Brightlingsea on Friday

johnalison

johnalison

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We left early for the weekend on Friday and were treated to a bit of practice with the radar, coming up the Wallet to Brittlsea. An echo that I thought was a buoy turned out to be this barge yacht, which I am told is called Cygnet. I trust that you all had enjoyable weekends too.

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There wasn't much more to see when we got to the creek

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But the last warm day turned out to be a romantic-looking evening, though I wasn't fully ebriated when I took this, for which I blame my friends.

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Supine Being said:
Nice pics, although I'm very glad that I wasn't out there, all radar-less, on Friday. I wouldn't have been happy.
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We've been blessed with radar for the last dozen years after thirty years without. At least in our waters you have the option of going into shallow water and anchoring, but that is not an option in the middle of the North Sea or Channel, which we cross a couple of times each year. I think we use the radar in anger about once very couple of years, so it is a bit of a luxury.
 
When I wake up and see fog I generally go back to sleep, due to the lack of technology aboard!

Imagine my surprise when waking from anchor off the island of Aero in Denmark on my mates flashy new boat, being unable to see the bow from the wheel and then leaving.

Boat speed is set at 9 knots and the chaps are sitting the saloon looking at a TV which repeats the nav gadgets and broadband whatever's that are bolted to the mast. The auto pilot is driving and course changes done from an iPad.

I suggested we ought to keep a look out and maybe sound the fog horn occasionally - they laughed at me :-(

It did appear to work quite well though!
 
xyachtdave said:
When I wake up and see fog I generally go back to sleep, due to the lack of technology aboard!

Imagine my surprise when waking from anchor off the island of Aero in Denmark on my mates flashy new boat, being unable to see the bow from the wheel and then leaving.

Boat speed is set at 9 knots and the chaps are sitting the saloon looking at a TV which repeats the nav gadgets and broadband whatever's that are bolted to the mast. The auto pilot is driving and course changes done from an iPad.

I suggested we ought to keep a look out and maybe sound the fog horn occasionally - they laughed at me :-(

It did appear to work quite well though!
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Terrifying.

Hope not too many have such a total belief in radar.

From experience radar is a useful aid but can have a death wish.
 
nortada said:
Terrifying.

Hope not too many have such a total belief in radar.

From experience radar is a useful aid but can have a death wish.
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Yes!

There was a point when the alarm went off and someone appeared to be steaming flat out towards us in the same manner appearing out of the fog on a collision course.

His broadband whatever had obviously woken the other boat up too so course changed at last moment.

I was uncomfortable with the situation but in the minority so suffered....though not in silence!
 
To use radar well takes practice. If you'd plotted Cygnet, even with just the Variable Range Marker and the Electronic Bearing Line, you'd have noticed that she was moving; something buoys don't normally do!

One of the great things about radar is it is competely up to date; just like your echosounder and unlike your charts and plotter.
 
Friday was 'interesting' ! Your pictures capture the feeling !! We left Ramsgate bound for Fambridge, using radar, AIS, eyes and ears.

From the off the visibility was less than 0.5nm. The electronics tracked the hi-speed wind-farm traffic and the large ships out of Princes channel. Entering Fishermans Gat we picked up Alert coming down the Black Deep, and she came within a 100m. Alert appeared to be lining up to pickup a small red bouy.

We crossed the Black Deep to use the 'Tillergirl Swatchway' across the SW Sunk. Transit without incident :-)

AIS & Radar picked up two yachts near the S.Whitakker bouy. One called Scooter (?) had been talking to Thames Coastguard about visability as he came out of Harwich. He passed ahead of us heading down the Middle Deep.

As we approached the BoC moorings visabilty reduced to ~50m, scary with a number of boats on the move.
 
I took Bonsella to Brightlingsea on Friday after aborting an earlier plan to get up to the Deben. The fog was awful at Bench Head at about 1300 (perhaps viz of about 60m) but thinned as we turned North into Brightlingsea. We then had a major thunderstorm in the early hours of Saturday and scuttled back to Bradwell in very heavy rain once the thunderstorm had moved away. Not what we had planned but good fun most of the time. The fog did not seem to slow down Offshore Provider much but she was a good test for the AIS!
Morgan
 
xyachtdave said:
Yes!

There was a point when the alarm went off and someone appeared to be steaming flat out towards us in the same manner appearing out of the fog on a collision course.

His broadband whatever had obviously woken the other boat up too so course changed at last moment.

I was uncomfortable with the situation but in the minority so suffered....though not in silence!
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I suggest you get them to read some of the MAIB reports involving collisions about watch keeping and use of electronics etc... As others have said, scary
 
michael_w said:
To use radar well takes practice. If you'd plotted Cygnet, even with just the Variable Range Marker and the Electronic Bearing Line, you'd have noticed that she was moving; something buoys don't normally do!

One of the great things about radar is it is competely up to date; just like your echosounder and unlike your charts and plotter.
Click to expand...
I practice quite a lot! Cygnet was actually very close to a green buoy and scarcely moving, so the dictinction between boat and buoy was not immediately evident. I doubt if she was doing even one knot.
 
morgandlm said:
I took Bonsella to Brightlingsea on Friday after aborting an earlier plan to get up to the Deben. The fog was awful at Bench Head at about 1300 (perhaps viz of about 60m) but thinned as we turned North into Brightlingsea. We then had a major thunderstorm in the early hours of Saturday and scuttled back to Bradwell in very heavy rain once the thunderstorm had moved away. Not what we had planned but good fun most of the time. The fog did not seem to slow down Offshore Provider much but she was a good test for the AIS!
Morgan
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I made the wrong choice. I was taking my daughter to see Sealand and aborted due to fog and headed for the Deben. That was even worse and so I returned to the Orwell where I actually saw a boat,
 
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