Wednesday 11 April 2012

Easter Cruise 2012

I had spent a couple of weeks on pre-season maintenance, including supervising a few engineering jobs, so Toucando would be ready for her Easter cruise - the first of 2012.  I was joined by Peter and Stewart on Thursday evening.  Our first task was to take Toucando over to Shamrock Quay so she could fill her water tank and enjoy a night plugged into the mains.  The crew checked out The Waterfront, while I prepared dinner.

In the morning we made ready to go.  Getting off the berth avoiding the enormous Sunseeker moored behind us was not easy - the tide flows at right angles to the pontoons, but we managed eventually and made another short hop to the fuel barge where we took on 100 litres of diesel, before heading under the Itchen Bridge and out into Southampton Water.  Peter and Stewart raised the main... encountering a few snags and tangles (we got a lot better at it over the course of the weekend), and we motor sailed towards the Solent.  The forecast was for moderate northerly winds, which would have been ideal for a trip west, but the wind was very light and of indeterminate direction.  Our initial thoughts of heading for Poole had to be abandonned, and we settled for Yarmouth instead.  We got some sailing in which was good before motoring in and berthing on the new pontoon by the lifeboat.

We went and had a beer in the Royal Solent (ginger beer in my case), which is part way through a major refurbishment.  Dick and Pat Dawson showed us the work in progress.  We moved on to the Bugle before returning to Toucando for a Pirata Carbonara.

Saturday seemed like a good day to head to Poole, which is what we did.  Crossing the bay was easy, but we really had to fight the tide in the harbour entrance. Poole Quay Marina told us they were full (there's a wretched Sunseeker taking up the space for abour four sailing boats).  Fortunately there was space on the quay itself, which gave us the opportunity to use the fender board which has only had one other use over the past year.  It was towards low tide, and we had to climb up a horrible ladder to do the mooring.  As time went by and the tide rose we had a convenient step ashore from deck to quay.  Three other boats moored alongside us, and negotiated out departure time the following morning.  I did a little revictualling.  There was a rabbit in charge at Tesco... ok, a person dressed as a rabbit.  She tried to sell me some carrots, which I thought was quite amusing.  We had a (ginger) beer in the Jolly Sailor with some pub grub.


Toucando on Poole Town Quay

On Sunday we headed east, towards Cowes.  There was not a lot of wind to begin with, but once we were inside the Solent we did a training run, gybing our way to our destination.  By the time we took down the main off Gurnard there was a Force 5 blowing.  We went to Cowes Yacht Haven and found a suitable mooring before going ashore and enjoying some (ginger) beer and more pub grub at The Union Inn.  We helped the people at the next table in the quiz... well, we think we helped them we didn't stay for the answers.

Monday the wind had blown up.  A gale was threatened.  We reefed Toucando and set off.  It was blowing Force 7, gusting 8.  We headed north across the Solent and up into Southampton Water. We motored.  Those boats sailing were all well reefed: one was even using its bright orange storm jib and trisail.  In less than two and a half hours Toucando was back on her mooring.

It would have been good to have had a little more wind earlier in the weekend and a little less at the end, but nevertheless was had a good trip to four ports.  Toucando has emerged from her winter somnolence and is looking forward to more sailing.  She may be a little disappointed over the next month, as my priority will be to complete four assignments for my course but by the end of may we should have a pretty busy schedule.  Thanks to Peter and Stewart for crewing this weekend and getting to understand the running rigging of a gaff rigged cutter.