2024 April 19th Day 21, to Portland.

The inshore forecast on Friday morning dropped the strong wind warning, although the weather gods had a different idea, so with a bit of a scramble to get off the mooring before the tide turned, I was off at 09:00 in a light wind that increased to F5 as I got into the Solent. I could not quite weather Sconce Buoy (south of Yarmouth) so on went the engine to go through Hurst Narrows and the mile or so though the North channel.

Approaching Hurst Point, note the water breaking over the
norther end of the Shingles bank (centre).

It was a quick but bumpy ride in a strong F5 wind, sailing for comfort (a relative term) under a double reefed genoa and no mainsail. The boat is very well balanced under this rig giving the autopilot very little to do.

Then, at just the wrong time and place, the wind increased to F6 as I was approaching Anvil Point and the expected bumpy ride turned into very bumpy until I was past St Alban's having gone outside of St Alban's ledge.

Hamble to Portland 55 miles in 12 hours, 5 minutes slower than
the east bound trip going back to Hamble for repairs.

Click here for the trip to Hope Cove.

2024 April 17th Days 19 & 20,back to Hamble to fix the anchor windlass.

A bumpy but quick ride back under headsail only in a stronger than forecast F5-6 wind. With a F5 northerly wind forecast it would have made getting onto the mooring very hard work so it was a good job I had booked the RAFYC walk ashore pontoon which would also be more convenient and save getting the dinghy and outboard into and out of the water.

I will write up the windlass problem in my normal post on defects for the cruise (link opens in a new window), but for now there turned out to other issues than a burnt out motor and I had to replace the whole windlass.

The offending windlass came out very easily but
there were big problems to follow.

With brisk winds forecast overnight on the 18th and through the 19th I moved to the mooring earlier than planned to avoid struggling with the wind.

56 nautical miles in 12 hours back to the Hamble.

Click here for my return to Portland.

2024 April 1st Days 3 - 12, Portland Marina.

Last night the UKMO model predicted winds gusting to > 40 knots tomorrow (Wednesday) and strong winds  before and after - it was blowing >25 last night but with a few hours of lighter winds on Wednesday morning. 40 knots would be at best uncomfortable and if things went wrong getting onto a marina berth could be problematic. I therefore moved at 09:30 and am now secured to a berth and likely to be here until Monday or Tuesday.

It’s going to be a long wait with not a lot to do on the boat, except there is always something, last night most of the main cabin lights stopped working, as some on the same circuit were ok and the others blinked before going out it was clearly a dodgy connection, probably on a connector block. So it proved. An easy fix as I had cable and crimped connectors.

The failed linked between 2 parts of the negative 
connector block that has been in place above the
headliner for many years.

It got a bit windy Tuesday evening and got a lot worse overnight....

Screenshot on my iPad, slaved to the Garmin chart plotter /
Multi Functional Display.

Just after I took the screen shot above the  plotter refused to restart due to a failed card reader, after several hours of searching I could only find replacements in the US and at a cost approaching what the unit is worth, so I had to bite the bullet and buy a new one, the current range are smaller than the old so I went for a 9" to fill the hole, expensive but easier to read and at least, possibly due to a software bug, I got a free upgrade to my 2 year old charts when I transferred them, worth at least a couple of hundred pounds. 

The plotter is now capable of running the new Garmin charts incorporating Navionics functionality but although having daily updates is attractive, I don't really need the extra functionality, it is expensive and covers a smaller area than the G3 charts I have; so I won't be doing that any time soon.

Update: I was really annoyed a week or so later when Garmin announced a sale that would have saved me c £300 on the purchase.

It took a while to sort this, fortunately not at

the height of the gales.

I have been here for a week now, 3 gales including 2 named storms and not much sleep last night with the motion and the creaking of the mooring lines. 56 knots (64 mph) recorded on the breakwater. The westerly wind is blowing straight into the marina, fortunately not as bad as on the sailing centre pontoon, also I am now on the lea side.

I may be able to get away on Friday but it will be a pain with the inshore route unavailable, a spring tide and a likely head wind to weather The Start, Brixham may be OK but more bad weather may come in Sunday or Monday.

