I've done it!

[jamesjermain]

Re: I\'ve done it!

Your last point is the big iffy. At Cargreen we are seven miles plus from the Sound and another two to open water. However, as you go nowhere up the Tamar without the tide under you (up to six knots past the Crooker Spaniard - a good eatery by the way) - seven miles can be covered in well under an hour.

Even so, I suspect we will become quite familiar with St German's river and the Dandy Hole and the various anchorages in the Sound.

JJ

 

[Chris_Robb]

See you down there

James - so you decided to stay there after all! We decided to take up the mooring at Torpoint, so we will also be racing you down the A 303, so i hope we can meet up during the summer

 

[Guest]

Upside and downside

The upside is both financial and quieter cruising grounds.

The downside is the cost of going from somewhere that was convenient and now having to have a long drive to get to the better pound in the pocket mooring.

JJ, you know where I live and where I sail from ... The mooring cost is £420 pa. I go there from where I live and the to and fro cost in petrol alone is £80. (It's about 4 hours drive eachway) ... but I haven't included all the other car costs. Assume I go sailing 20 times a year then the minimum basic costs are 420 + 20 x 80 = £2020 per annum

All I care about is quality sailing ... In theory, I've got £2,200 more in my pocket than JJ had when he was at Mercury .... but my real downside is that I've got 20 x 2 x 180 (net) = 7,200 EXTRA more stressful miles per annum to drive.

So why do I do it? Answer: Quality wilderness sailing; a better chandlery with staff who care and know you; a welcome when you visit adjoining sailing/yacht clubs; a boatyard that looks after your boat when you are not there ... etc.

Having sailed out of the Mecca area and swapped for somewhere else and found a better mousetrap, I wouldn't swap from where I now sail from for anywhere else.

JJ, Enjoy the Tamar and all points south; welcome to the 'Outsider' set where pocketted pounds and quality sailing prevail.

Cheers,

NigeCh

 

[longjohnsilver]

The Spaniard

Went up there on Sunday for lunch with Haydn from MB chat forum, no one else on the river and an excellent Sunday lunch. Well recommended.

 

[jamesjermain]

Re: The Spaniard

Glad it worked out. We will be there next weekend

JJ

 

[ParaHandy]

Re: Upside and downside

I think you two (incl. JJ) are making all this up eg itinerary:

a) leave 6pm Friday
b) arrive 10pm
c) extract dinghy, load and row out to mooring 11pm
d) store everything on board, oops p*ssing with rain, too knackered after long drive, leave it to the morning
e) 6am Saturday no rain, leave mooring
f) arrive destination 2pm, enjoy quality life, wilderness etc
g) depart 6am Sunday
h) back to mooring 2pm
i) load dinghy 3pm
j) load car 4pm
k) back from whence you arrived 8pm Sunday

Obviously, if your sailing is a week at a time, then you’re very lucky. Otherwise. at 6kn your range is 48m and probably somewhat less.

How can a boatyard seriously say it will look after your boat (other than casually)? Is a “friendly” chandlery that important to you?

It’s the ridiculous distance you have to travel on narrow, busy, roads that makes your smugness barely believable.

 

[Guest]

Re: The Spaniard

I think you mean the Crooked Spaniard's Inn. I wrote it up for YM a year or so ago, and it has been well visited since then. If you are thinking of living in the area try the associated pub called the Crooked Inn just the Saltash side of Landrake. Come further upstream in the summer, pick up a mooring off Cotehele Quay for free, and I will be glad to meet you at Cotehele Mill, a half mile walk through the woods.

 

[Guest]

Re: Passport

I heartily agree with you, but JJ seems to do the A303 run from t'other side of Exeter at weekends. Why, I can't imagine!

 

[Guest]

Re: I pay my taxes

Not if you keep flitting over the water, but you do now qualify for half price Tamar Bridge toll. Downside is that the book of tickets has just doubled in size and now costs £20.

