A new tender for my Bella

I picked up a cracking new tender on a trailer for the enormous sum of £30. 
It looks gimpy but is fantastic... Stable to stand up on, motors lovely with my 2hp 2 stroke, rows pretty well and tracks really well. 

While down at the club I took the opportunity to go for a little potter in the Mirror dinghy... Life is good :)   Thanks to Lapwing Paul for the photos. 

Being a spur of the moment thing I only had jeans as sailing attire so getting along side and not capsizing were important considerations. :)

Studland

Sunday turned out to be a cracking day for a sail.  Forecast was F2/3 and it was perfect for taking my sailing averse son out for a day sail... I had to sweeten the deal with a promise of a pub visit :)
Aiming for a lunchtime departure, we wandered down to the club.  After a mercy mission to get a stranded boaters engine running we needed to get ourselves back on track.  Kirk on 'Hannah Snell' was circling us like a hawk, keen to get going.
Away under full rig we tacked out of the harbour, no need for engines today. We had a good sail out past the training wall and tacked our way into the moorings at Studland.  Picking up a Banks Arms buoy, we rafted up;  Kirks Seal 22 rafts up much easier than Paul's Corribee,  I think because we have similar freeboard and the fenders stay in place.
Time to inflated our tenders... Oh boy, I thought my coracle was funny, not a patch on Kirks.   He'd have looked insecure in a paddling pool :)

We spent a pleasant couple of hours at the Banks Arms, Mrs Ciao Bella and a friend dropped by for a drink while out on a walk around the headland.

Having paddled back aboard, the kettle went on as we settled down for a chat.  Only to see Kirks rubber duck drifting away, a bit more exercise for yours truely and it was recovered.

The sail back to Poole was great, tramping along at a good pace.  James took the tiller most of the way back while I trimmed the sails.
We sailed right onto the mooring first time, tidied Ciao Bella and headed home. I think James enjoyed it, what a successful day sail :)

Christchurch cruise

We had a little cruise to Christchurch last weekend.   Christchurch is quite shallow so is restrictive to the fin keelers but for us bilge keelers and lifting keel boats it is an absolute dream of place to visit.
Three boats made the trip, Pete and Cathy on their Shrimper 'Coffee Bean', Kirk on his Seal 22 'Hannah Snell' and John and I on 'Ciao Bella'. We had a civilised start time, leaving the mooring just after lunch.   The forecast was for F2 or F3 Northerly on the way there and very light SW on the return.

Coffee Bean Goose winging towards the bar.

The Northerly turn out to be a southerly which made no odds, once out of the harbour we had a nice easy sail around Hengistbury head and goosewings our way to the bar.  The beach along the East side of Hengistbury head is lined with some lovely beach huts but beware if you are thinking you'd like to buy one... they are chuffing expensive.

Why spend 1/4 million on a shed when you can have a small sail boat instead. 

The run was against us slightly on the way in but not too bad, nothing could prepare me for the attack of the flying crabs being launched by a couple of kids on the sea wall,  strangly funny :).  Although we kept the sails up until well into the river the engine did the work as we avoided various small craft.

Christchurch Sailing club had reserved some spaces on their visitor pontoon for us and we were greeted by the Commodore. The club has a fantastic location with a balcony overlooking the river and great views to the Isle of Wight. We whiled away the afternoon and evening out here until the chill got to us.

Ciao Bella and Hannah Snell with the club house in the background

The welcome at the club was really nice, the members chatted freely and bar and food were good quality and value at £3 for a decent pint of Doom Bar and less than £7 for Fisherman's pie.
The return was necessarily early.  The latest we could leave would be 8am.. Coffee Bean left at 6:30 but Hannah Snell and us made the most of ever second to relax :) To be fair I wasn't feeling tiptop and had picked up some kind of bug which was making me very lethargic... some may connect this with the £3 a pint at the bar but I can guarantee that a hangover wouldn't last five days and I'm still suffering :(

A misty morning start.

We motored back down the river and out through the run before hoisting the sails.  Hannah Snell extended his trip East bound into the Solent and we turn back West for Poole.  The Wind was SW and our first long tack took us at good speed almost due south.  My ailment was taking hold now and I completely handed over control to John while I slept, waking occasionally.  I helped tack back towards Poole then woke sometime later as, due to the lack of wind, it was time to fire up the motor.
I recommend a night in Christchurch, it's a lovely location and you'll be well looked after.

First stretch of the legs for the season.

The bank holiday weekend was the first EDSC cruise of the season.  The plan was to go to Lymington.. the racy type boats would race there and the bimblers would bimble.  Being in the later group I didn't wait for silly things like starting signals,  I knew that I'd have to leave earlier than the others to make the tidal gate at Hurst.

I'll keep out of the way then

I left the mooring about 0920 and made my way to the entrance.  The Condor was just leaving it's berth at Port of Poole and there was other shipping around as well as the usual harbour ferries, chain ferry and bank holiday leisure traffic.. all a bit busy.

