G
Guest
Guest
Some of you may remember my epic first sea trip last year from Gt. Yarmouth round to Kings Lynn where another BB contributor, Matts, helped me over that first psychological hurdle of actually using my boat at sea. For those who missed it, I won’t bore you with the details, but suffice to say it certainly whetted my appetite for proper boating as against our normal river boating on the Gt. Ouse.
Last December I bought a set of s\hand duoprops from another BB contributor, Dave Steward ("advertised" here on the board)and he planted the seed of an idea in my mind to join one of the MBM Cruise in Company trips. We’re due to depart Ramsgate on 28\29 July for their Zeeland cruise and last week I had our little Fairline Mirage trucked from Huntingdon down to Dover and this weekend we planned to pop over to Calais for a shakedown cruise in company with Dave in his Turbo 36.
You know how sometimes things go according to plan and sometimes…?
Well, this was the one time that it all worked brilliant. Out of Granville dock at 05:00 Saturday morning watching the sun rise, tried to beat a ferry coming out of the Eastern exit, but changed my mind and slipped round behind him, and then just followed the GPS track for CA10, turning right a bit when we got to the TSS. Dave was about a mile or so ahead making 21ish knots, we were bumbling along at 17 till I realised you can actually open the throttles to their stops (they’ve never been that far open before) and crept up to 23. Only problem was the 23 was mph, ‘cos I’d been using the GPS in the car and forgot to reset it. We had winds of 3 I guess all the way across and a nice gentle swell that gave the odd bit of spray onto the screen to make us feel like real boaters, but nothing dramatic. Straight across no trouble into Calais 15mins before their last lock of the morning, tied up at the visitors jetty at just about half eight French time, to be greeted by Sarah, Dave’s wife with a congratulatory bottle of bubbly. Perfect for breakfast.
Coming back Sunday evening was just as good. NW 4 in Calais but as soon as we got a mile or so offshore quietened down nicely and routed to the north of the Goodwins straight into Ramsgate. Only one minor glitch in that we hit a chunk of wood about a mile east of the Goodwin light. Quite a loud bang but checked around and didn’t see any water in the boat so just carried on. A little vibration and our speed dropped down to 18knots, but nothing traumatic and went straight into Ramsgate Marina. Port props (duoprops) are bit bent but nothing that Steel Developments can’t fix and I’ve got four spare sets so that’ll be OK.
So what’s the point of this posting?
Firstly to show off a bit. We’ve “gorn forern” sort of on our own and there’s nothing to it, is there?
Does everybody get this feeling of elation on their first X Channel? For us this really is a major achievement. With the exception of the trip to Kings Lynn last year (which my wife didn’t come on), and an excellent 4 day weekend with Matt and his family on their Targa 48 in Nice in June, this is our first time on the sea in anything smaller than a Sealink ferry. I think Saturday night was the first time she’d slept since about February worrying about this and you should have heard her telling stories to other boaters on Saturday night, you’d have thought she’d crossed the Atlantic single handed.
So it’s a big thank you to Dave and Sarah for their encouragement and help. We had a good weekend in Calais, Bastille Day celebrations for the French so an excellent fireworks display on Saturday evening and a perfectly lazy day on Sunday.
Also thanks IPC. Why IPC? Well in reality it’s only through this BB that this whole thing was possible. I met both Matt and Dave through various postings here and I reckon without the encouragement of them and others on this board (but not Haydn, he’s enough to put anyone off boating for life), I’d still be ditch crawling in Cambridgeshire thinking, if only…..
And fourthly to encourage anyone else who feels the urge to have a go. Oh and now of course “she says” we’re looking for a bigger boat. Any recommendations around the £50-60K mark?
<P ID="edit"><FONT SIZE=-1>Edited by colin_maslen on Tue Jul 17 21:08:27 2001 (server time).</FONT></P>
Last December I bought a set of s\hand duoprops from another BB contributor, Dave Steward ("advertised" here on the board)and he planted the seed of an idea in my mind to join one of the MBM Cruise in Company trips. We’re due to depart Ramsgate on 28\29 July for their Zeeland cruise and last week I had our little Fairline Mirage trucked from Huntingdon down to Dover and this weekend we planned to pop over to Calais for a shakedown cruise in company with Dave in his Turbo 36.
You know how sometimes things go according to plan and sometimes…?
Well, this was the one time that it all worked brilliant. Out of Granville dock at 05:00 Saturday morning watching the sun rise, tried to beat a ferry coming out of the Eastern exit, but changed my mind and slipped round behind him, and then just followed the GPS track for CA10, turning right a bit when we got to the TSS. Dave was about a mile or so ahead making 21ish knots, we were bumbling along at 17 till I realised you can actually open the throttles to their stops (they’ve never been that far open before) and crept up to 23. Only problem was the 23 was mph, ‘cos I’d been using the GPS in the car and forgot to reset it. We had winds of 3 I guess all the way across and a nice gentle swell that gave the odd bit of spray onto the screen to make us feel like real boaters, but nothing dramatic. Straight across no trouble into Calais 15mins before their last lock of the morning, tied up at the visitors jetty at just about half eight French time, to be greeted by Sarah, Dave’s wife with a congratulatory bottle of bubbly. Perfect for breakfast.
Coming back Sunday evening was just as good. NW 4 in Calais but as soon as we got a mile or so offshore quietened down nicely and routed to the north of the Goodwins straight into Ramsgate. Only one minor glitch in that we hit a chunk of wood about a mile east of the Goodwin light. Quite a loud bang but checked around and didn’t see any water in the boat so just carried on. A little vibration and our speed dropped down to 18knots, but nothing traumatic and went straight into Ramsgate Marina. Port props (duoprops) are bit bent but nothing that Steel Developments can’t fix and I’ve got four spare sets so that’ll be OK.
So what’s the point of this posting?
Firstly to show off a bit. We’ve “gorn forern” sort of on our own and there’s nothing to it, is there?
Does everybody get this feeling of elation on their first X Channel? For us this really is a major achievement. With the exception of the trip to Kings Lynn last year (which my wife didn’t come on), and an excellent 4 day weekend with Matt and his family on their Targa 48 in Nice in June, this is our first time on the sea in anything smaller than a Sealink ferry. I think Saturday night was the first time she’d slept since about February worrying about this and you should have heard her telling stories to other boaters on Saturday night, you’d have thought she’d crossed the Atlantic single handed.
So it’s a big thank you to Dave and Sarah for their encouragement and help. We had a good weekend in Calais, Bastille Day celebrations for the French so an excellent fireworks display on Saturday evening and a perfectly lazy day on Sunday.
Also thanks IPC. Why IPC? Well in reality it’s only through this BB that this whole thing was possible. I met both Matt and Dave through various postings here and I reckon without the encouragement of them and others on this board (but not Haydn, he’s enough to put anyone off boating for life), I’d still be ditch crawling in Cambridgeshire thinking, if only…..
And fourthly to encourage anyone else who feels the urge to have a go. Oh and now of course “she says” we’re looking for a bigger boat. Any recommendations around the £50-60K mark?
<P ID="edit"><FONT SIZE=-1>Edited by colin_maslen on Tue Jul 17 21:08:27 2001 (server time).</FONT></P>
