We had originally planned to go on Thursday, but near gales were forecast, so we deferred until Friday. Andrew and Michele took Toucando round to Hamble Point on Thursday evening to get a head start for the trip over the Solent. When Friday came it was quite breezy. We came out of the Hamble River to see thousands of boats taking part in Cowes Week racing. We crossed the water on a broad reach taking advantage of a gap between two separate races. We crossed the finishing line at 1200: shame we weren't in a race. We then wove our way (somewhat anxiously) through hundreds of small sailing boats whizzing about in the Medina River entrance. We got in without incident. We made our way to Sealift and moored up on the waiting pontoon.
Sealift is a platform which can be sunk to the river bed, and then brought up to enable work to be done on the hull. It uses submarine type technology with four large tanks which can be filled with water to sink, or air to rise. We manouevred Toucando into position and then slowly we were lifted out. Once fully out of the water the three Sealift staff got to work with jet washes. Toucando's hull was covered with black slime, weed and various crustacea. Andrew went to a nearby chandlery to get some anodes (sacrificial metal blocks to prevent corrosion of more important things). It took the best part of two hours for the job to be completed, but Toucando looked a lot better for it. When it was all finished the platform was lowered and we motored off. We then had a bit of excitment, almost going agound in the very busy river as boats came back from their races. Andrew exchanged a wave with Sir Robin Knox-Johnston (the first person to sail all the way round the world, non-stop, single handed... back in the '60s) who was driving a rib with a large party of young children aboard. I am sure he was impressed with Toucando. We returned to the Sealift waiting pontoon to have lunch before heading back to Southampton in the afternoon/early evening.
Waiting for the Sealift to be lowered before we could go in
Andrew on the deck as Toucando is slowly lifted out of the water
Getting started with the jet wash
The propeller before...
... and after
A nice clean hull!
On Saturday Toucando was joined by Ben, Daryl and Nik (former colleagues of Andrew) for a daysail. We decided to go to Beaulieu. As we left the mooring we followed Tom and Ros Cunliffe out of the Itchen on their new boat, a 23 year old American cutter, which had just arrived from Florida on the back of a ship. They were going on their shakedown trip to make sujre everything worked.
Tom Cunliffe and family taking out their newly acquired American cutter (left)
We got our sails up and had a nice easy sail down Southampton Water. When we got out to the Solent proper the wind picked up and we tacked down to the Baulieu River entrance. We motored up the river where we were greeted by Lord Montague's henchmen (aka the Beaulieu River Harbourmaster)... they didn't have a pontoon for us to moor on, but suggested we moor on a buoy. To our great delight they didn't ask for any money. Phew! We had lunch there before returning.
Buckler's Hard on the Beaulieu River
Nik, Ben and Darryl contemplating lunch
By this stage it was pretty windy, so we put a couple of reefs in the main and we had a fairly fast sail back, returning to our mooring just before sunset. We then enjoyed cups of tea (sic.) sitting on the cockpit, watching the life of the river, human and animal.
Toucando seemed to have benefitted from the wash. She sailed beautifully, and the engine was perfect. Thanks to Michele for her help over the whole three days, and Ben, Daryl and Nik for the Beaulieu trip.
Ben and Nik flaking the sail
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