Will a mile dinghy ride to swinging mooring be a culture shock?

[Rappey]

Its not so much the waves getting you wet. Its breaking waves against your hull and the wind taking the splashes inside your dingy, often from the side that get you soaked.
Can you travel solo and get the boat to the shore to load? It is so much drier with just one person.
8ft is because i would struggle to lift a dingy any bigger.
A rigid is a lot easier to row over an inflatible as less windage and some directional stability
Most times i go out i see another dingy. Its a busy area.
In the past 30 years ive rescued 3 people. Two incidents were in weather where one should not really have been out in a dingy.

 

[DoubleEnder]

I used to launch my dinghy at Royal Harwich for a mooring about 300m below Pin Mill. It could sometimes be pretty sporting. Outboard failure was always on my mind, I never enjoyed the dinghy ride. I had a 10ft hard dinghy and I’d have liked something bigger except for the thought I might have to row it.

 

[StUrrock]

I used to launch my dinghy at Royal Harwich for a mooring about 300m below Pin Mill. It could sometimes be pretty sporting. Outboard failure was always on my mind, I never enjoyed the dinghy ride. I had a 10ft hard dinghy and I’d have liked something bigger except for the thought I might have to row it.

We will be going from Royal Harwich too, to just above the Mulberry Starboard buoy.

 

[Leighb]

We will be going from Royal Harwich too, to just above the Mulberry Starboard buoy.

We, many years ago, had an MDL mooring which was near the No 7 buoy. I had a very light plastic pram dinghy, no o/b, and launched from RHYC. It was not to hard with only one in the dinghy but with two the transom dug and it became hard work. If the wind and tide were contrary it was a struggle! I found that I could row up u der the old bridge at MDL, then up the inside of the pontoons where the crane berth (was!!!) and come out as far up river as possible. This did save a long slog in mid channel. I am not sure if this route is still viable as MDL may have changed the layout of the pontoons.

On one particular day I was taking a chap out who was thinking of getting a Devon Yawl for a demo sail. Wind and tide were wrong and we were struggling, when I was a cable or two short of the mooring and getting quite tired the RIB from the Ian Jacob, Suffolk Police which was moored at MDL came alongside and asked if we were OK. I said we were just making for that mooring up ahead, he then said would you like a tow? They had obviously spotted that we were having trouble.

I was very grateful I can tell you. Anyway we decided we needed an o/b and got an old Seagull. The next season MDL moved us to a mooring just off the Club.

 

[Aquaboy]

As an aside if you have a mooring anywhere below Woolverstone/RHYC I would check your depths at low water..... The crowd that have been dredging on behalf of MDL have been dropping the spoil pretty much anywhere they choose on the ebb. They only go down to Buttermans during the flood.

 

[DoubleEnder]

Worse was when I sometimes used to use a mooring at Harty Ferry in the Swale. My son and I once launched an inflatable to go to the boat from the mainland side, went about 20 yards and freaked out. Just made it back, wind and tide were clearly going to send us way east of the mooring. So we dragged the boat along the shore, westwards and judged our moment jumped in and rode the weather using oars the just to steer. I knew that if we missed the boat we’d end up on Sheppey.
Foolish But we made it.
the dinghy ride is a Pain and a problem

 

[StUrrock]

Just an update. Now moored near the Deer Park Nav Buoy, just under half a mile from the RHYC slipway.
In calm conditions, in a Aqua Marine u type 2.5 with our trusty 3.3 2 stroke mariner even with 2 old blokes was ok.
Lauching from the end of the slipway at low tide was a muddy affair, but landed on the marina pontoons on the way back. Much more civilised

​

 

[Daydream believer]

you can leave it on the mooring while going for a day sail or tow it back to the club to store if you're headed off for a cruise.

How do you get back to the boat if you are going to take the dinghy to the club when you leave for a cruise & then collect it when you return at midnight?

 

[johnalison]

How do you get back to the boat if you are going to take the dinghy to the club when you leave for a cruise & then collect it when you return at midnight?

You tow the dinghy behind your cruiser, tie to the hammerhead or somewhere handy, and take the dinghy ashore. The leave for your cruise.

 

[PeterWright]

You tow the dinghy behind your cruiser, tie to the hammerhead or somewhere handy, and take the dinghy ashore. The leave for your cruise.

Thanks, Johnalison that was precisely the way I intended it.

Peter.