Intro
Here is a collection of experiences from my journey in my little yacht. The trip was made up of a trip down the coast to Harwich, then braving it across the channel and finally the easy bit through Holland and Germany. I had planed to write this as I went. But a combination of being to lazy and not much electricity or internet put me off until now. I kept an ever decreasingly detailed journal of my travels and a sparse number of pics (which I have scattered throughout the prose to keep the reader amused). I guess I will take a lot of the material in my log book and post it verbatium (in italics) and add all the other bits that you might like to know.

August
3/8/11
With everything finished I finally set off with Charlie Mackie for Germany. He planned on accompanying me as far as Newcastle. The likes of Matt Green and David Hawley whimped out, but appearently thats standard practise when it comes to sailing crew.  We left in the pouring rain with the sails up just for show since there was no wind. So motoring full speed against the tide we used a tank of petrol by the time we reached crammond island. A little more driving later and we finally got a whisp of wind.

The sailing continued like this through the night. I took the first night watch whilst Charlie tried to get some kip. By the early hours of the morning Charlie had rembered that his sleeping bag was filled with itching powder or fleas or something; having scratched all that time. So he happily took over the helm.  

The fleeting sunshine that we enjoyed yesterday afternoon till mid day today came to an abrupt halt as the rain came pouring down the wind picked up to force 3 and the visibilities became only a mile. We decided to call it a day and head back to Dunbar habour. The habour entrance is through a gap in rocks  that surround a 10m high cliff with a cut out in it.

I started up the Mariner  outboard heading between the two entrance marking posts that I had reassuringly picked out in the fog. I kept the sails up since apon entering the harbour it would be sheltered and therefore I could maintain fully control of the boat whilst lowering the sails at my leasure. The sails were also a prudent back up as the engine cut out 20s later. I had forgotten to open the fuel vent! So I immediately remedied that and got it going again.

After motoring around in the habour looking for the vistors berth and not finding it we settled on parking in the corner. Some local youths volunteered to catch the mooring lines if we through them up, so we duly did so and we tied up and were safely in the local pub shortly afterwards.

Beyond around Leith Charlie spent most of that leg suffering the effects of sea sickness. So he was pretty miserable unless lying down which is what he did for the remainder of that journey. What he experienced was  what I consider calm seas. A significant wave height of perhaps 0.3m. So he wisely decided that he cant hack it any more and left the following morning.  Since the wind is still low I decided to put the engine on and motor around St Abbs Head giving it a wide berth. By the time I reached the harbour it was dark. Paranoid that I would hit rocks I chickened out and turned around only 20m from the entrance. Why did I do this? Well I attempted to enter two harbours, St Abbs and Eyemouth.  The first looked like there was a wall right in the entrance and the second had the dark outlines of rocks all around. I had no GPS as I used up all of the electricity on board i.e. two 12V batteries. I had left the area of my good chart (Imray C27). The alternative was to look at my 20year old chart which did not have any detail of harbours. I remeber there were some harbour lights but I didnt know whether they marked a transit or just the edge of the harbour wall etc. The waves were big gentle corogations in the water that could be heard against the shore cliffs. They did not pose any great threat but bumping into rocks should always be avoided even in calm conditions. Especially on day 3 of a long expidition, it would be embarrasing to damage the yacht at this stage.  There was also one other fear that the habour may have dried out. A lot of the harbours on the forth can only be entered around high tide.

I concluded it was too dangerous entering a harbour at night. This left only one option-to continue through the night. At this stage the wind had picked up and I sailed at few knots along the coast. The wind continued to pick up and by midnight I was racing along in Force 4 riding occasional breaking waves. I was scared. I did not look forward to reefing in the dark. Gazing at the dense cluster of lights I thought I had identified  Berwick-Upon-Tweed, but dismissed it as being Eyemouth.