Update Wednesday 10th:

It is still quite windy but not extreme, there was a lull early morning so I took the opportunity to get out of the marina and moved back to the anchorage to save the expensive marina charges. The bad weather may arrive Saturday so I may accept a bumpy ride with a F3-5 headwind and move before then, heading towards Brixham with the option of making it an overnight trip to Plymouth, perhaps motoring from Brixham to Start Point(into the wind and with some shelter from the wind and waves) before reaching to Plymouth. Unfortunately the inshore route around Portland Bill will not be practical due to timing, weather and a Spring tide so it will be a 10:00 start to go outside of the Shambles and then passing 6 miles off the Bill. Assuming the forecast Fog tomorrow is not too bad.

This is getting rather tedious 🤬🤬🤬🤬🙁

Click here for Portland to Brixham.

2024 March 30th Days 1 - 2, Hamble to Hurst and Portland.

The objectives of and preparations for the trip can be found here: 2024 - Towards Muckle Flugga?

For the past week the start date has been touch and go, on Thursday it was off but Friday mornings forecast from 6 different models was OK for Saturday and Sunday with a reasonable chance of getting to Brixham or beyond on Monday and Plymouth or Fowey by the end of the week, dodging bad weather. The remaining worry was the very strong wind still blowing but forecast to drop during the day.

One of at least two sails trashed in Thursday nights blow, each
within view from my boat. The other was a seriously expensive
  hi-tech sail, completely shredded, on a 40+ ft boat. And neither will be
covered by insurance as they were not caused by contact with
something other than the wind or water.

The car was quickly loaded and after a visit to the supermarket I was at the club by 12:00. The wind was about 15 knots so it was safe to use the dinghy and the club launches were operating. Two trips to the boat had everything aboard, getting the outboard off the dinghy and onto the boat was worrying when a squall came through and we were bouncing around but the derrick did the job and by 15:30 the launch picked me up and I was home in time for dinner.

On Saturday it was a 3.5 hour journey by train and bus back to the boat which went pretty well although my arthritis is still complaining about the brisk walk from the station to the bus stop. I had largely prepared the boat for sea on Friday so hoped for a quick get away on first high water but when I turned on the electronics the wind instruments were not working, they had been two weeks previously.

I had a pretty good idea what the problem was, a very expensive "waterproof " plug and socket by Aquasignal was not very water proof, it had failed a year ago and I had hard wired the connection and it had worked fine for a couple of thousand miles and a winter on the mooring but gave up the ghost at the last minute, but there were 2 good points, it had failed before I left rather than just after and I had taken the precaution of buying a replacement (of a different make) and it was on board with a length of the correct cable.

It was a struggle to get it done quickly but with the timber headlining I put on a few years ago getting access to the tag block under the deck was easy, although I did not get panels back up until this morning (Monday) at Portland. I made it with a few minutes to spare and slipped at slack water on the second high, 15 minutes later and I might not have got off with the ebb tide and a SE wind.

The brisk wind dropped and backed as I passed Calshot and I reached down to Hurst under headsail only, because I could not be bothered to put up the main as I had plenty of time to get there and with the delay there was no question of heading further west. If the sail had not put a shadow over the deck it would have been a pleasant warm sail rather than just a pleasant one.

Dusk at Hurst. 11 NM in 2 3/4 hours

Sunday - Hurst to Portland

I set the alarm for 04:00 BST (BST starting at 02:00) a couple of hours into the ebb tide but was awake at 02:00Z so had the anchor up and was away at 03:30 BST (all future times Local) with a light wind from the SE but more forecast. I motored through Hurst narrows and turned quickly into the North channel to avoid having the Shingles bank under my lea; I generally prefer this route as it avoids the over-falls at "Bridge" and once through the short channel you are further from dangers, there is then a bit less tide but often you make that up sailing a slightly shorter route.

The wind was forecast to rise so, being close to a run,  I did not bother with the mainsail [as it turned out this was to be a theme for the whole cruise due to strong winds]. The wind gradually increased and I made good speed although at some discomfort because the boat was rolling a lot with a following wind and the sea on the beam. I passed St Albans still with a fair tide the wind was now F5 and but with the sea more behind me life was more comfortable apart from the cold. 

