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| Early morning day 2 - passing Grain Tower |
Single handed weekend sail to Queenborough, Medway
Day
1.
GYC
1125
Crossness
1155
QE2
bridge 1350
Gravesend
1455
Hole
haven 1645
West
nore1800
Nore
swatch 1900
Queenborough
1945
8
hours 20 minutes
Surprisingly
grey start after two weeks of blue skies but undeterred etc. Motoring
start into force three and then on the nose all the way. Ran slightly late
and behind schedule at each waypoint but not enough to matter. Bursts of
motoring. Motor sailing v effective. The usual nasty chop at Gravesend from
wind on tide.
The
sun came out in Sea Reach, a beautiful pearly light in this broad place, and
the waves started to build. Passed
a lifeboat attending to a yacht (aground perhaps?). Wind over tide building to 8 ft waves to ride - which spray
did well - soaking the skipper and crashing off wave tops. Scary.
Saw
a seal lying leisurely on the beach only 50 metres away from my maelstrom. It
feigned fear and started toward the water but thought better if it when it saw
it was only me.
Last
few miles motoring, then sailed into the Medway with a following sea of
breaking waves. Unpleasant near broach - Held the helm over seemingly forever
to try and get the boat round. Eventually it came round but not before
lying broadside in a trough with the rail in the water. Did not ship too much
so perhaps lucky. Lesson - free the mizzen and main immediately, in
fact do not sail downwind in a following sea with mizzen at all. Too
tired for such excitement. Decision - anchor in Stangate or moor in
Queenborough? Went for the latter. Too tired to go on and anyway looking like
rain. Good choice, after ambling round the harbour in a dazed state found the
harbour boat and negotiated a nice mooring next to Hal and his wife on
Kingfisher! These GYC people get everywhere. They were also sailing back the
next day.
As
you go down the estuary the landscape gets bigger. Result - You get smaller.
Cruising is always like that, big gaps between buoys and long distances which
look tiny on the map. A very beautiful experience.
I
must have motored half the way, 20 nm. Less than half the
tank
used. Pretty good. That means 0.75L per hour or 3.3MN
per
litre.
Fantastic
day. More of the same tomorrow?
Reefed
all the way.
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| Queenborough - safely moored but exhausted |
Day
2.
Queenborough
0530
Nore
Swatch say 0630
West
Nore sand 0700
East
blyth 0725
Holehaven
0750
QE
bridge 1030
Crossness
1140
GYC
1250
7
hours 40 minutes.
Damp
and grey start up at 0430 for simple breakfast and welcome tea (simple things
make sense in small surroundings). Set out a few minutes ahead of Hal assuming
he would catch up - he did. Straight out into head wind and waves. Motor
sailed out to Nore Swatch in company of about 5 others. Amazing seeing medium
sized yachts leap over and into the waves, at times most of the hull out of the
water - what must Spray look like. Crashing down makes a horrible noise
but the boat seems fine. Engine is good for this stuff, tough and confidence
inducing.
Turning
left into the Thames over shallow water (1.7m at one point) and then the long
run in. Hal a tiny spec behind growing of course as they caught up and over
took. Shook out the reef at East Blyth and flew along at 5KN. Slowing as
the day grew and as the wind reduced to force 2ish. Hal put his biggest
genoa up to overtake me but slowly enough for a chat.
Motored
through Gravesend and Tilbury to avoid the shipping in windless spots. Passing Broadness a glimpse into a tiny
inlet with moorings I had not seen before – very Dickensian looking, must come
back.
The
wind died in Woolwich and the day suddenly became hot, 30 degrees, so put the
motor on to GYC.
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| Ghosting upriver past the Ovens Buoy |
The
boat performed brilliantly with no breakages and very little water shipped in
the whole weekend. The new boom is a real improvement down and upwind but makes
for more work reefing and stowing - Must fit a topping lift. The
engine is OK although it soon reverted to old habits of not running at low
speed grrrr. I think I will replace it, but is an electric powerful
enough to get through that?).
Moving
time 15.34 hours
Distance
81 NM
Max
speed 9.4kn (over ground)
Average
moving speed 5 kn