There were lots of lights out at sea. I could see fishing vessels, tankers and cruise liners all light up. Also the stars where really bright in the sky and also for the first time I my life noticed shooting stars. I had a little pocket radio and tuned into the  DJ Kissy Show. It was a special made up of hours of intro tunes of the genre electro hause carbage garrrage dubstep doorstep cat telephone or whatever, but was cool and sound really futuristic and gave me courage making the whole experience sort of fun.

 This was incorrect. I had worked on the basis that the light I was aiming at was the edge of the head land. It was not. It was in fact the edge of Farn Island--something I realised once it got light. I reckoned then that it was time to reef as red sky in the morning shepards warning. This was achieved by relying on the tiller tamer keeping the boat on coarse whilst I ran up to the mast and lowered the main, then quickly heaved the outhaul in. This was all remarkably smooth and I felt pretty safe whilst doing it. A 3hour tack back up wind returned me to farnham flats. During this exercise the wind picked up to a force 8 so I double reefed. That was the strongest I had ever encountered in The Graduate as the gunwhals were dipping under the water.

I have learnt that night time navigation is ezay to get wrong. I struggled to make it in to Holy Island bay so I just anchored off the beach and had 8hours kip. Then on the flood tide I motored into the bay.

13/8/11
More eventful sailing. Initially conditions were perfect. After 20 mins the wind strengthened and I was forced to reef. I entered Farnham channel with a strong inflowing tide. I encountered large breakinb waves. Here the only safe option remaining was to plough through them head on. Once further out at sea the waves were less steep. The wind also died. However this was only the case for half and hour and then the wind picked up again. At 19:00 I decided that it would be good to find a place to stop before dark. I spotted a bay with a few boats in it so I headed for it. As I got close I saw waves breaking just ahead. Also there was a post marking a rock. On the chart no hazards were indicated but the scale was not detailed enough. Reaching the area of breaking waves my arrival was met with a crunching sound and halting of the boat. Immediately I started the outboard and swung the boat around.

Since the situation was not good--a possible hole in the hull and approaching dusk, I put the engine to half throttle and motor sailed towards Amble Marina. I made just in time to enjoy daylight apon my arrival at the harbour entrance. Similarly I encountered breaking waves here. I theorised that it could just be the interaction from the waves encountering the strong current of the river Coquet, but having just touched the ground an hour earlier I was not going to take any chances. So I endevoured to anchor just outside the entrance, off a sandy beach. This turned out to be fruitless. Having let out all of the chain I saw that it led directly down meaning the water was too deep. Tentatively I neared the shore but again the anchor did not catch. By this time it was dark. At this point I did not dare getting closer to the shore as surfing a wave onto the beach was not appealing. Therefore I thought I would lengthen the chain with a piece of rope. This did not add much because the rope was surprisingly boyant.

It is probable that the anchor did reach the bottom since logical things like the chart depth and transits indicated but, I did not have any of the other reassurances like the rate the chain went out or putting the boat in reverse and seeing whether it moves.  I could have pondered the question all night. I chose to only do so till 2am when I thought the tide would sufficiently far in to allow my harbour entrance. Carefully I entered the visitors berth and tided up. It was still not time to relax. I was now certain that a leak was present as water had reached the height of the floor board. So this water had to be bailed before I could get any sleep.

The next day I motored over to a harbour wall which dires out and investigated the hull. Everything looked sound except for a small indentation and crack near to the attchment point of the port keel. This was quickely repaired with liberal application of epoxy.

17/8/11
Sailed from Amble to Blyth. To begin with I enjoyed the nice force 3 with the spinaker up. Then some fishermen informed me that they had laid down a drift net and I had to follow them upwind for a safe passage through.  I later got the spinaker up again only to find the wind die and change direction. This meant slow progress  arriving in Blyth at 6pm. It would almost be possible to say it was uneventful except the engine started playing up. This meant an intense moment apon entering Blyth as I could only slowly make my way to the edge of the channel to allow a ship that had come around the corner past me.