I had thought to head round Portland Bill on the outside route but with the cold and tiredness from all of the rolling it was an easy decision to abandon that when I saw the forecast and I headed for Portland. It was a good decision not to try for more, the wind piped up with a few miles to go and if I had decided to get round the Bill on the offshore route I would have been plugging into 2 - 3 knots of tide with F6 behind me that would create ugly seas. 

Hurst to Portland 40 NM in seven and a quarter hours, averaging
better than 6 knots over the ground if you ignore anchoring time.
Tide vectors from when I took the snapshot after arrival.

After some experiments over the winter, Sunday dinner was egg fried rice with chicken and water chestnuts, new on the boat but so easy it and variants are likely to be regular events, especially at fishing harbours when I can get prawns.

Monday morning was sunny with no wind when I got up
to chase away the crows making a mess on the deck, by the
time I had made the coffee the breeze had set in and by 12:00
if was F4 - 5. 

The forecast for the next couple of days is not pleasant and with the inshore route not viable I am staying put.

Inshore water forecast from Selsey to Lyme Regis at 07:00 Monday.

24 hour forecast: South or southwest 4 to 6, increasing 6 or 7 for a time later. Slight or moderate be moderate or rough later. Showers, perhaps thundery. Good, occasionally poor at first.

Outlook for the following 24 hours: Southwest 4 to 6. Moderate or rough. Showers, then rain. Moderate or good.

And the lunch time one west from Lyme was worse:

24 hour forecast: South or southwest 4 to 6, veering west or southwest 6 to gale 8 for a time. Slight or moderate, becoming moderate or rough. Showers, occasional rain later. Good, occasionally poor. 

The problem is, with the updated forecasts I could be here for a week ☹️, I'm at anchor in about 5 metres of water, with good holding and an 8:1 scope of chain with plenty of water behind me so should be OK in whatever gets thrown at me but it could be gusting 45+ knots at the end of the week by which time I would welcome a shower so will probably pony up for a couple of nights in the marina.

Anchorpro plot overnight, arriving in F6 easterly, veering
to SSW F4 with more to come.

ECMWF gust map for Friday.

Click here for the move to the marina.

2023 9th August, Day 3 Studland to Portland.

An excellent sail in around 8 knots of wind even though the tide made for an early start at 04:45 and it was a beat from Swanage on but I almost made it in one tide and was at anchor by 11:45.

Above: Heading in towards Weymouth before tacking to the harbour entrance

I have mentioned the number of fishermen  seen around
the harbour entrance, this one probably takes the biscuit.

30 miles over the ground in less than 7 hours.

Click here for rounding the Bill and accross Lyme Bay to Plymouth.

2023 June 27th, Day 75 Brixham to Portland

I left at 04:45 for a good trip across Lyme Bay and was kept busy by a wind varying from WSW to SSW and from F2 to F4 and F5 passing the Shambles. 

Like the previous day I ran the engine to make the tide gate around the Bill and Shambles but for less than two hours in total on the 12 hour trip. 

Several boats not that far from me on the run in risked the inshore route in relatively benign conditions and a day before neaps but with a variable wind and potentially a lot coming, which it did shortly after they got round, I decided on the longer route outside of the Shambles but was still at anchor at 17:05.

Facebook Post:

Almost home, another fairly quick trip with quite a few sail changes with the cruising Chute and Spinnaker going up and down several times as the wind changed. Then 20 knots to finish , probably appreciated by some of the wind surfers etc in the harbour. The tides are not that helpful for the rest of the way so I’ll be fighting them at least past St Albans.

Reaching with the 60 square metre spinnaker.

Another member of the RAFYC passing me in Minkie 

2 miles off Portland

Track around Portland.

54 miles in twelve and a quarter hours.

Click here for the final leg of this cruise.

