Noisy night in Wareham

Friday 19th July

More fantastic sunshine had me grasping for a days holiday on Friday.  It's great to be able to get out on a week day, especially before the summer holidays start in earnest.   I didn't have much of a plan, however, I had said to Jewels that I'd go to either Wareham or Poole yacht haven for the night if she wanted to come along for the evening.

After my success with the fishing rod last week, I thought it would be fun to head out of the harbour and try and catch some mackerel again.   No such luck this time, I meandered around for a while trawling for the little blighters but they were too cunning for me.   Resigned to the inevitable fact that I'd be having Tesco's sandwiches instead of fresh Mackerel I scooted over to Studland and dropped the hook.

  Now I know Studland has a naturist area so I aimed for a part of the beach with lots of people on it... Assuming there'd be more clothed people than naked... Wrong! After spending five minutes in my own world making sure the anchor had set and generally tidying up it dawned on me that there was rather too much wrinkly skin on display.  Tough, I wasn't moving until I'd had a cuppa and a sandwich.
Around 2pm I lifted the anchor and tacked my way back to the end of the training wall. Once around the marker I was on a run back to the harbour entrance with a handful of other boats.

A shipmate senior heading out of the harbour

With it being a weekday there were a few proper working vessels out and about.  The harbour entrance was being dredged and the Parenco ferry, Parenco run the Witch Farm Oil field now, was shifting trucks around.  Most other boats were smaller sailing yachts.. looks like the posh stuff comes out at the weekend :)

Dredging the harbour entrance

Parenco Ferry

  I took the straight route between Brownsea and Furzy Islands then followed the stakes up towards the Wareham Channel.  This was feel good sailing.  I was going with the wind and tide, on a rising tide, it felt great.
I arrived at Wareham Quay at about 5.30pm and rafted up along side Bob and Sally in a Shetland 570.   They turned out to be good company.  Jewels came down about an hour later and after having a drink or two we walked into town for a nice bit of nosh at the Red Lion on North Street.  Good food at the right price in nice surroundings, that's all I every ask for :)

Back at the quay and things were livening up.  Kids were jumping off the bridge into the river, the pubs were getting busier and the ferry had arrived with a load of brash women on board,.. time for a walk along the river.

Escaping the rabble

It doesn't take long to get away from the noise and regardless the ferry man had announced that he'd be leaving at 9.15pm so I knew we didn't have long to wait.

An  old friend

I spotted Lady of Ower, a Fantasie 19, moored on a trot close to the Quay, I'm guessing shes been sold now as she was at North Haven.  I know her previous owner had bought a Falmouth Gypsy. Glad to see she still being cared for.

Tranquil away from the Quay

Back at the Quay and Jewels headed off home, I haven't managed to persuade her stay onboard yet.. probably best as this night was going to be noisy all night.

There was a band playing covers in the Quay, they were pretty good and managed to avoid some of the Top Gear sound track old faves. Bob and Sally had some friends over and were having a full on 1980's disco... Gary Newman, Joy Division, OMD... they kept coming.  After all the music had stopped, the local teenagers were still swimming in the river and shouting at each other until after 3am.  I eventually got to sleep, only to be woken by the guys setting up the market at 6am.  Oh boy, I was a shell.

Saturday 20th July.

I eventually came to terms with the fact that I'd have to get up.after all the necessaries I sat in the morning sun reading a book.  Eventually the kids reappeared and started jumping off the bridge again.. I couldn't cope so packed up and set off.

The wind in the morning was coming from the NE and was a good F4. Unfortunately it was on the nose so I had to motor the first 4 miles to Rockley Park, As the channel widened I was able to unfurl the Genoa and get going.  It was a bit too much  in the gusts for full main but as it was up I continued with a good reef in the Genny.My first stop was at Brownsea. I'd planned to stay here a while but Jewels called and said she could meet me at the yacht haven for lunch.. 

Tudor Rose - Another Hurley 20

Off I set, this time with a reef in the main and a good chunk out of the Genny.  As I passed pottery pier another Hurley 20 'Tudor Rose' was heading in the opposite direction with just the Genny up and towing a tender.  Out of the lee of the Island and the wind picked up.. so much so that it blew my new hat clean off my head... Time for an impromptu MOB drill ( around 9 on the track above).

The casualty retrieved

 Safely recovered , I headed full steam ahead for the marina. The wind was getting quite exhilarating now and I felt like we were flying. I had to drop the sails before entering the marina which was a bit bouncy to say the least.  Within the marina it was instant calm and I found a free pontoon berth.   After finding Jewels we went to pay at the office, we had to move to another berth as the one I was on was taken.  We motored to a hammerhead pontoon as ask before tucking into our lunch.

Walk ashore in Poole - A bit of  luxury

After lunch Jewels headed off while I attempt to catch up on some sleep.  That was not easy and in the end I gave up.  I did make use of the showers while here as the facilities at Wareham extend to a public toilet.

Since repairing the tiller and rudder pintle the tiller alignment had been a little bit off.  Being on a pontoon gave me the opportunity to play with it.  I wanted to take up the slack in the vertical movement so dropped a line over the stern, under the rudder blade and tightened up on the cleats. You should be able to see in the picture below.  This by chance also sorted my second objective. The rope had also pulled the rudder blade into a central position.  Nice and easy, all I had to do was tighten it all up again.

Lifting and centralising the rudder

I could see the burgees on surrounding boat were still flapping furiously so I had some idea that it wouldn't be pleasant in the harbour.  I motored out and considered motoring back to the mooring, that was until I found I couldn't make any headway using the engine.  Everytime I opened the throttle it was like the prop was losing grip in the water.  I raised the main, still with the reef in and unfurled a small amount of genoa.  with all the faffing of getting the sail up I'd drifted onto a bank and the keel swing me round.  I was stuck for a moment but decided to let out the main which powered me off the bank and back into the channel.  Once I'd regained composure I began the long slog back to the mooring.  As you can see by the track, every gain was hard to make.

I was worried about being able to pick up the mooring but as the afternoon went on the wind dropped to a more friendly level and I managed to pick up the mooring first attempt just using the sails.

The tiller had felt easier to use with it now being centralised.  I'd better get someone to have a look at my engine / prop to find out why it's not driving me forward.  Once again another great day or two on the boat.  More experiences and learnings... Tip top :)