing friends, who have chosen to settle down in nearby Morwenstow on the exposed north Cornish coast.  We had to hold onto our hats as the spume from the crashing waves  floated around us as if we were in a glass ‘snowstorm’.

Today there’s a swell and – would you believe it – the wind is on the nose once more!  So we are once again banging into the waves but surrounded by graceful, swooping Manx Shearwaters, black on their topsides and snowy white underneath.   They nest, along with the puffins, in Spring on Lundy but only their holes and some feathers remained by the end of July.  Some dolphins come bounding up like playful puppies, anxious to guide us south.

I calculated that Lundy was our first English landing since Blyth about a thousand miles away on 17^th May!  Now we are heading for Padstow – the only port on the whole of this rugged coast of sheer cliffs and offshore rocky islets that has a sheltered harbour where you can lie without going aground.  Mind you, you still have to get the tides right as Padstow is on the drying Camel Estuary, the other side of Doom Bar!!

The golden yellow sands either side of the estuary look perfect for sandcastles, surfing and swimming.  This is serious seaside family holiday territory.  Lady Hamilton has a slight contretemps with a dredger which does a 12 point turn right in front of us as we negotiate the red and green buoys marking the channel down the river.  We later learn from Smithy, the Berthing Master in Padstow,  that the new Whitby Harbour Master, Martin Willis, used to captain the dredger here.  Smithy sends his regards, Martin!  We tie up to an enormous yellow buoy in a 2 knot tidal current to wait for the lock gate to open 2 hours before high tide.

Padstow’s inner harbour is surrounded on three sides with pubs, cafes and restaurants so there’s a very lively atmosphere with sea shanties and pop music all mingling together.  We are directed to tie up alongside a Contessa 32 bearing dodgers with ‘Round Britain with a Brain Tumour’ along the sides.  The young couple on board, Roger and Jossie, have sailed from Ipswich on a similar track to us, raising money for research.  Jossie was diagnosed with a brain tumour five years ago.

We eat on board as it’s late and go for a walk round the quay – noticing lots of amazing shops!  Well they are when you’ve been starved of shops for weeks!  Sleep like babies, safely tied up and no rock and roll – at least only from the pubs!

Shades of Col!  A rocking and a rolling all night long!  Moved the boat to another, recently vacated mooring nearer the shore. Time to escape to stability!  Malcolm blew up the dinghy and I did my Grace Darling impression and  rowed across to the slipway (very good for batwings he says!).

Lundy Island, a tall lump of granite, is less than 3 miles long from north to south and a little more than half a mile across.  It’s now owned by the National Trust but managed by the Landmark Trust who let out about a dozen properties on the island to those wishing to get away from it all – at a price!  There’s a well-stocked shop and the cosy Marisco Tavern where yachties have to pay their £5 a head landing fee.  You can roam all over the island along sheep tracks and footpaths, peering over the precarious cliffs at the seabirds and looking for seals and basking sharks in the clear water below.  On land there are ordinary sheep and Soay sheep (with horns), wild ponies and black rabbits.  And all the tourists who come on the MS Oldenburg at 10.30 am and leave at 5 pm.

We visited the church and climbed to the top of the disused lighthouse with amazing views across to South Wales, Devon and north Cornwall where we’re heading tomorrow.  A beautiful day – overheard one Lundyite saying in the pub that ‘this is as good as it gets on Lundy’ – well, it was just about perfect!  Would have been perfect for the spinnaker today too!  Had a picnic lunch at the north end of the island and then, after much rambling up and down steep paths, stopping at every turn to admire the extensive sea views of the Bristol Channel and the Atlantic Ocean, we ended up at the Marisco Tavern.  The walls are decked with, I thought, rather sad memorabilia collected from all the wrecks around Lundy’s rocky shores.   At five o’clock the tourists left and only a few residents, campers and cottage dwellers remained. The ‘Lundy Experience’ bitter went down a treat after all that tramping through the heather and the Lundy lamb wasn’t bad either!

Back on board, the dying sun caught the white-washed seaside towns on the Devon coast, with Exmoor lowering in the background.  But we’re still rocking and rolling!

Wild horses on Lundy

Approaching Lundy Island

Lady Hamilton in the anchorage at Lundy Island

51 40.13N  05 08.16W to 51 09.83N  04 39.27W  (42 miles)

When we were in the Yacht Club in Whitby last Saturday, Gary (off Vegality) told us that he’d been crewing for Bill Raynor on Hjarga from Falmouth to Milford Haven as part of a Round Britain trip.  Whilst waiting in the lock at MH he’d looked over the wall and seen Lady Hamilton – but the lock keeper told him that we’d gone home that morning!  Two Whitby boats on opposite circumnavigations and only just missing each other!

Slipped our moorings at 8 am to go through the lock in the last of the free flow and motored down the Haven, past a couple of tugs manoeuvring a tanker onto the Chevron oil jetty.  As I’m currently reading my old friend Skelly’s autobiography, ‘Out of Bay’, about his early career as a Ship’s Engineer, I now understand a great deal more about the ships we identify on our AIS programme – and about life on board, although he says that things changed for ever with the introduction of  containers ships and supertankers.

Sails up – hooray! – for a broad reach and we are on course for Lundy when a fast launch crossed our path, swung round and came alongside.  For a moment we thought we were going to be boarded and searched for drugs, but it was a Firing Range Safety Launch to ask us our destination and tell us to alter course for half an hour until they came back to us.  They never did so an hour later we returned to our original course and hoped we didn’t end up as target practice. There are three ranges along this bit of Welsh coast (and 32 nationwide) and apparently it’s quite common for yachts to be told to divert.

