The last few days have been a little of a rollercoaster.

On the positive side, the weather this weekend was spectacular: sunny 60 degree days that felt a lot like a nice June weekend in Maine. I take back everything I said about British weather... for now. Just like the US, the UK had a 3 day weekend, except they call it a "bank holiday" rather than Memorial Day. The English were out in force shaking off the cold weather/covid doldrums, and it was quite a scene around town: families with little kids wandering down the cobblestone streets, kayakers and paddle boarders cruising by on the river, chains of little sailboats with 8-10 year olds getting towed out to their races, and a constant parade of sail and power boats heading out into the deeper water of the Solent. Lots of dogs too: on sailboats, on paddleboards, around town, even sitting on the benches next to their owners at the pubs. Quite a few Springer Spaniels, but none with cropped tails... I wonder if that is a US thing?

Out in the Solent itself, the breeze was a perfect 10-20 knots, and we got in some wonderful sailing. We caught the tide right (hey we're learning!) and tacked east past the Napoleonic era forts, past Portsmouth, almost out to the eastern edge of the Isle of Wight. Then a wonderful run back to Southampton as the tidal current diminished. There were so many sail and motor boats out there that you really had to pay attention, and trying to figure out which boat was the "give way" vs "stand on" vessel added to the fun. There must have been hundreds of other boats out there enjoying the glorious weather.

Coming back into our slip we had the first big mishap of our trip. The tidal current in the river is strong, and it was flooding (coming up the river) as we came down the channel and into the marina. In addition, the wind picked up and was blowing in the same direction. We turned to go down the row of docks to get to our slip, with the wind and tide both pushing us to one side of the channel... no problem, we can compensate for that by steering to the upwind side of the channel. But when we went to make the right hand turn into our slip, the boat was moving at the same speed and direction as the tide, and so we lost the ability to steer. With no steerage the boat was at the mercy of the wind, and we went crashing broadside into two piling and were pinned there by wind and current. It was quite scary, with the tide/wind combo pushing our 28,000 lb boat against the rusty barnacle encrusted piling, and threatening to push us into other boats. We were finally able to get out by using the bow thruster to get the bow off the front piling and then gunning the engine to execute a turn to retreat back down the channel, but the damage was already done. We found a pontoon that was in an easier location, docked the boat, and took a break to let the adrenaline wear off.

When we calmed down, we radioed the marina manager, who gave us a new more manageable location (when our sense of humor returned, we called it the "time out" dock). We got the boat in, tied up and inspected the hull. For the most part the damage seems cosmetic and not even particularly noticeable, but there is one crack that will most likely need some work. We got the names of fiberglass repair folks, and will call them up on Tuesday.

That whole event shook our confidence, and we were feeling pretty blue afterwards. Our spirits picked up after talking to one of the owners at our new dock, who described similar docking travails that he and others had had over the years. He said that under similar conditions he often chooses simply to dock somewhere else and wait for more opportune conditions to enter his own slip, advice which we will definitely take to heart. On the positive side of the ledger, no one was hurt, the damage to the boat is fixable, and we learned yet another lesson. Monday (today) morning we were still a little shaken, but got up early and practiced docking when the tide and wind were low and the boat traffic was light. We will get this.