Summer at Last?

Well the last few days have been pretty good,  A very nice evening at the sailing club on thursday, racing cancelled unusually with zero wind. but at last a sunny summer evening.  A nice social evening with the added attraction of a visit from Graham and Wendy taking a break from their world tour.

Saturday was a damp day but the Summer shindig was a success despite the rain.

Sunday. Good wind for sailing, and an enjoyable race.

Too much then too little

Hey Ho    Yesterdays race abandoned again,  this time No Wind.    Graham and Wendy visiting on holiday from their Holiday.    Last chance to get everything sorted out for the Atlantic crossing in November.  

Race abandonments

In the last 10 days we have had 3 races abandoned or cut short through too much wind.  Everyone wants to get on the water but we are braving bigger winds than we would normally because we have missed so many races to the weather.

House maintenance

With the weather as it is,  Totally unpredictable and always at an extreme (Dead Flat or a gale). Watanga hasn't been anywhere.  I check the mooring line every couple of days and thats about it.  We decided that house maintenance would be a good alternative to bumming about, so have started on the external window frames in good weather and redecorating the the spare bedroom when it's not.

Drive leg repairs

Got the lift out yesterday, As I have already done this job before it was a relatively easy job to do and took about 2 hours,  It would have been quicker if the pins had come out without a fight.   Considering how much grease I put on them and all the attempts to stop corrosion I'm still surprised at the speed at which things seize up.

Still a nice new functioning drive leg.  Always a good thing.

Another trip to the boatyard.

It's not been a good week for finance.  Twice this week I've had separate bank accounts defrauded. a spate of bills for Moorings,  berthing at Poole, barclaycard etc,  and now Watanga has a broken casting on the drive leg necessitating a lift out and an expensive part.   I think I need a job to pay for all this?

Ho Hum

Never a Dull Moment

Ok so now it's the second week in June and there's another gale on the way,  part of it from a south east / easterly direction.   This is getting really silly.  Just took a look at her from the shore SE 4/5 and shes already bucking around.   Going up to f7/8 before veering to the SW during the night.  

No racing at the club tonight, I'm guessing!

Home again

Yarmouth to Swanage with a following easterly,  not a bad sail but cold and wet. Despite calls ahead to check state of the bay and being assured that it was flat, something must have changed in the last hour or so of our journey, because it was lumpy. 

We took just the essentials and got a soaking when coming ashore.  Luckily I have an "Overboard" waterproof bag for the computer as it was floating in the bottom of the dinghy after a swamping.   I don't think it would have stayed watertight for long though as there was evidence of water inside.  Still no damage.

Went back today in slightly calmer weather to bring the rest of the gear ashore.   

After spending some time on Thursday removing and then resealing the hand rail on the roof I was surprised to find that the leak I have hasn't been stopped.   I'm running out of things to seal that are anywhere near the drip point!

Planning the return journey

We're still in Yarmouth,  and spent yesterday leisurely going round the shops having tea etc.  It was very windy, nothing to be seen on the solent except waves, Even the wight ferry was on a restricted service.   We bought some local caught crab and went to Sorrento for Evening meal and drinks.  I think we came back to Watanga around 0300. 

After a late start today we made a plan for our return, which will be tommorrow afternoon.



Add caption

Why we didn't go



I want that one

Stormbound in Yarmouth

Thursday starts wet and miserable but undetered we shared a full english breakfast donned our wet weather gear and headed for the bus station.  Got a great deal with a group ticket, unlimited travel all day for £20. Visited Cowes, (wet) Ryde, (sunny) Shanklin (briefly) and on to Ventnor (windy) for a fish and chip takeaway supper.  Back on the bus for the ride home.   The wind now is about a f7 and increasing so a quick bit of tidying up of the shore lines and then to bed.  Lou starts her second nocturnal treatment,  With the wind during the night exceeding 40knots it was a tad noisy,  a banshee of shrieks from all the boats in the marina, the boat trembling and rocking on its berth, not much sleep this night.

Holiday

As always with sailing you are at the beck and call of the wind and the tides.  Our intention at the start of the week was to sail to Torquay, spend two or three days exploring the Devonian coastline then back home across Lyme Bay at the end of the week. 