2023 April 15th Day 1 - Hamble to Portland.

After a lot of false starts due to weather I finally went sailing on Saturday 15th April, a month later than hoped for and after a tedious trip down by rail the day before, going via London because the mainline between Oxford and Didcot was closed due to problems with a bridge over the Thames. I was disappointed to find that the Hamble COOP had no chicken and only one pack of pork on its sell by date so I left relying largely on tinned food and cured meat.

On a neap tide the start was at 05:45, it would have been a bit earlier but I had to wait for enough light to see the lines in the water, particularly important as there was a brisk NW wind also making it tricky to get off of the trot mooring without hitting the boat in front of me even with the tide pushing me into the wind and away from her.

Not unusually just before high water, there was shipping to avoid, a big cruise ship, a container ship and a car carrier so I was close to NE Gurnard (East of Beaulieu river)  before I switch to sail, just the headsail in the gusty F4 – F5 north westerly wind until past St Albans head, but making good speed through the water although I did not pick up any significant favourable tide until past West Lepe, then it was at least 7 knots or more over the ground until past the Needles.

Hurst Castle now with new sea defences and rebuilding of the
collapsed northern casements well underway.

Approaching the Needles.

Sea breaking on the shingles bank despite a moderate F4 wind, rather a rocky ride due to over-falls at "The Bridge".

The Lulworth range was inactive on the last weekend of the school holidays so I was able to keep fairly close in to St Albans, but not so close as to get significantly less wind and with the early start I was well past before the tide turned adverse and I made Portland under sail at 15:00 to anchor in solitary splendour until a sport boat turned up for a couple of hours then a yacht that arrived after dark.

Track (the thick red line) on SeaPro, a little cluttered by thin
red lines that are trails of boats tracked by AIS, there are lots
of boats shown but most have the details hidden and icons
minimised to partially de-clutter the screen. In use it is not a
problem as its on a 17" laptop screen and if it became a
problem they are easily removed.

A pleasant sail reaching all the way, but chilly. 53 NM in a little over 9 hours.

Click here for the leg across Lyme Bay.

2022 Celtic Circuit, Day 42 Salcombe to Portland

Force 6 winds had disappeared from the forecasts the previous evening and I left at 05:40 with light winds increasing to fresh as I approached Start Point, it was then mainly NNW F4/5 until I was south of Portland but varying from N to NW so I was frequently changing sail, varying from two reefs in both sails to one reef in the main and full headsail, it is a good job both systems work without too much effort!

A 400 metre container ship east of Start Point heading towards
Brixham to pick up a Pilot, one of her sister ships was heading
to the same point from Portland.

The first challenge was a 400 metre container ship on a converging course. AIS showed a Closest Point of Approach (CPA) of about a mile, although that varied down to almost nothing as the wind was gusty changing my course and speed. It took some time to establish, by checking the ships bearing from AIS, that it was passing astern, not my favourite as I would be crossing her bow leaving me vulnerable if there was a sudden problem, so care was needed. 

The wind increased but I did not want to lose speed whilst I reefed so pressed on rather overpowered but making good speed. Ducking behind was of course an option but it was a big ship and a way off. In the event I crossed her bow by over 2 miles and she passed a mile astern of me.

A further complication was a French yacht, I was again stand on vessel
but he was having control problems running with a small boomed
out jib the boat was unbalanced and broached a few times. Half an hour
later the skipper gave up and headed up to a broad reach.

I had timed my departure well, helped by a calm sea and offshore wind making the Salcombe Bar a non-issue I had left just after low water and the tide turned favourable as I passed Prawle Point with the fresh wind I made excellent time and carried the tide to south of Portland averaging a fraction under 6 knots over the ground.

The final part of this leg was annoying, as I headed up to pass east of the Shambles Bank the wind suddenly gusted and veered from NW to NE, fast enough that the SeaFeather wind vane steering almost lost the plot only just avoiding having the boat flat aback with too much sail up. I had hoped to get further under sail but the tide was turning against me at a little over a knot but in a couple of hours would be much stronger and sailing I would not make any progress and could be going backwards towards the Portland Race so on went the engine. 

The new plan was to motor to the East Shambles Buoy then I should be able to sail to Portland Harbour. That did not pan out as the wind went back to the NW, dead on the nose so I ended up motoring the rest of the way. With a strong west going tide largely helping once I was past the buoy and the rough water just north of the bank at least it was quick.