Blyth Yacht Club is nice with the facilities accomodated on board an old ferry. I had a pint and chatted with the folk I had rafted along side. I paid 9pounds for the pleasure of my stay which is about as cheap as it gets. I was informed by one of the members that my boat is a Lisander.


18/8/11
Blyth to Newcastle. Spoke to a friendly Hollander after she spent 57hours sailing across the North Sea. The other chaps I spoke to sailed from Gosport to Blyth in 59hrs. These sound like pretty long legs. I fitted a solar panel to the yacht. Since the engine gave up I tacked out of the habour. When I arrived in Newcastle I sailed expertly into my berth. I was greeted by an authoritarian bouncer like "Berth Master". I dont like Quay Marinas because they are too comercial.

19/8/11
After stripping and reassembling the Mariner I got it running again. Spinnakered to begin with then experienced a wind shift and had to tack up wind. The wind strengthened to force 6 so I double reefed. The wind was variable but decreasing so eventually I shook the reef out. I was eger to do so a yacht  that was in the distance had overtaken me and it had started to rain.

I sailed through the night. I enjoyed a force 5 or 6 so I reefed. Except at the head land the seas were calm. But having experienced 24hour sailing before I new what to expect. Dawn was buetiful and the wind dropped to force 3 so I enjoyed excellent sailing conditions as I reached Scarborough.

21/8/11

Scarbourgh to Brdlington. Excellent sunny sailing conditions. Spinnakered along by the clifs. At the headland (Flamborough) the wind dropped to force 1 so I reached south to get out of the strong tide flowing around the point. As the wind picked up again I made good progess southwest. It this point I considered anchoring but decided it would be worth the effort to get to bridlington. This I achieved after 2hours.

In bridlington I bought some more fishing lures as I lost the last one with mackerels attached.

22/8/11

Paid 9pounds harbour fees, which was cheap but 3days would have only been 16 pounds. Failed to get a weather forecast again, other than Tuesday should be rainy. I made about 3.5 knots which extrapolated would mean about 10hours to make the 30 mile leg that was necessary. Unfortunately the wind shifted and I had to anchor off the coast of Whithernsea.

23/8/11
Got some sleep last night. Stayed up to make sure I did not drift because the anchor did the usual trick of going straight down and the boat did not point into the wind. I determined this was due to the tide running along the coast as a tanker anchored out at sea was also pointing in the same direction. Also I was reassured by the working depth gauge which indicated 4metre of water. In the morning the wind was a nice force 3Easterly. The anchor was now at a 65degree angle and definetly doing its job. I enjoyed some more spinnakering interupted by a brief tack to avoid the inner and outer binks. A local would have been able to cut through the gap in the banks but I was not willing to take the risk. My dead reckoning was out by a fair bit because I did not factor in the tide. So I ending up handrailing the very first channel marker into the Humber Estuary.


As the whether closed in I was approached by the Humberside police who speed over to me in their rib. I was asked who I was and what my intentions were. I guess they thought I might be a drug dealer or something.

29/8/11
Grimsby to Wells-next-the-sea. A 60mile leg. Left Grimsby with the spinnaker up doing 8knots over the ground. After nerve raking cuting of the corner with only 4m of water, the  wind started picking up from a force 3 and  I started to head to far south so I took the spinnaker down. The wind continued to increase . I reefed. Reefed again. Took the main down entirely. This was only for an hour wilst a squall past but the wind got to the point where spray was comming off the waves. During this trip Robert wretched 3 times. After 10hours at the helm we had crossed the Northfolk Broads. Whilst doing so I cut 100m in front of a ship which is the closest encounter I have had so far. We handrailed the coast and Robert was convinced  that Skull point was Wells so I asked the habour master to escort us in .