We travelled in company with Adrian and Jayne on Sorrento with a light wind and fair tide. Forecast for the week started to look bad for the latter end, with a large storm arriving.   We made a plan that we would stay in Weymouth on tuesday as it was going to be a very wet day anyway and a passage would have been miserable. This would give us a chance to reassess the weather situation at the end of the day.
With a quite vicious storm on the way we decided that we didn't want to be stuck at the other end of Lyme Bay when it hit.  An early start for passage to Yarmouth (closer to home) was the plan.

Tuesday night, Lou completed her first nocturnal treatment on the boat.

It was an early start Wednesday and a fast downwind sail to Yarmouth,  arriving just as the wind was freshening.  "Collective Spirit" the Boat Project boat sailed past and we got a a few pictures, later it was moored in Yarmouth and we had a chat and took a few more pictures.

   

Same old

May has been and gone and I'm still here complaining about the easterly weather patterns.  I do feel sorry for the Divers and the Fishing guys in the bay as most of these bouts of bad weather have come at the weekends.  This coming Saturday and Sunday are no exception.  On the good side the weather in between times has been hot and Sunny.

Easterlies

Ever since the drought in the south was announced it has been raining. Now I don't mind a bit of rain, but what is worse is the procession of low pressure weather systems running up the English Channel. These  create lots of storms and easterly winds keeping us off our usual mooring. Most inconvenient!

It's also not good for the diving and fishing trades in Swanage making it a hard start to their season.

Whoo hoo Back in the water.  

Booo Hoo lots of bad weather forcing expensive stay in Poole

New Year.

Day one was a bit of a damp squib, with most people recovering from the festivities a nice walk on the first day of the year is always welcome.  Constant rain put the mockers on that (What is a mocker).  So a lazy day watching the telly.

I was sad to read this morning that the Celebrations were tainted by violence and that a young lad is now in hospital with head injuries after a fight in the town in the early morning of the new year. 
Now I have no knowledge of what happened and I have no want to condone fighting, but it occurs to me that when I was young that if there was a fight we used our fists and once one or other of us was knocked down that was pretty much it. 

The fashion in the film industry to finish people off with a kick to the head, or any other part of the body for that matter seems to have instilled itself into modern day culture.  Unlike in the films where hero's and villains just get back up,  blows to the head with a boot are likely to cause serious damage.  I don't thick there is that much malice in most people they are just conditioned to think that it is a survivable part of fighting.

I hope the lad is OK.

Couldn't get to the boat this week because of other commitments.  Which is a shame because the weather has now turned and it;s really cold all of a sudden.  Reminder to self - winterise the engine !!  Spent this week catching up with stuff at home.  Actually got the christmas tree yesterday, can't believe it's only 3 weeks to Christmas!

I have spent last week getting items off the boat, well the stuff that goes mouldy if you leave it.  Also made sure there was no water left in the piping as I had some damage last year with bits freezing.  ( One tap and the water filter both burst)  Weather so far has been warm so not really a problem yet.

Must make a battle plan for this year maintenance program.

Bringing the teak trim back to it's former colour is a must as it's starting to look shabby now. I also need to get a generator to run the dialysis machine next year.

November

It's been a busy month.  Not long after my last post, things started to go downhill.  Lou and I both caught colds and the dialysis on the boat became a bit tricky because of the cold.  So it was decided that the best course of events was to get Lou back home.   So on the Thursday we, well I, as Lou was so unwell,  packed up everything, tidied the boat somewhat jumped in the car and drove home.  As soon as we got there we had to set up and dialyse before crashing into bed. Quite a day all in all.

Since then things have been slowly improving.  Lou got better,  although we still are coughing and spluttering from the back end of the colds.  We've had a home visit from the hospital to check we're OK.  And I went back with a mate, to get the boat and sail it to it winter berthing in Wareham.

Having had the weekend off, it was back to training yesterday.  Me this time,  I was given the task of setting up the machine, and getting it primed then connecting up to Lou.  Then after the session to strip down and clean up.  I had to administer an injection, to the machine not directly to Lou, and deal with a fault.  I must admit the fault was caused by me not undoing a clamp.

Then today the anti was upped again.  The machine was brought  to the boat, then they let  us set it up and do a session on our own.  It was both daunting and cramped with three of them scrutinising.  Lou wasn't too good after, maybe a bit too much stress for one day. 