Maris Otter pops by for a chat

I motor sailed out of the harbour and heard the foghorn voice of Mike on 'Maris Otter' hailing me.   They were doing a PYRA race to Bembridge. After a quick chat and turning down the offer of a cuppa, we went our seperate ways. 

 The sailing across Bournemouth bay was pretty good.  The winds felt light but I was maintaining 4.5 to 5.8 Knots most of the way... can't complain at that. :)

Racing fleet sliding by Hengisbury head

By 11am the sky was clouding over, plenty of bigger yachts were also starting to overhaul me.  Into Christchurch bay and the wind started to mess around a bit.  Dropping off completely at times and changing direction, I had been expecting northerlies all day. Seems bizarre watching the windex spinning!  The rate of progress really started to drop off.  As I only had a day pass  I decided to cut it short and go to Totland bay on the Isle of Wight.  It has a good pebbly bottom, I know how it feels :O,  which holds the anchor well and a cafe type thing on the beach.

Ciao Bella anchored at Totland

The cafe on the beach didn't really look my thing so I took a walk up to a country pub just outside the village. The High Down had a good selection of real beer and some pretty tasty food, although £14 for bangers and mash and a pint felt a little steep.  While sat inside the rain came poring down... not looking good for the return journey.  It was still drizzling as I walked back to the beach but soon cleared up.  Back onboard, I stowed the inflatable, made a cuppa then set of back to Poole.  With full sail I was only making 3.5 knots into the North Westerly... a few minutes later the wind really picked up.. I heavily reefed the Genoa and hurriedly put a reef in the main. Things were very uncomfortable for a while.. although the speed did pick up :)

Out near the needles the wind just turned off again and went fluky.  I un-reefed every thing, still no movement, so the engine went on.  Five minutes later and there was breeze to push us along at 5 knots again, great, off went the engine.  The engine went on and (mostly) off all the way back. When there was breeze it was great but when it stopped it wasn't gradual, it just stopped! About a mile from the entrance the engine went on again and stayed on as it was getting late and I had to be somewhere. I was back on the mooring around 8:30 so 12 hours give or take from climbing aboard to jumping off again.

The table below is the windspeed & Gusts in knots and the direction at the needles during the day.  As you can see, lots of changes :)

30.04.2016 21:00:00		5		-	NNE
30.04.2016 20:00:00		10		36	NNE
30.04.2016 19:00:00		7		-	ENE
30.04.2016 18:00:00		3		-	WNW
30.04.2016 17:00:00		19		31	N
30.04.2016 16:00:00		3		37	ENE
30.04.2016 15:00:00		12		25	WSW
30.04.2016 14:00:00		10		-	WSW
30.04.2016 13:00:00		8		-	SW
30.04.2016 12:00:00		9		-	NNW
30.04.2016 11:00:00		8		-	NNW
30.04.2016 10:00:00		9		-	N
30.04.2016 09:00:00		11		-	N

Track of the day

GPS gets a reprieve

I plunged into the depths of my Garmin handheld GPS this afternoon.  I have a spare one which I'd goosed the NMEA by wiring it up incorrectly some years ago...Luckily I have an aversion to throwing things out :)  I'd bought a second hand replacement off ebay which has done sterling service for several years.

This year while clearing off the green crud from the earth pin, the pin just fell off.. no worries, I had the spare so I replaced the back with the one off the original.

When I took it out to play yesterday it would fire up but I could not cycle through the screens.  Once stripped down it was obvious what the problem was.  The pcb keypad, the brown bit under the screen, was corroded.  Unfortunately I couldn't swap that out as it is all one pcb and the good keypad was attached to the none working NMEA.   

I gave it a good dose of contact cleaner and wiped off with a glasses cleaning cloth.  Looked a lot better, so I left it to dry thoroughly before reassembling, with all the best bits from each, and putting the batteries back in.  Touch wood it all seems to work ok now.   I will assume that because I've opened it up it will be less water proof than before, so more care required.  These things seem to have got very expensive.

A proper shake down sail

I took Ciao Bella out for a proper trip around the harbour yesterday to sort out all those little bits and pieces which get forgotten over the winter..  The forecast was for dry but cold and getting windy later on.  I wrapped up warm and winged my way to the club.

ELF... my other passion, keeping an eye on the tide.

It was a bracing topless drive down only to find a distinct lack of water in the harbour,   no worries, it gave me time to tip toe out to the tender and tip out all the rain water :)  The little outboard for the tender fired up straight away but started to run a little off key as I approached Ciao Bella.  Maybe it needs a bit more TLC after its dunking.

Looking back at Brownsea castle.

It was great to be back aboard and in control of Ciao Bella.  The wind was so light, we barely moved and eventually had to motor away from the mooring.  Eventually the breeze soon started to fill in and with full main and a slightly reefed genoa we headed of towards the haven.

