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.
Muckle Flugga
Earlier this morning the wind dropped to around 6 knots and progress since has been painfully slow. We hoisted the spinnaker but, with a sloppy sea, it was almost impossible to set dead downwind and we had to keep reaching up, so, in the end, we dropped it in favour of a boomed out yankee, which allowed us to point directly at our waypoint and gave a slightly better VMG. Fortunately the tide was with us around the headland. Just about the only lucky break we've had so far. We're now beam reaching slowly down the east coat of The Shetlands. Lerwick is about 45 miles distant, so, unless the wind pipes up, we'll be arriving early tomorrow morning. Can almost smell the beer.
Had a Baby Wipe bath earlier. I was beginning to stink. Mackerel line out. Fingers crossed for a fish supper.
