Otter
Well-Known Member
We had always gone to Belgium via Ramsgate but took the encouraging advice of the forum and set off direct for Belgium yesterday at 4.30am from the Deben. We set a course of 127 degrees which we never veered from. The tide set us a long way south after the first hour and normally I'd be getting twitchy but we stuck to it and sure enough it pulled us back up on to the course. The thing about electronic plotters is they encourage you to fight the tide and stick slavishly to the route. We largely ignored the plotter except for AIS and used a huge paper chart in a perspex frame on the saloon bulkhead. The result was 20% less effort and the satisfaction of getting it right. 15 hours later we tied up in Nieuwpoort which we prefer to Oostende. Two days r n r and then we head up the coast for the Versemeer.
Thanks for all the answers to our questions over the last 8 months of planning this trip. BTW - who enjoyed the trip most and was as good as gold? The 3 year old of course, the one we worried about doing such a long trip with.
On another matter, anyone else noticed that AIS is particularly useful not so much for ship avoidance as for avoiding altering course? A number of ships we would have got all twitchy about and steered to avoid, instead we found we could safely stand on as we knew the CPA was fine and could see immediately If they altered course.
Thanks for all the answers to our questions over the last 8 months of planning this trip. BTW - who enjoyed the trip most and was as good as gold? The 3 year old of course, the one we worried about doing such a long trip with.
On another matter, anyone else noticed that AIS is particularly useful not so much for ship avoidance as for avoiding altering course? A number of ships we would have got all twitchy about and steered to avoid, instead we found we could safely stand on as we knew the CPA was fine and could see immediately If they altered course.