Track from Salcombe to Portland, I went well south so that when
I headed up the tide would not push me into the notorious Portland Race.

70 miles in less than 14 hours.

To Studland and Hamble.

2022 Celtic Circuit, 1& 2 To Cowes and Portland.

It would be best for new readers or those who are non sailors to check out my new (Nov 2022) blog introduction (Opens in a new tab / window) that explains how I go about writing the blog, its limitations whilst I am writing it whilst cruising and what some terms mean.

A north easterly breeze delayed my departure for half an hour as the boats were being blown inshore onto the pickup line, moving it to the other side would not help as the boats downstream would block my way out shoreside where there is little water at low tide. I had to wait for a lull and for the flood to start overcoming the wind allowing me to get the boat out. Once out it was a bit tricky getting into the main channel as there were dozens of boats going down river, on the third attempt I made it out and joined the queue to get out of the Hamble.  

It got rather dangerous around Hamble Point Buoy when two idiots driving large displacement power boats in the middle of a large group of boats abruptly accelerated creating a huge wash Sancerre, about 30 yards away, rolled a gunnel under and I suspect at least one other boat did the same. There could easily have been collisions especially if boats had still been on autopilot which generally can’t respond to such violent deviations quickly enough, fortunately I saw it coming alerted by the roar of engines and grabbed the tiller in time and “only” briefly went about 45 degrees of course.

The rest of the trip across to Cowes was straightforward and went as planned, slipping in ahead of a 200 boat parade celebrating the jubilee and lots more ready to start a race from the Royal Yacht Squadron’s line off west Cowes. 

Dodging east of the Bramble Bank where there
is an annual cricket between the Island Sailing
Club and the Royal Southern.
Bramble Bank - Wikipedia

Rather busy off Cowes and Osbourne Bay, and this is just the
boats with AIS transceivers switched on, a lot more would
not have one

Reaching the Folly Inn, I managed to get a slot without a boat rafted on me to make an early start practical, albeit with large catamarans in front and behind but I would be leaving heading into the flood tide so getting off in the forecast calm conditions would not be difficult.

A pleasant evening followed with decent food albeit chaotically served, most had finished theirs by the time I got my starter and I and all having the same main course did not get served until everyone else had finished theirs. After declining to pay for everyone, I paid my bill and was back on board fairly early and with the planned early start was in the bunk promptly.

A still unexplained bump in the night woke me at 04:00 thirty minutes before the alarm, there was no point in delaying, so I was under way at 04:30 springing off the pontoon with no trouble. The forecast was for variable winds F2 or 3 occasionally 4 but except for a few minutes I did not see F4 and was mainly sailing in F2 or less, so it was a bit of a struggle. 

AIS makes it so much easier to work out which crossing boats
are a real threat and which are not, in such a confined space
my parameters for automatically classifying dangerous targets,
those in red, tends to highlight too many boats, there is not much
you can do about it and is a reason skippers of large commercial
ships often filter out "class B" (small boat) returns.

The trip down the Solent was slow but pleasant in a NE wind sailing with the cruising chute and main but the wind gave out as I was just short of Hurst Castle and with commercial traffic coming the other way I put on the engine to go through the narrows into the north channel making c 10 knots over the ground, well before N. Head buoy I had the engine off making progress under sail.

Passing Hurst narrows and into the North Channel making up to 10 knots

over the ground - it would have been faster at springs. The cruising chute

"snuffed" but still up ready to be redeployed a few hundred yards later.

Short of Anvil Point I was only making c 2 knots and it was clear I would not get past Anvil and St Alban’s Head before the tide changed so I reverted to engine because I wanted to get to Portland to take the inshore route at the optimal time on Monday, a days delay would mean starting an hour later on Tuesday. The wind perked up short of St Alban’s so I reverted to sail but should have held on for another twenty minutes or so as I missed the tidal gate and spent a long time getting past.

Punching the tide off St Albans under sail. You would not want to be

here in bad weather!