With the first week of training over, we were given the weekend off from dialysis. Saturday we decided to go for a sail. It wasn't a great day, a bit misty damp and cold, but good to get away from the marina.  we went to Cowes and had lunch in the Anchor pub, then headed back in the afternoon.  We were a bit late leaving Cowes so it was dark by the time we were back.  had a close encounter with another yacht just outside the marina.  Fortunately no contact,  I don't think he had seen us and I was left with a choice of hitting a pontoon, or the other boat.  Full reverse power, and we just missed the corner of the pontoon, whilst the front end just missed the back of the other boat. Phew it was close. Even in the darkness I could see the shock on the skippers face.

Today we went to Gunwharf Quays by car,  took a trip up the Spinnaker tower, and had lunch at a tapas bar on the quay.  We had the meal outside, amazingly warm for November.  Looking forward to Xmas Barby on the beach ! !  

Day 3 of the training

Because the weather was fine and the rest of the week looks as if it will be chucking it down  I stayed on the boat today to get on with some essential maintenance.  Now that Lou;s OK with operating the new machine, I will join her for thursday and friday, to learn how to set it up and of course know what to do if things go wrong. Our two weeks of training may be shortened because Lou is getting on with the machine so quickly. No sessions over this weekend so have got to decide whether to stay here or return home. Suppose that will depend on the weather as well.

A New Chapter

I'm restarting the blog.  It's two years after the last entry some of the entries that would have been here went into "A Year in Swanage" blog.

Life comes in chapters just like a book. First a new life with Louise, and now another change for us both with daily dialysis using a nxstage portable dialysis machine.  This opens up an exciting era where we can plan for longer trips away on Watanga.  Lou is going to feel so much better all the time.  I hope I can keep up.

We are currently living on Watanga in Port Solent Marina whilst Lou and I train at Portsmouth Hospital.  It not the best time of year for it but it's fairly mild for the time of year.

IOW trip 2

Lazy sail across to Newtown Creek, all against the tide so took some 6 hours but we weren't in a rush.  The sun kept shining most of the day with the odd spot of rain every now and again.

It's not often you see an Avro Vulcan, let alone flying

The french are invading? Looks like the chap at the back is feeling the swell!

Finally a bit of fishing before turning in for the night.

New Start - Hopefully

Well August was busy wasn't it.

The carnivals over, the red arrows have done their fly past. 

No more fireworks for a bit.

Swanage became a highly populated place with most of the visitors doing their best to get run over.   Strange how folks suddenly forget the highway code, walk everywhere at 1 mph and look everywhere except where they're going. It's not only the pedestrians either,   There must be 500 cars a day do a three point turn on the bit of road in front of the pier. It's only thirty yards and there's a couple of gates - dead end.  Maybe they are all budding 007's and are going to fly off the end of the pier and turn into submarines.

Then there's Shore Road we've had a whole summer getting used to walking in the road, very shortly the sound of screeching tyres will be heard as drivers try to avoid those who've become used to pedestrianisation and wandered into the road without looking first. 
Hey -ho and probably nonny nonny too. Septembers here and  it's time for the hankies, face paints and donning of bells  - it's folk week - Morris men and women, witches, and other strange sights.  Still it's only a week

July 20th Cherbourg

We have been thinking about a Cherbourg trip for a little while now and as we were "on holiday" and the winds were right we made a snap decision to go. I asked Greg if he would like to come, on monday he said ok. Then I told him we were leaving 4:30 the next day, he wasn't so pleased about that!

Apart from going all the way in thick fog it was a reasonably uneventful journey,  we didn't see any other boats but the radar was on all the way though.

Grabbed some wine inthe supermarket then dinner in "The Regency restuarant" in the evening.  Early to bed as another early start in the morning.

Nice sail back with the odd period of motorsail to keep the average speed up to 6.5 knots.  Again we had the target of getting Lou back for dialysis.  Came past peveril bouy doing 10.5 knots   whoohoo!

Spent the next week recovering from the 10 days of sailing.

IOW Trip The last day

By 10am the next morning all the PYRA boats had left for their return race to poole. Leaving us high and dry on the pontoon.  I had little stomach for beating into wind and tide so we waited until the afternoon for the tide to change and then began our journey back home.  It seemed a better option than having to fight the elements on Monday morning to ensure Lou was back in time for Dialysis that afternoon.

We managed to sail most of the way back but as the evening drew on the wind died and we had to motor from Ballard to the mooring.

IOW Trip Saturday

We had arranged to meet up with Graham and Wendy in Yarmouth. PYRA had a race to there on the Saturday morning.   The tides from Cowes to Yarmouth were foul in the morning but we had to go come what may. We tried sailing as there was a decent amount of wind but tidal flow kept putting us back in the same place.  Eventually we gave up and motored in order to get there on time. 

