Medway to Ramsgate - local knowledge?

Keep the land on the right!

Seriously, leave at high tide and head for the Princes Channel and then pass inside the Goodwins. Then go to Ramsagate or continue down to Dover and taking the tide with you all the way.
 
mattonthesea said:
Planning from Otterham to Sheerness and Ramsgate, or pos Dover, at the end of the week. Any tips?

New, to me, boat draws 1.5m; cruising speed 5kts.

Matt
Click to expand...

Hi, yes make sure you have a recent chart showing the buoys off Reculver. It's the only shallow bit, apart from inside Ramsgate, where you don't want to cut inside the SHM (greenie) at low water, or you will come to a grinding halt..

It will be low water, in Ramsgate it's easy to run aground. Dover is deep water at any state of the tide.

Both harbours need permission to enter due to commercial traffic, check which channels, listen to them approaching harbour to get a feel for the way they talk on the radio. Dover can be very sharp, like wannabe air traffic controllers, Rambo more informal.

If you go for Dover, ask to enter the Eastern entrance, they will fit you in around the ferry movements. Once you're inside Dover docks, it's still quite a long way to the marina..

Medway VTS is a good frequency to listen to on the radio as well.
Have a good run.
 
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Leave about HW and you will get 6hrs of favourable tides. Personally I would leave the Medway heading for The Coperas Channel via Spile and then inside Margate sands and round North Foreland to Ramsgate. Next week will be neaps so plenty of water on the "overland" route. Watch out for quite a strong cross tide when going in to Ramsgate. Have a look at the East Coast Pilot web site, better still buy the book.
 
It's all a matter of tides, if you're too late for Dover, just don't bother. The tide runs at the best part of 3 kn off Dover. There are many joys in Ramsgate; it's just that I can't remember what they are.
 
The joys of Ramsgate include
A guided tour of a historic steam tug, and various interesting old boats to look at.
A great maritime museum
Old church with ship models, and the Home for Smack Boys
Lots of good value cafes, pubs, shops, restaurants in the compact and characterful town centre.
The externally imposing, but very friendly yacht club, open to visiting sailors. Sometimes with resident crooner doing Sinatra songs, you haven't lived..
Tattoo spotting on market days, look out for the guy with a huge Freddy Kruger face on his chest ;)
It's a one off, I love Ramsgate, take the time to explore and check out the architecture as well
 
Lyndsey Doyle said:
Hi, yes make sure you have a recent chart showing the buoys off Reculver. It's the only shallow bit, apart from inside Ramsgate, where you don't want to cut inside the SHM (greenie) at low water, or you will come to a grinding halt..

It will be low water, in Ramsgate it's easy to run aground. Dover is deep water at any state of the tide.

Both harbours need permission to enter due to commercial traffic, check which channels, listen to them approaching harbour to get a feel for the way they talk on the radio. Dover can be very sharp, like wannabe air traffic controllers, Rambo more informal.

If you go for Dover, ask to enter the Eastern entrance, they will fit you in around the ferry movements. Once you're inside Dover docks, it's still quite a long way to the marina..

Medway VTS is a good frequency to listen to on the radio as well.
Have a good run.
Click to expand...

Why is Lyndsey Doyle suddenly greyed-out? He's not the type to suddenly start using expletives or something similar.

Richard
 
Hi all

thanks for the advice. I took the Reculver route; interesting time as we were late getting out of the Medway and I had forgotten that Rival 32s do not like short choppy waves. So at the lowest tide we got confused between the Green Lateral marker (really a southerly cardinal) and the Red one (northerly-ish). Honestly, it looks like a pair of channel markers in the dark :rolleyes:

Fortunately, by then, the depth gauge had decided to start working!!! We worked our way around the right channel with blind nav techniques and, once through, it was obvious what we should have done!

Several lessons learnt the main one being that she may also be a Rival 32 but she is different from my previous one.

Back in Bristol now (two weeks later). Well I am but she is in Portishead. All that way and I missed the tide back into Bristol by 20 minutes. We had some fabulous sailing and some good maintenance in nice harbours :) And it feels good to have a boat again.
 
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