bump

This is an account of possibly the best days sailing i've had in the last 2 years... ending with a slight bump! We arose at a more gentile time of 08h00, to enjoy a full english fried breakfast.... By 09h00, we had slipped, and locked out... It was very hot... not less than 26 degrees at 9 in the morning, and the wind was blowing at 12kts.... It was on the nose up the river, but regardless, we decided to sail... for the first time SWMBO took control, and insisted that she was going to set the sails with no help, which she did with ease.. she was very pleased with herself... not a huge task, or indeed a challenge in this wind, but for someone whom I sometimes forget, had only ever done one weeks charter before April 2005, a result. She was quite rightly, delighted with herself... We then tacked up the river.... crossing paths with the same boat the whole way up, which enevitably turned into a good natured duel!...The kids took charge of the winches, and were winding like gooduns for most of the way... boy did they enjoy themselves... The wind eased off a couple of knots, and as we reached Levington, the tide turned, and so we started to struggle to make headway... so we decided to grab a buoy at Levington for a long lazy lunch... Given that the wind and tide were in the same direction, and it was generally light, we (read as 'me') thought that it would be fun to sail onto the mooring.... which we did... slightly overshot on rounding up to the mrak, but the wind and tide pushed us back down, and with a little careful tiller work, we grabbed the buoy easily, and stopped.... SWMBO continued her good run, by then dropping the sails... It was midday, it was hot (over 30 degrees), and SWMBO popped a new CD on the player, 'feel good songs'.... life quite frankly couldn't have got better.... kids sat and played happily... we sat in the sun and read good books, and ate a perfect lunch, along with a couple of ice cold beers.... I was happy to the point of bursting... by 13h00, we slipped off the mooring, naturally under sail!... and the wind filled as we turned, and we ran goosewinged most of the way back to Ipswich, never going below 6kts SOG.... We locked in, and made our way over towards our berth... One of our challenges has been that our finger is about 6 feet too short for the boat, and is starboard side too.. as Maggie kicks hard to port in reverse, its not always easy to get onto.... we were going to try a spring onto the pontoon, to see if that helped... all was well, we came nicely alongside, the spring dropped perfectly over the cleat, SWMBO declared "OK", so I put her in ahead to motor onto the spring and draw her alongside, when SWMBO shouted "S**T... the springs fallen off the cleat".... which resulted in me motoring into the pontoon..... a small chip in the gelcoat on the bow.... not happy! Still.... only a quick repair needed.... All the way home, SWMBO is feeling sorry for herself... blaming herself for the mistake.... really not neccessary... firstly, these things happen, and secondly, my fault for not telling her to worry about the spring and nothing else... it only slipped off because she was dashing off to deal with the stern line.... unnecceassarily, but she didn't know that.... lets say, blame shared eh?

Miles logged 10nm
Miles this season 353nm
Miles since this blog started 1,134nm