The tides in the Bristol Channel are very strong and our enforced change of course meant that we were punching about 2.5 knots of tide, so Malcolm decided to deflate the dinghy as it was filling with water and acting as a sea anchor!  This was no mean feat in the huge swell as he had to manhandle it onto the coach roof, squeeze the air out, roll it up and stow it in the very full locker. The sea was on our quarter and very roly poly – better to keep looking forward as the waves behind seem to tower over the boat threatening to overwhelm it – this is known as ‘a following sea’.  Ginger biccies came to the rescue – very good for roly poly tummies!  And dolphins – excellent distraction – and we had three visits with bowriding and everything!  All the while Lundy Island was getting nearer, with a lighthouse at each end and one in the middle (now defunct) for good measure.  The pilot book tells you that ‘Lundy is surrounded by races and overfalls, so pick a quiet day and approach at slack water.’  Not sure about the quiet day bit…

By 5 pm the anchorage off the SE corner of the island already has six yachts on mooring buoys but we managed to grab the last one  (this is where I have to hang over the bow and pick up a huge loop of seaweed-covered rope with the boat hook).  Just as we are completing this delicate operation, the MS Oldenburg, a lovely old ferryboat from Bideford and Ilfracombe, having just finished embarking her passengers who have been here all day, took off at speed through the moored yachts.  A dive boat also shot off to a nearby wreck in the Marine Nature Reserve.

We had a slap-up meal on board as we were too tired to blow up the dinghy and go ashore.  However we had to clutch the table with one hand whilst eating as the roly polies seem to have followed us.  Could be an interesting night!

Time to visit Tesco for provisions, change oil filters, buy fuel, fill the water tanks and blow up the dinghy!  In the afternoon we had a special visit from the Swansea grandchildren, our daughter-in-law Catrin and her mum, Caryl.  The children hadn’t been able to see the boat because we didn’t sail to Swansea so they came to see us instead!  They explored every nook and cranny and posed for photos in their pirate outfits – at least one did, the other was not so keen!  Had Wales’ best icecream, Joe’s, at a café on the marina and kept a very tight hold on small people wanting to climb up on the railings and look at Gandad’s boat!

Put the spinnaker lines on ready for our sail to Lundy Island in the middle of the Bristol Channel tomorrow.  The forecast is W, NW 3 to 4, occ 5.  We plan to spend two nights at anchor there so we have time to go ashore, and then move on to Padstow (or Padstein as it’s known now!).

Had to be dragged out of my Whitby home to go and get the train to Milford Haven – I just hate change and there’s still so much to do in the garden.  Had a great time with our grandchildren though!  We had super weather for playing on the beach, in the garden and for my brother Patrick’s 60^th birthday BBQ.  The children were on fantastic form, playing so well together even though they are only 4, 3 and 2 x 2 years.  Mud pies featured quite a lot – or ‘chocolate soup’ as they called it!  Baby Tobin was giggling and looking as if he couldn’t wait to join in all the fun!

The Yacht Club had organised a visit on Saturday to a new prawn trawler being built at Parkol Marine in Whitby – due to be launched in a week’s time for a Fraserburgh fishing family.  It was fascinating to crawl all over the covered decks, crew quarters (with oak bunks and wardrobes) and the bridge, with computer screens galore.  But there are no more trawlers on order so our first-hand impressions of the demise of the fishing industry in Britain still hold true.

The major excitement of the week was the breakdown of the Whitby swing bridge – in the open position much to the delight of the sailing fraternity!  The harbour was full of boats ferrying tourists from one side to the other for a £1 a trip, but even so the shopkeepers on the East side were complaining bitterly about the loss of revenue.  A new part will have to be specially made and it could be mended next week or in several weeks time – speculation was rife!

Our journey took 11 hours so we were jolly pleased to see our faithful floating caravan at the end of it.  Stowed all our gear and went to the Lord Nelson Hotel for a pub meal.  Seemed appropriate to unite Lady Hamilton and Lord Nelson at last!

Leave the boat and catch the two-carriage train which goes all the way cross country to Manchester.  We were hoping to sail into Swansea but have run out of time with our extra week ashore.  After Camarthen, views from the train of the wide and sparklingTowy estuary, with Dylan Thomas’s Laugharne on one side and Worm’s head, Rhossili on the Gower on the other,  show us what we have missed.  But our grandchildren are very pleased to see us and we go for a walk round Oystermouth Castle , finding hidden pirate treasure in the park!  Looking out over the mudflats of Swansea Bay, the tide is out – so we couldn’t have got in anyway during the day!  Tomorrow another train journey through the heart of England will bring us back to Whitby and a week of family fun with all our grandchildren.

PS This is the quotation that started it all!

Twenty years from now you will be more disappointed by the things you didn’t do than the things you did do.  So throw off the bowlines.  Sail from the safe harbour, catch the trade winds in your sails.

Explore, Dream, Discover.

Mark Twain

Blog to be resumed on Tuesday, 27^th July for Phase 3, Milford Haven to Whitby,  the last leg of our journey.

51 40.13’N   05 08.16W

A gloriously sunny day!  Time to put the boat to bed for a couple of weeks, do the laundry ready for our return, check out the trains to Swansea and catch up on some sleep.  Lady Hamilton should feel at home here as her husband, Sir William Hamilton, established Milford Haven.  Lord Nelson declared that it was one of the finest natural harbours in the world – but may have been slightly influenced by his mistress!

We are leaving tomorrow for Swansea – for a short stay at Jonathan and Catrin’s – and then home on the train to Whitby on Wednesday.

Sailing ship passing us out of Arklow