Unfortunately we had a few more miles to go. As a result Simon the harbour master was left wondering where we were and called the coast guard. The lifeboat was at the outer marker as we made our approach. We were then guided in. I had to surf 3m waves in. As the route snaked I  started the Mariner and  had full throttlel assistance for the upwind sections. It was a relif to get into the calm of the river.  At this point the motor ran dry and I had to refuel on the move, but this was fairly relaxed.


30/8/11
Wells-next-the-sea to Lowestoft. Raced down wind past the croner of Cromer. Only to be hit by the full force of the tide. As the tide increased so did the wind up to force 4 and we were doing a phonomenal speed over the water. As a result we held our position until the tide turned. Some simple night sailing and we made it to Lowestoft. The marina we stayed at was dead the first indication of this was the layer of bird shit on the pontoon. Therefore first thing the next day we set sail again.

31/8/11
Lowestoft to Southwold. Quick sprint with the tide to Southwold. Both VHFs have not been transmitting far enough. Consquently it was not possible to contact the harbour master. He was dischuffed at our unannoced arrival.

1/9/11
Southwold to Harwich. Had planed to Sail to Orford but it means finding a small entrance and to go miles up a river. Having missed the entrance we sailed on to Harwich. It was dark after we reached horesly bay but, we had the sectored light from the light house on the head land to guide us toward the channel leading into Harwich. Also the lights from ships approaching and leaving were a good indicator. Once in the Harwich complex we tried to find the half penny key. This was too difficult so we just anchored inbetween a load of moored yachts.

2/9/11
Harwich to the Naze. Tacked against the tide and wind and struggled out of the Harwich entrance. Then made my way into Tichmarsh Marina. Tichmarsh Marina is in a marsh which takes ages to get to. It was worth it though because our neighbour saw our attempts to catch one of the local fish that are in abundance there and promptly got out his spear and spear one of them. He gave us the fish and explained that it was called a mullet. Mullet are bottom feeding fish that like to eat the vegitation on the bottom of pontoons and boats. They have a reputation for being contaminated but, we ate anyway and it was good. The meat on the fish is really substantial and there are hardly any bones.

3/9/11
Cut the corner from the naze. Left at HW-2 but it was to shallow so I headed out a bit further and tryed again. Sailing around the headland was fast because we had the last couple of hours of tide on our side. At this point I realised I had got the tide directions completely wrong and that I would have to do some skilled sailing just to hold my ground. Despite my best sailing efforts the wind was not sufficient and so I put the engine on and burnt two tanks of petrol. This got us to Clacton.

 The GPS is still tempermental after half a day of playing with it. Nonetheless I had it working and it is a very nice tool indeed. It provided lots of interesting information like to the answer to "when going get there". This meant that the entrance to Bridlingsea was eazy on a flood tide and a precise knowelage of my position.

6/9/11
Brightling Sea to Blackwater. We left early to catche the tide out of the river. A fleet of sailing vessels were out today. I was being out performed by all of the other boats but, at least I was going at lot faster than yesterday. I could do with a Genoa since the storm jib is not much use in light winds. For this area I had detailed albeit dated charts. Also I was guided by another sailing vessel on the same heading as me. Looking behind me a convoy of sailing boats were taking the same shortcut.

16/9/11
Blackwater to Fambridge. The first challenge was getting the anchor up. A problem which I put off until spring tides. I spent 4 days in London at Lukes. I rowed over to the were the anchor was snagged on a mooring line, using an oar kindly given to me by the Badchick Sailing Club. After trying various devices to lift the anchor I eventually dived down and had a look at the problem. The water was a pretty reasonable temperature. The anchor had really buried itself under the mooring chain. So I pulled myself down the anchor chain and dug the anchor out from under the mooring line.

