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.
The 60th Parallel
The vast majority of the British Isles lie between 50 and 60 degrees north. The most The Bishop Rock, at the far southwest extremity of The Scilly Isles is at about latitude 49 degrees 50 minutes north and Muckle Flugga, at the far north of The Shetland Isles is at about 60 degrees and 51 minutes north. Muckle Flugga is therefore, almost exactly, 600 miles north of The Bishop Rock.
To give you some idea how far north that is, Cape Farewell, at the southern end of Greenland is at 59 degrees 36 minutes north. Fortunately for us in Great Britain, The Gulf Stream means that our climate is much more temperate that it would otherwise be. We are, for example, well north of Ottawa, which most people don't realise, is the coldest capital city on Earth (not Moscow). I've been there when it's been minus 40.
Some pessimistic climatologists suggest that it's not inconceivable that, due to global warming, The Gulf Stream could switch off, just like that, leading to a very rapid deterioration of our climate to sub-Arctic conditions. That'd precipitate a multi-trillion devaluation in UK real estate prices, wouldn't it?
This far north, and at mid-summer, it doesn't really get dark. It's still fully light beyond 2300 and fully light by 0400, with just a few hours of twilight in between. Of course it's the exact opposite in mid-winter. Ugh!
Just 22 miles to Muckle Flugga and the, once we've turned the corner, another 60 miles into Lerwick. The wind is forecast to drop though, so we'll probably be in sometime between midnight and 0600.
Taking a look at the GRIB files another 48 hours out we see that the wind is forecast f*cking southerly when we will be leaving Lerwick bound for Lowestoft, nearly 500 miles further on. Yet again the wind gods are being exceptionally cruel to us. The faster boats had strong northerlies.
Looking forward to a few pints in Lerwick though!