50 miles in Fourteen and three quarter hours of which 4.5 was under power but that did include well over an hour getting down the Medina river and more entering Portland harbour.

Click here for Day 3 to Hope Cove.

2022 St Kilda Days 1 & 2 to Portland

Day 1

Two days that went very smoothly, apart from finding that I had put one mainsail slide in upside down! 

The train was on time and I opted to take the Bus from Southampton rather than train to Netley then picking up the same bus service, I was fortunate to cover the half mile walk in time to catch the bus with about 2 minutes to spare and I was in Hamble an hour or two earlier than would have been the case if I had continued by train.

One thing that puzzled me, I got to Southampton with one change of train and it cost c £25, the alternate service (2 out of every 3 trains during the day) involved three changes, tales longer and costs £42!

A very short hop on the water taxi out to the boat and I was underway at 14:20 more than an hour ahead of scheduled with the boat fully prepared for sea, to make the tide I had expected to have to put on the sheets etc whilst underway. It was a pleasantly warm afternoon with about 10 knots of wind a little east of south.

Hamble to the anchorage behind Hurst.

Entering Southampton water there was some commercial traffic so I continued under engine on the east side until it was past then headed towards Hurst, sailing from Calshot point and making good progress on the ebb tide. The wind started to veer when I was halfway and then died, I gave it an hour then motored the last few miles arriving at 17:35 for a quite but short night. 15 miles in five and a half hours.

The Hurst anchorage, I was much closer in then when I stopped
off here last year.

Day 2

A very early start was needed and I woke up an hour before the alarm and thought I might as well get started and was underway at 03:00. I have compensated a little by changing ships time to BST a couple of days early, partly to make tomorrows early start seem better but mainly because the instruments are still on BST from last year.

Leaving early turned out to be a good move. Going down the Needles channel the wind was only 4 or 5 knots from the north but with 3 knots and more of following tide there was not enough to maintain steerage in the strong tides of the channel so I motored out to SW Shambles when I got there and turned towards Anvil Point the wind piped up to c 10 knots and I had a Force 4 N - NE breeze  all the way to Portland vs the forecast E or NE, that was good news as I was going much faster and covered the 35 miles in 7 hours on one tide.

It was a bit chilly but not really cold and it warmed up quickly from about 9:30 and by lunch time it was 28 degrees.

Dawn off of St Alban's Head.

I was the only one in the main anchorage, not even a single
resident boat on the moorings, and just one boat on the moorings
outside of the marina.

Tomorrow is likely to be interesting, a breezy day is promised and I'll be using the inshore route rather later in the "gate" than I have done before, with a N or NE wind forecast I should even be able to sail round which at least will reduce the risk from Lobster pot floats. However the forecast wind strength for Saturday has been increasing over the last couple of days and if that trend continues it could make the inshore route iffy and I could be delayed,

Slide show of photos so far:

Click here for the next post.

2021 Late Summer Cruise, Days 23 & 24, Salcombe - Portland.

The weather forecast indicated that this was likely to be a frustrating day, and so it proved, but I did not expect the wind to start off from the NE then veer right round the compass back to NE before settling down at the forecast westerlies or never to get to the F4 mentioned in the forecast. Nor did I expect fog, and I hoped the "possible thundery showers" would be further west and not involve lightening, at least near me.

I left at 04:15 for the best tides past Prawl and Start Points and out into Lyme bay. Shortly after dawn what appeared to be a light shower appeared in the SE (the wind was NE) rather than pass clear it came very close, growing in intensity. Then the lightening started, fortunately not that close and all I got was rain. Another system followed at 10:00 but with less lightening.

Thunderstorms!

The display shown above shows a thunderstorm from 2 to 6 miles ahead (left, the bright white circle is 8 NM out) and another close aboard (right, white circle at 0.75 NM), displayed on an iPad replicating the chart plotter display. The doppler radar shows things with relative movement towards the boat in red, moving away in green and anything stationary or moving slowly in blue, rain filters are switched off. To protect them all other portable electronic items were in the cooker acting as a Faraday Cage. As the storm got closer this one went in as well.