At Yarmouth I blagged my way into the middle of the PYRA fleet as they moored up and was soon recognised by a few of the boat owners.  I'll have to join next year before they realise I'm not a member.  Went to a barbeque in the evening at the local sailing club.  The PYRA crews drank the place dry, but they were happy with the revenue.

Isle of Wight Trip Friday.

With another bout of dialysis looming in the afternoon we spent the morning leisurely strolling round the town and had a coffee in the craft centre by the quay.   Whilst Lou was off at the hospital I toured the Boat museum and planned our exit from Newport on the falling tide.  I reckoned we had to be gone by 7:30pm at the latest.  As it was we had lots of time to spare (and water) for the short trip back to the Folly Inn where we stopped for the night. It was Quite windy even up there in the river making it a little difficult to come alongside the pontoon.

Isle of Wight Trip Thursday

With lots of strong wind forecast for today and Friday morning we decided to stay in Newport and do a tour of the island by bus. we settled for one of the eastern bus tours .  Arreton craft village being the first stop. This farmers market was obviously too much of a temptation for Lou and we did take away quite a lot of goodies.
Next was the Garllic farm, again with food products we were getting quite loaded up.   Learnt a new word, well 2 actually   - "Alliophile and alliophobe"  Lovers and haters of garlic.
Back on the bus and off to a vineyard.  for some free wine tasting. 
We even maaged to get to Bembridge which was a bit of nothing, and finally arrived back at the boat by 7:30 in the evening.

No Pictures today.

IOW trip Wednesday

We were debating how best to get Lou to and from dialysis, when a Prout 45 owner who was leaving the pontoon behind us on the way to Newport needed a hand pushing off.  A quick chat with him allayed my fears about drying out at Newport, assuring me of a soft mud bottom.  So a quick look at the tides, a quick phone call to the Newport harbour master who also said no problem, and we were off.  The quay is only about a mile or so from the unit at St Mary's so taxi cost would be low. With a SW f5/6 blowing just the jib up was enough to do 7Kts + another 3 on the tide - we were at Cowes in an hour.  This made us a bit early for the tide so it was a gentle crawl up to Newport with the Depth gauge often reading under a metre. Lots of pontoon space so we aimed for the nearest spot and just got there as we kissed the bottom..

We had arrived with nearly an hour to spare.  Lou ordered a taxi and went to see the Harbour master. He was really surprised to see us, He didn't think we had enough water to get there. It does go a long way out though.

IOW Trip Tuesday

Tide and wind dictated where we were going today so back down the Solent to Alum Bay we went. Forecast was not great but it stayed dry most of the time.  It was surprising that although we were sat at anchor in an almost flat bit of sea that there were large breakers along the shoreline. After a spot of lunch we went ashore, not an easy task as we had to time our landing so as to get in between the breakers on the shore.

Once ashore we used the cable car to get to the top then the bus to get to the old and new Battery's (National Trust) for a bit of sight seeing. Good view of the needles from here.

Back to Yarmouth in evening for a meal ashore.

IOW Trip. Monday

An early start today as we have to get as close to St Mary's Hospital in Newport as we can in order for Lou to get to Dialysis.   We planned on getting to the Folly Inn and then by taxi to the Hospital.  Plan worked but cost of the cab was a bit high £12 each way.

Folly Inn on the Medina river.

While Lou was dialysing I went walkabout and found the Quay at Newport which had a surprising number of yachts in it.  So I made a few enquiries and found that it's perfectly feasable to get to Newport as long as the tide is right.

Isle of Wight Trip Sunday

The tides were about right for us to make the trip from Swanage after racing on the Sunday afternoon. A lovely day for it with a nice following wind. We left about 3pm and got to Newtown Creek around 7pm sailing all but the last few hundred yards.  Here we stopped for the night.

What a week

What a cold? Why do they vary so much? When I started coughing over a week ago I thought it was just another winter cold. No not quite this ones a different kettle of fish. Not quite debilitating but it wears you out. After a week most of the symptoms have gone but this persistant cough doe's you in. By the end of the day, your ribs ache, your head throbs and you just want to sleep. Talking to friends, they all cheerfully declare that they've had it for weeks, Seven and a half is the longest claim so far. Well I hope it's not going to be as bad as that.