The Haven with the Isle of Wight on the Horizon.

I could have gone out to Studland but going around the islands makes me work a bit harder.  There will be plenty of time during the season to to get out of the harbour.  Having had a great sail across the harbour entrance the gusts really started to pick up, possibly upto F6, laying Ciao Bella right over at times..  I rolled in a big chunk of genoa and made my way from Bramble bush bay up to Goathorn point.

Peaceful scene at Goathorn point deviously hides the true strength of the wind.

The tide was still coming in so I cut the corner, keeping a careful eye on the depth. It was nice to see it increasing as I approached Furzey island.  The wind, although not as gusty was increasing.  I set about reefing but got caught out by the channel edge, the keels found some soft mud and spun Ciao Bella around.  No drama, I just dropped the sails and waited for the tide to rise enough to float me off.  After about 45mins I realised that 1; I had no teabags and 2; she wasn't going to free herself on her own.  So with 10mins of engine forward and reverse, vectoring it side to side, pushing from the bow with the boat hook, she slowly, slowly released herself from the mud.

Hmm 3.8knots with this rig :)

Hessitant to put the main back up I sailed around green island with just a handkerchief of genoa, even like this we made 3.8 knots.  In the clearer water of Ramshorn lake I pushed her nose into wind to raise the reefed Main again.  The wind was on my tail now and we made 5 to 6 knots back around Brownsea island.  The cloud cover was really coming over now, I took the opportunity to drop the anchor in the lee of Brownsea to tidy up the reefed sail before cracking on back to the mooring.

Looking cloudy over Poole.

Picking up the mooring under sail was a little difficult, partly because I'm ring rusty but mainly because of the strength of the wind. I grabbed it at the third attempt right at the bow, I still had trouble pulling the pick up buoy onto the boat over the bow roller. I thought my shoulder was going to pop out!

A great shake down sail, glad I didn't have a passenger, they'd probably never sail again :)  Next steps... provision the boat with tea, coffee, chocolate, crisps and bisciuts and more importantly, fix my GPS which, although is still sending NMEA data to the VHF and recording the track (above), it's not playing ball when you want to use the buttons.

A quick round up

Not much to report,  I ventured back to Ciao Bella a week last Sunday.  It was a fairly windless day so ideal for sorting out a few jobs.  I wasn't the only one.. Tim and Dave where busy setting up Jelly Bean, Tim's Prelude, after their launch at Salterns.

A proud Dad (sorry 'Skipper') rows home.

First was the wonky mast.. I spent a bit of time tinkering with the standing rigging so that the mast was at least straight with no funny bends one way or the other. The shrouds all feel like they have similar tension, thats good enough for me.   The Sails then went on, I have decided not to run the jib halyard back to the cockpit this year.  With it being roller furling there is no need.  I have coiled the tail and hung it on a mast cleat.  No doubt it'll cause me some grief in the future which I haven't considered :).   Just by way of celebration this beasty gave me a fly past :), not sure what it is but sounded great.

Shivers down your spine.

The breeze picked up in the afternoon so I took her for a little shake down sail around the harbour.  The breeze soon became a wind, probably top end of a F4, which shone the spotlight on two things... first, I hadn't set up the reefing lines and second, the jib sheets where not fastened correctly at the clew, allowing the Genoa to keep slipping away.

A bit more breeze than I expected for the first sail.

I anchored in the lee of Brownsea, had a brew and put these right before heading back to the mooring. There was another quick visit to Ciao Bella midweek to fit some longer and lighter jib sheets.  All seems dry in the bilges and the solar panels are maintaining the battery at 100%.

Ciao Bella happy on her mooring with rigging adjusted and sails and covers on.

My next trip out was less successful, one of the club members had run over his mooring line and got the tender painter and pick up bouy caught on his keels.  I legged it down there and motored out in my wee tender, it was a little lumpy and uncomfortable.  By the time I'd got there the pianter had chaffed through on the keel and allowed the crew to secure the mooring.  I didn't loiter, just turned and headed back to the pier.  While transferring the outboard from tender to pier a wave knocked me of balance and the engine went for a swim!
I didn't look back just secured the tender and took my bad mood to the club house.  Low tide was at 7pm so I went back then and collected it.  It's a tough little engine, a Tohatsu 2hp 2 stroke.  I hung it on the water bin and gave it a swill down with fresh water, took the float chamber off and cleaned that out.  I took the plug out and gave it a good few pulls on the starter...  Plenty of water splurged out.
I was going to ditch the fuel from the tank but it looked to be uncontaminated, I had closed the tap and vent before taking it off the tender.  After liberally spraying everything with WD40 and refitting the plug and float chamber the engine sprung back to life.  It ran a little poor for a few minutes but soon cleared it's throat and was on song.  Catastrophe averted, I shall make sure it has a lanyard fitted from now on.