With the inshore route around the Bill unavailable due to the timing of the tides and darkness, you have to stay well clear of the race and over-falls before skirting the dangerous Shambles bank that extend 5 miles east of the Bill.

Yes I did go backwards for quite a while.

With very light winds, a choppy sea and, close to springs, well over two knots of adverse tide even clear of the Bill, I spent a lot of time going backwards (over 4 miles in one go) or at best holding my ground. With shortness of fuel (see below) the dash for the harbour under engine round the Shambles bank needed to be timed right to take advantage of strong helpful tides there, I hit that about right with 4 - 4.5 knots largely helping as I went south of them.

Going around the Shambles bank making better than 8 knots
over the ground at times. I was about half a mile east of the East
Shambles Buoy, I could have gone a bit closer but with 4 knots
of tide heading NE it was best to let the current take me quickly past
into slack water before heading for the harbour.

A bad day with Fuel

With the fuel tank due to be replaced I did not want to take a lot of fuel, the tank would need to be emptied and I would need cans to store the fuel and may calculations showed sufficient for 120 miles. In my previous post I foolishly wrote:

"[a disadvantage of a bladder tank is] an inability to measure how much fuel is in the tank (I keep a detailed fuel log which has worked so far but it does require the tank to be filled right to the top every now and again to confirm the calculations)"

Until Wednesday.

At 13:10 I updated the fuel log (in Excel) that showed, to be on the safe side, I needed to put more fuel in the tank with in a couple of hours. 10 minutes later, whilst I was having a coffee prior to transferring some fuel, the engine began to stutter, fuel starvation is always a good bet on a diesel so I quickly stopped it for investigation and sure enough a pump of the lift pump showed no fuel coming out of the bleed in the final fuel filter. So I put most of my reserve in the tank, bled the system at the filter and the engine started and ran fine without having to bleed the high pressure pump or injectors, stopping the engine quickly certainly helped there.

Checking the calculations and the high implied fuel consumption if the tank had run out, together with the fact that only few pumps were needed to bleed the system (indicating the primary filter was not empty), I now believe there was some fuel left but that the pitching of the boat prevented the fuel coming out of the tank, a bladder tank has no baffles and is not necessarily smooth and level. I have on a few occasions run the engine with low fuel levels but iirc always in calm water.

The remaining problem was that I had half the fuel that I thought and an emergency reserve is what it says. Staying up all night to sail on in light winds does not count as an emergency so it was going to be a long day.

Update: When I got back to Hamble I removed the bladder tank ready to install the new steel one, calculations showed that there should have been 10.7 litres of fuel remaining. I pumped out 47 litres so I have been carting around at least 30 litres, almost 30Kg, of unusable fuel and I "ran out" because normally usable fuel could not consistently get to the tanks outlet in the choppy sea and with the boat rolling.

A bad day with Halyards.

Once upon a time (in 2018) raising the mainsail whilst coming out of Plymouth Sound the boat went hard into a wave, the main Halyard swung forward of the mast above the spreaders and wrapped itself around the radar reflector (the can shaped thing on the front of the mast in the picture). Getting it untangled took some time, a boat hook and going a few steps up the mast. Since then I have been carful to keep it taught as much as possible and it has not happened again.

Until Wednesday.

When I was hoisting sail after motoring out of Salcombe the boat hit a wave left over from strong winds the previous evening and in the few seconds it took to get from releasing the halyard at the mast back to the cockpit to pull it up the halyard went forward and was trapped.

Fortunately it went to port over the spinnaker halyard and I was able to use that to flip the main halyard forward and off of the reflector. a coupe of minutes and it was sorted.

Much later when I was hoisting the mainsail for the third time that day (motoring into a head sea with no wind made the sail slam around so I had taken it down), it happened again but this time it had gone to starboard and there was no halyard to pull it away and after a considerable time trying to free it I gave up and decided to use the topping lift as a halyard. This is a bit of a pain when reefing as there is nothing to support the boom but no big deal and I had deliberately used a rope (8mm with a Dynema core) strong enough for the job but thin enough not to cause problems in normal use.

And blow me, it happened again! 3 times in one day and only one previous occurrence in c 8,500 miles!

