Kipper Sailing
| Vessel Name: | Kipper of London |
18 November 2010
White Boats
Sailing schools are commercial enterprises and margins are extremely tight, so they typically buy training boats that provide sufficient accommodation for the maximum of 5 students and one instructor at the lowest possible price. These are usually European (as opposed to British) built and on large production [...]
18 November 2010
Jet Skis
I positively hate jet skis, the people who use them and everything to do with them. As far as I'm concerned they're ridden by men with small willies and without the balls to ride a motorbike. And I mean MEN. When did you ever hear of a woman stupid enough to buy a jet ski? Am I being unfair. No. Do I have an issue with other powered recreational vessels (motor-yachts, ribs, ski boats)? No. The problem with jet-skis is that the idiots who ride them will ride round and round and round what, should have been, a quiet anchorage. This is akin to somebody riding a noisy motorbike round and round a park where everybody else is trying to enjoy a quiet, whatever you do in a park (I wouldn't know). If I could legally buy a bazooka, I'd buy one and blast all the jet skiers to kingdom come.
18 November 2010
Big Boats , Small Boats
Once upon a time, maybe 25+ years ago, a typical first boat was a Mirror Dinghy, then a Wayfarer, then a small Westerly, then a Contessa 32, then a 40 footer. All this over a lifetime of sailing. Experience was gained slowly. Nowadays too many people go out and buy (yes you've guessed it) a shiny new [...]
18 July 2010 | Lymington
Back to Work
Back to the day (and sometimes night) job after the (excitement) of the 2-handed RB&I race. And guess what? I'm enjoying myself more working than I was, supposedly, taking some R&R. It's one Hell of a lot more varied and stimulating.
06 July 2010 | On our way bsck to Lymington
Final thoughts on the race
Now it's all over, I've had time to reflect on the experience and to report on what worked and what didn't.
Slow progress, toys out of the pram, microwaves and DOLPHINS
. At one stage the best COG we could make was 070. We're now back on starboard tack makng 290 COG, which gives us a miserable VMG to our next waypoint, which is 97 miles due North off Mullet.
If we believe the latest forecast, the wind will back Southerly 4-5 in the next 12 hours ;-) and then veer Westerly 5-7 later, which should speed things up considerably.
We've got around 300 miles to go, so if (big if) the wind does what's forecast we should be in to Barra sometime on Monday.
It's often the case that the 2nd night at sea is the hardest. This was certainly true last night. Whereas during the first night you're well rested and can due virtually without sleep, by the time the second night comes along you're knackered and not yet into a proper, watch-keeping sleep pattern. We both struggled to stay awake and it's been bloomin cold too. I'm wearing my full Musto 3-layer system (aka as my “fluffy bunny suit”) and was still only just warm enough .It's mid Summer for God's sake!
During a tack in the small hours we got the yankee sheet trapped under the jockey pole. Then, when we tried to tack back to clear it, the other sheet snagged. We furled the yankee, freed the trapped sheet and untangled the snagged sheet. Then lost the tail of the other one
then unfurled the yankee, tacked and got a riding turn on the winch. We're running out of toys.
The microwave has been a real boon. Proper cooking wasn't really feasible in quite rough conditions last night, but a bag of Uncle Ben's instant, microwave rice, topped off with a can of sardines in chilli oil, made a tasty meal. It's also great for instant porridge.
Now the best bit. We enjoyed the company of a beautiful pod of around 8 dolphins for almost and hour this morning. I would have tried to take photos but I could tear my eyes off them log enough to go and get my camera and, anyway, I know form past experience that they're almost impossible to photograph.
