It was all looking so good – we just got onto the platform at Waterloo on time to catch the 1705 to Southampton Airport Parkway and on to Universals where we had a table booked for dinner at Riverside Social at 1945. We put our bags in the rack and sat down, just in time for the guard to announce that a person had just been hit by a train near Vauxhall and the power was off all lines out of Waterloo to allow the emergency services access. Someone else and their family was clearly having a much worse Friday evening, but it left us replanning.
We decided to head back to the flat and drive to the yard and then we could relocate the car to Birdham on Saturday. We were even only 20 minutes late for dinner. Saturday saw us take the morning tide round to Royal Clarence in Portsmouth harbour, where we get a free berth as it is the sister marina of Birdham. Once Trouper was tied up we took an taxi back to Universals to collect the car.
From there we headed to Gosport and Waitrose to provision for the trip to France we had planned. Unfortunately as we left the car park I realised that we had a flat front nearside tyre. I used the BMW supplied temporary repair kit to get the car drivable, dropped Kathryn at the boat, and headed to Birdham to leave the car, and where Graham was going to pick me up and take me back to Gosport. The reason for the trip was to deliver Graham and his partner, and a load of stuff, to Cherbourg to join her eldest son’s new boat on its delivery to Valetta via Lisbon.
Saturday evening saw us have dinner in the Marina with another friend who lives on the Hamble and we left for Cherbourg early on Sunday morning. It was a motor to start with and then the wind built with the second half of the trip hard on the wind with 20kts over the deck, and a reef in the main and a few rolls tucked away on the genoa. We got in early evening to be met on the pontoon by the delivery crew and proud new boat owner. We went for an excellent dinner in the yacht club on top of the marina office. I’d never been before as it always looked closed from the outside. The furniture was a bit dilapidated with torn covers on chairs, but the food was excellent and there was a super hot charcoal grill that delivered me some fantastic lamb cutlets.
The new boat was in Cherbourg for a 1000nm service by the Nautor Swan Global Service team from Hamble, who’d been working on Trouper the week before. A couple of minor problems had been found during the delivery from Finland, and the rig was due a check. They were due on Tuesday.
Monday saw fair weather, although Kathryn who’d just finished a course of antibiotics for a chest infection was really quite unwell and stayed in bed all day. The rest of us took the new boat, a Swan 51, out for a couple of hours for a quick sail. It’s a beast – and effortlessly quick, but huge.
Tuesday saw the weather turn with drizzle and over 20kts of breeze. By the time I was heading out for Croissants at half past eight the Swan team were already most of the way through the rig check with one of the team up the rig. Later in the day they were also able to fix the nagging electronics issue that had put the bow and stern thruster out of action – much to the relief of the delivery skipper. I was really impressed by him – he runs a sailing school in Montenegro, and does a few new boat deliveries every year. He and I had a bit of a laugh on Monday when we met heading for the same rope in anticipation of the same possible problem (that never came). He was saying that he wants to come back to the Channel area to cruise as it is unfamiliar ground for him but looks really interesting and demanding. He said, much to my entertainment, that you can have too much sailing in hot weather with no tide. He’s got my details and I’ll be happy to offer him what advice I can if he does come back.
The Swan guys also had a look at our dyneema backstay as it seemed to have stretched a bit – it’s due to to be replaced with new rod once we’re back in the UK, but in the meantime we do need to get back home! They checked the splices, which seem secure and I then wound the bottle screw so that we could get some tension as we’d hit the limit of the backstay hydraulic ram’s range.
On Wednesday and Thursday we were very definitely weathered in – although the local sailing school was still taking out fleets of 10 year olds in Oppies. The harbour steadily filled with broken boats: a Class 40 race took a bit of a pounding from the weather. We took it easy, did some boat chores, a Carrefour run, and I reworked this Website. Pâtisserie might have been consumed.
One of the boat chores was making up new leather covers for the lifeline bottle-screws where they join the pulpit at the bows. These protect the headsails from being damaged by the sharp edges. I cut two but only stitched one in place before the rain returned – the other is next weekend’s job.
Friday saw a weather window for both crews. The new Swan left at about 0200 French time for Roscoff, going north of Alderney and tacking back just off the Casquettes TSS. They got into Roscoff at about 1800, having motor sailed. We left at 1000 French time and made Chichester at about 2000 UK time after an uneventful passage also motor sailed, in an about 12-16kts of SWly. It wasn’t quite enough breeze to keep up a decent passage speed under sail… If we had the top down furling asymmetric that’s on my wish list it would be a different story. We steered 020 from the Cherbourg breakwater until past Bembridge, when I thought we were a bit too far to the East for the west going tide to sweep us home.
By 2030 we were on the Itchenor walk ashore pontoon, and could see the wall of cloud as the next weather system rolled in. Saturday saw us go for a short walk along the harbour path before being discouraged by the rain and returning to our books, and this website. It was properly windy. We saw over 40kts in the gusts and the Nab reported over 50kts. We elected to stay where we were given the weather, as trying to get Trouper into Birdham’s lock, which is a bit of a squeeze at the best of times, seemed like an unnecessary risk with huge gusts beam on – especially once the lovely Sara, the duty lock keeper, had offered to come in early for us on Sunday. She very kindly came in at 0530 so we could lock in an hour after HW. There wasn’t a lot of water under us, and I felt vindicated in my rule of thumb of not trying to get in after HW+1, but we were secure on our berth by 0550 and back to bed for 90 minutes.