Again I could not use another halyard to free it and I was not going to go up the mast in the still choppy sea. I worked out that if I could throw the heaving line over the spreader I could haul the halyard or topping lift forward, free it from the radar reflector, then pull it back. That sounds easier than it was, I don't have a strong throwing arm but the main problem was the small target swinging from side to side as the boat wallowed, using the engine would have reduced the roll but I could not risk the heaving lie going over the side and getting wrapped around the prop.

It took an hour to get the topping lift back, unfortunately the main halyard had followed a different path so could not be pulled through at the same time. I got it one way but could not get it back so exhausted, with my arthritis hurting and my temper getting frayed I gave up and set sail with the topping lift as a halyard. Later when I had recovered, the sea had calmed a bit and the wind was strong enough to stabilise to boat under sail I managed to finish the job.

This winter I'll look at running a wire from the radar reflector to the mast to stop anything getting in.

A bad day with fog.

When I was SE of Portland Bill the visibility began to deteriorate to the point that I could not see a large well lit cruise liner (c 300 metres long) until it was less than a mile away despite having it on AIS and radar to give me a hint. As I passed the East Shambles Buoy the visibility was not much above a quarter of a mile and getting worse. A seconded cruise liner coming from Portland went by less than half a mile and not clearly visible. 

Although I was confident in having fuel for the rest of the trip I turned the engine off and sailed under headsail only in a light westerly wind at about 3 knots and in the quite listened out for small boats that might not show up on radar or have AIS. The pier head lights on the eastern entrance that have a nominal range of 5 miles showed up dimly at a quarter of a mile. 

Navigating by radar and GPS I made the north entrance following an old track (not really an issue with a well charted area like Portland harbour but  following a track you know to be good is generally better than relying on the cartography), again the lights showed at about a quarter of a mile but I never saw the pier heads themselves even though the entrance is quite narrow.

Entering the harbour, the breakwaters were never visible.

The lights on buoys marking the channel through the harbour showed up at 400 feet by GPS & radar (the modern "broadband" doppler radar with pulse compression works very close in, to about 8 metres, unlike old pulsed radar) and I saw nothing else except a single anchor light before I anchored. The radar was a big help showing a number of buoys and boats.

I anchored shortly before midnight, tided up the deck, filled in the log and pored a glass of wine, by which time, at most 15 minutes, the fog had lifted and I could see 1/2 a mile. By the time I was ready for a second glass (not long!) I could see right across the harbour.

Next morning I moved into the marina to take on fuel, get a shower, a meal at the café and some supplies from the supermarket not far away.

79 miles in 20 hours.

Click here for the last leg and summary of the trip.

2021 Late Summer Cruise, Day 3. Studland - Portland

 A long beat in light winds, the weather was generally good until south of Lulworth when fog and drizzle reduced visibility to half a mile or less and on went the radar, something I don't normally do when the engine is not running despite the relatively low power requirement of the modern radar.

Radar plot on the right, GPS map on the left. approx SW of
me is an AIS target (red triangle) classified as dangerous because
it fell within criterial I have set up. on the radar plot the blue return
if the radar return was red it would show the target moving towards
me, if moving away it would be green. Approx NW is a radar return
I have "told" the radar to track.

Approaching Portland things started to get very busy, I knew where
I was relative to Portland and the plan track so I had switched 
the display to radar & AIS only. The middle tracked target had just
gone within the set limit and the green one will shortly do so.
Ahead there is a target showing on AIS and radar.

When I was about 4 miles from Portland there were at least a dozen small boats showing ahead on radar but not AIS plus a couple of huge P&O cruise liners and a couple of tankers, the ships almost certainly hiding other small boats. Some of the small boats with poor or no radar reflectors were not showing up until within half a mile, so I decided to stop sailing as the headsail makes keeping a visual watch whilst watching the radar difficult so I changed to the motor. Naturally 10 minutes later the sky cleared and it was an easy arrival.

20 miles in a little under 5 hours.

Slide show of my pictures from Hamble to Portland, page through by clicking the arrows or click in the centre of the pic to view from Flickr in a new window or full screen:

Click here for days 4 and 5.