Shopping?

I'd been out in the morning helping Nick T get my old rowing boat to the sailing club. Za had said he was getting fat so he has decided a spot of rowing would do him the world of good. Well once he'd launched I left him to it and went back home.

Around 1.00pm I suggested to Nicky that we should get some supplies in. Now bearing in mind we had not had much for breakfast we reckoned that we should eat before we shopped, the old adage "Never shop when you're hungrey" came to mind. So we dined at "Beavers cafe" after which Nicky said we'd have to walk to Ocean Bay to burn off the enormous all day breakfast she'd just eaten.

We got to Ocean Bay and being such a nice day we thought we'd carry on and see what the white triangle was at the other end of the beach. As you can see it is a pile of white rocks which someone has painstakingly erected. There are no white rocks for a several hundreds of yards so it must have taken quite a time to build

Looking back we realised that we should get back before the sun left the sky as we had still not been to the shops. By the time we'd shopped and got home it was 5 o clock.

Time for tea already.

Fencing completed

It hasn't been the best weather for it but at least the rain held off for most of the time. We used metposts for ease of replacement but because of the soft nature of the ground we set them in concrete with the sockets just protruding to allow drainage. Time will tell if this is the right choice.

We also changed the security light on the garage and put a new alarm on the house. Mended all Lukes broken guitar leads and made a couple of new ones.

In Granpa's house we fixed his broken shaver light ( down to a bad design )

Rendering all done

There are very few manual jobs that I cannot put my hand to, so today was time to have a go at external rendering. I can plaster to a reasonable standard so I thought this would be a very similar. Well I was wrong,

Ok the technique is the same but it's so much heavier. It played havoc on my upper arms and wrist. By the end of the day I couldn't get the pressure on the float to make the muck stick to wall. It is also a lot harder to get flat. Fortunately Luke was not too worried about that as he plans to paint it then maybe grow some vines up to create a mediterranian feel.

Scratchcoat goes on

Today we cleared up the area from yesterdays bonfire and got down to removing the old pebble dash. We kept any original scratchcoat if it didn't fall off. No sense in wasting effort is there. Went to buy some materials then got down to work. Bearing in mind I've never done rendering before it came out quite well. By the time all that was done it was nearly dark. aren't the days short this time of year!

A sad end for the summer house

Dad on loan for Jobs at Lukes house.

Improvements to Lukes garden are to include a decking area in front of the garage. First job on the list is to render the end of the garage facing the house to give it a more asthetic look. However this necessitates the removal of the old summerhouse which I loving put together over a period of a few weeks, many moons ago. None of your B&Q stuff here, this was proper tenon joints, screwed and glued all made from scratch.

Well it took about 10 minutes to reduce it to a pile of timber, some rotten, some good. Then about 5 hours to burn it all, which in the pouring rain was quite fun.

Lacey

This rather glum looking thing is Greg's new puppy that they have named Lacey. Very well behaved and almost house trained. The photo doesn't do it justice as when it's not asleep it bounces around trying to ambush Bailey (Gregs other slightly older pup)

Back in the water

Whoo hoo. At long last she's back in the water. After a week or so of bitterly cold east winds, everything calmed down and as you can see, it was a lovely evening to put the last bits of antifoul on the centreboards. I get the last lift of the day and he guys at the yard lift her to about six feet off the ground. They leave her there overnight which gives me about three hours before dark to get the last bits done. .
You can see the difference in draft quite clearly in this shotNext day we set off with four aboard Robert, Mike Greg and me. Stop off at Dorset lake to drop Mike and Robert on Yeta then travelled back in company. .


After a gentle start we ended up with a reef in and were about to put a second in as the wind rose to 25 knots off Old Harry As we entered Swanage Bay it settled down to an easier 17knots as we moored up.

Busy week ... Again

Well, again a week has gone by without a blog entry. The move went well on Friday, a warm and pleasant day. We were on the go from 8.00 in the morning till about 10.00 at night and absolutely knackered by the end of the day. Saturday we woke with stiff muscles and sore body parts where we had injured ourselves lifting and carting. We only had the van for a day, and we should have recruited more muscle as there was still lots to move. Thank goodness for the carrying capacity of our Previa. . We had motored down on Saturday for a surprise 50th birthday meal for Greg, the meal was a surprise, not the birthday. And then came the snow. To be honest there wasn't much of it in Swanage. However there was a 10cm layer back at the house in Heston.