Once free I was against the spring tides all the way to Fambridge. I dropped Robert off at the public pontoon on Meersea Island and burnt a couple of tanks of petrol getting out of the river Blackwater. The wind slowly crept up so I sailed over the St Peter sand bank. With the spinnaker now up I made good head way. However it was clearly going to be a struggle against a ebb tide peaking at 3-4 knots. I kept to the edge of the river cutting through moorings. This twice became it bit hairy. I was on a dead run and gybing was often necessary to hold my course. Being single handed implied running up the deck and swapping the spinnaker pole across. Momentarily taking focus from where I was going. The result was that the boat veered off course and by the time I was in the cockpit again I was headed for another yacht but, my heart was definately racing as I passed with 0.5centimetres to spare.

Everything worked out in the end and I arrived in Fambridge at dusk. Here I was greeted by a guy call Richard who Robert had arranged to buy an achor from. It turned out that the anchor was way too big so, Richard kindly did not insist on the sale. I then enjoyed a curry buffet and a pint at the club house.

17/9/11
Today we fitted a new VHF antenna to see if it improved the transmission range of the radio (it did not). This was done by parking next to the gantry in the marina at low tide and feeding the new cable down the mast.

18/9/11
Leaving at 12am we beat the tide down stream as we were enjoying a nice force 6. We saw a chap preparing to row across the atlantic. Was at the river entrance we saw that the depth gauge and the rest of the electronics were not working. This was due to a lose croc clip on the battery terminal. We aborted the attempt to cross the channel and headed back to one of the yacht clubs on the river crouch. Accomodation here was free on the basis that we purchase a couple of beers which we duly did.

19/9/11
Today we had another go at the crossing. The wind was very light so it was mostly tidal drifting. I cut the corner of the sand bank linig the croach estuary in anticipation of futher drift onto the planned course. At nightfall we were in the sandbank area of the Thames Estuary. We headed for a red light that I had identified  (wrongly) as a chnnel marker.

The planned route was too ambitious for the level of navigation we were adopting. For a brief while the GPS  worked. If informed us of a sand bank straight ahead. I redirected our heading to avoid collision. However I did not give us sufficient distance from the bank and we lurched to a halt as the keel ground on the sand with the tide drifting us further onto to the bank. I dropped the anchor immediately to stop this. It was too late to back off.  We bounced around for a few hours until we were floated again. I watched as the part of the hall connected to the keel flexed with every impact. I think I did not leave enough anchor chain out and we ended up bumping over the top of the sand bank. The GPS refused to work again and so I decided to aim for the gunfleet wind farm as it minimised the chances of futher sand bank encounters.

With dawn approaching we had navigated through the wind turbines to arrive at Frinton. I weighed anchor and slept till 8am. There we beached to boat to check for damage.

20/9/11
Meersea Island to Tollesbury. We dicided to leave Meersea Island in order to enjoy the comforts of one of the marinas on the river blackwater.


21/9/11
Tollesbury to Neuwpoort. Having made all of the important preparation such as buying food, up-to-date charts, a good hand compass and a bit of boat TLC. We set off at 8am and drifted with the tide to the end of the river in the fog. Later the fog cleared and the breeze freshend.

Once at Frinton the tide was raging againts us, with the spinnaker heaving us forward in a Force 5. I altered course for the ship roundabout. This took us to Sunk Inner. We identified the light ship by going alongside and reading the name printed on the side. I was hasty to just read the sunk part and the number of letters of the second word. Fortunately Robert insisted on reading it fully--just as well as I would have otherwise thought that it was Sunk Outer.

Continuing we noticed a cardinal marker on the starboard side. We had decided of a cautious northely route which turned out to be prudent as the had brought us to the begining of the sand banks. Doing about 10knots the spinaker was becoming a liability as the pole kept detaching from the mast. I took the kite down as the wind continued to strengthen. It was a relief at this point to reach the Galloper wind farm as left the distance sight of the Harwich dock cranes behind.