 

[jamesjermain]

Re: Upside and downside

I have the advantage of working for myself and can turn weekdays into weekends and vice versa. Also long weekends are not usually a problem.

Of course there is a lot in what you say and the situation is less than ideal. One thing which makes it more practical is that I also have a house 40 yards away from the mooring. Although this is usually let during the summer, it has a garage and store where all the kit is kept, plus a slipway at the bottom of the garden. Moving the boat down there this year is part of a longer term plan under which we will be moving to Cargreen lock, stock and barrel about this time next year.

JJ

 

[tcm]

Re: Upside and downside

Well, in that case I can't see too many downsides at all. Just a few short decades and you'll be a local!

 

[jamesjermain]

Re: The Spaniard

You're right, of course, Mike, despite my spelling of Crooked - which suggested a sort of ailing Antipodean Iberian.

In fact I still prefer to think of the pub as The Spaniard in its pre-merged days. Justin and Helen are a lovely couple and run a good establishment for yachtsmen. However, it is not so much of a local's pub as it was - the drinking crowd tending to go to the Rising 'Damp' over towards Landulph.

I look forward to seeing you at Cotehele - what an amazing place. Do you have anything to do with the museum there and the Tamar barge (Shamrock, is it?)?

JJ

 

[longjohnsilver]

Re: The Spaniard

Thanks. Sounds good to me, much prefer a mooring to marinas, and what better than a stroll thru the woods before a good pint. Will be in touch!

Weather wasn't that brilliant last Sunday, strangely enough I didn't see any pub sign at all from the river, you'd think they'd want to attract water borne trade.

 

[Guest]

Re: The Spaniard

Throughout the summer months when I 'm not sailing my time is filled with The Mill, but I do know Peter Allington who is Shamrock's ship's husband very well. We used to run little courses on moving heavy weights using blocks, taykels etc, for primary school kids alongside Shamrock. It will be one of her moorings you will probably pick up. If the tide serves you can also lie alongside by the manual crane. Some yachts have spent several days there taking the ground as the bottom is fairly soft mud. Check with Joe Lawrence the Area Warden if you intend to do that. Beware of the Calstock Ferry, though.

 

[Guest]

Re: I\'ve done it!

There was a Cornish car sticker doing the rounds for a while, as follows:

"Fishing's scat, farming's scat, mining's scat, so back to wrecking, me dears!"

Yachtsmen and women beware! ;- )

 

[Guest]

Re: I\'ve done it!

I'm a card-carrying member of the "Friends of the A11" which involves an intimate acquaintance with the rear ends of beet lorries and tractors - it's still not completely dualled, and Norfolk is very agricultural!

One long section of open road has a 40mph speed limit, which is infuriating... Roll on the summer and holiday season!

 

[ParaHandy]

Norfolk(ing) Chance...

....of them laying an inch of motorway, or have things changed?!

BTW card carrying members of A11 are wusses to the hardened A47 members!

 

[Guest]

Re: Upside and downside

Lived in Cargreen for a while in the 70's. A charming little village, and of course a wonderful pub a few doors down from the house, Rose Cottge. Also, some great pubs close by. I had a small dinghy so was able to explore the smaller creeks and upper reaches of the Tamar. Always wondered what it would be like owning one of the 'big' boats on the moorings, and sailing down to Plymouth Sound.

You have certainly picked a great little spot. Far enough out of the mainstream to be quiet and friendly, but still close enough for the flesh pots of Plymouth. Of course, things may have changed over the years since I was last there, but I hope not.

 

[Guest]

Re: Norfolk(ing) Chance...

Better Half used to live in Dereham, I in Yarmouth, so know *all* about the A47! Race you down the Acle Straight some time!

As regards the meagre A11, we did notice that quite a lot of extra dualling was done round about the time that John Major appointed lots of Norfolk and Suffolk MPs to his cabinet. Before that it was more or less a cart track. Are these things related? I think we should be told... ;- )

 

[Guest]

Re: I\'ve done it! - update

So, how did it work out James?
John Watson
MD
MDL