Got away to Brighton on Monday 23rd May after various hiccups for a couple of days. Northerly winds when we set off across Eastbourne Bay to Beachy Head and a lovely calm sea, so we tried out the whisker pole that Eddie made up from an extending handly for garden shears! (See photo) Worked very well, but we couldn’t use it for long as the wind shifted and strengthened as we approached Beachy Head. Then we had Westerly 5 all the way to Brighton! Almost on the nose of course. We stayed on the Visitor’s pontoon but had to be careful as parts dry out, although not really a problem for us having two keels. They advise not to enter 2 hours each side of low tide, which is especially important on Springs. We saw a few people trying to leave earlier only to get stuck about 10 ft away from their pontoon!
Whilst in Brighton we met up with Michael on ‘Limerick’ who was on our pontoon at Sovereign, but has moved to Brighton. He has his beautiful yacht up for sale, but is taking it back to Germany in the Baltic to try and sell it there, as not having much joy here. Then the next day our friends Maurice and Jill turned up on ‘Blue Diamond’ on their way back from the Solent, so we all went out for a meal together with Michael as well on Tuesday evening, and headed home on Wednesday. North Easterly winds coming back so we had an excellent sail to Beachy Head, then the wind dropped and was on the nose, so engine on. Blue Diamond followed on after us. A few problems came to light whilst away so we can fix those before our proper Summer Cruise in June. (Leaky heads (yuk), gas alarm malfunction, leaky compass (which warranted a new one), etc…) Middle of June is our next departure date, hope it warms up!
‘Whiskering’ along on a calm sea with sunshine – perfick!