The wave in the North Sea were about 3metre high and occasionally breaking. It was exciting as I steered through a couple of lanes of traffic. The first ship we approached tooted once, meaning that he had seen me and was turning to port. After hours of cold, wet, rocking, seasickening sailing we could see a factory flare that had previously been dim light pollution on the cloudy horizon. We had double reefed by now as the weather helm became too tiring and the last thing I wanted was for the tiller or rudder to break. I had already managed to catapult the kicker overboard during an overly agressive gyb. I decided I needed a break so I took the main down and let Robert take the helm.

During the night I had sailed to far south and missed the Garden City bouy, where we planned to steer for Oostende. Instead we where now in french waters. This was confirmed by a welcome to france text message. Sailing north our arrival in Belguim was annouced in the same manner. We attempted to ask a French fisher man for directions but only recieved a rude response.

Finally we sighted a cardinal marker and were elated to read Neuwpoort bank. Find this on the chart we headed for the pier which marked the entrance to the marina and the end of that leg.

22/9/11
Oostende to Brasken. Rubbish force 2, so did some slow sailing. Stuck the engine on and 2 tanks of petrol. Had a free stay at Oostende.

23/9/11
Hazy low wind condition again but, this time I am using a new technique for cross wind sailing which I saw other yachts doing. I have the spinnaker set up without the pole with the spinnaker sheet resting against the forestay. I was against the tide upon entering the estuary. It was getting dark and I had to resort to using the engine. I did have a chance to recharge the batteries over the last few nights so the nav lights were useless. The water police came over and complained that I must sort it out. On entering the harbour I had to speed across the entrance to avoid a trawler.

24/9/11
Brasken to Vlissingen
Made the hop across the estuary to Vlissigen, a pretty habour in the centre of town.

25/9/11
Vlissingen to first inland sea. My first experience of a sluice in Holland. Leaving early to catch the tide we motor sailed along the channel that hugs the beachs. It was very disconcerting seeing large ships so close to the shore. Going around the headland was a bit hairy. Despite full throttle and sail I only managed slow progress  whilst in a busy shipping lane. After a while the tide was pushing in the right direction and we sped over to the sluice. The tide was extraordinarily strong and I had to be careful to choose the right heading to make it into the sluice entrance and not crash into the flood barrier.

26/9/11
Sailed to the otherside of the inland sea. I was really foggy but the sun burnt through eventually. On the otherside we bought mussels and petrol

27/9/11
Hot and misty with force 2 wind. Rode the tide out but was not quiet fast enough so once the tide turned and so I cut across a sand bank and was again  assited by the tide. Sadly progress was not good enough to make it to Zeebrugge so we headed for the next inland sea. This meant motoring against the tide and we burnt a lot of fuel. Eventually we made it to the fish harbour. The next day we bought fresh fish and visited a comprehensive chandelry.

28/9/11
Entered the 2nd inland sea and stayed in a fancy marina with free bikes and modern showers. Our neighbours were friendly and invited us for gyros and drinks.

29/9/11
Crossed the lake and stayed at a marina there. We had coffee with nice lady on her 70 000euro yacht.

30/9/11
2nd inland sea to Schevengingen. Calm conditions, so took the shallow route. Ran aground twice but managed to reverse off the bank. Despite my efforts to sail I had to motor all the way. Crossing the Mass Mond entrance was exciting as the wake from ships churned the water up and left lots of cross currents. Spent two nights in Schevengingen and met up with Mike and Tanya.

1/10/11
Schevenging to Ijmuden. Under a brisk force 4 we  made our way the entrance of the amsterdam canal. This was a very simple sail--no obstructions or landmarks. By the time we reached Ijmuden the wind was definately strong. After entering the harbour I found the entrance to the marina was incredibly narrow. So I put the engine on and with its assitance made my entrance. In the marina I dropped the sails and headed for a pontoon. The wind was still strong and menouvering was hard. I gave the engine full welly and managed to make contact with the prop on the rudder. This cause the break pin to shear and I lost propulsion.  Lucky we drifted onto the pontoon.

2/10/11
Ijmuden to Amsterdam.