Plymouth to southampton: july 2017
Day 1
I travelled down to Plymouth on the Saturday and walked from the station down to Sutton Harbour where the good weather had brought out a lot of tourists. Gipsy Moth IV stood out well from the dozens of other vessels moored there with her distinctive ketch rigging. I was just starting to look at how I gained access to the pontoon when I saw skipper Pete Rollason approaching from the boat with a couple of members of the crew. These turned out to be first mate Paul and my watch colleague Katie. We were later joined by Mike and Camilla who met on the 07/08 Round the World Race.
Gipsy Moth IV is a beautiful boat though much maligned by Sir Francis Chichester, who thought her too big and difficult to sail single handedly. But with a crew of six she was about to give us a most enjoyable voyage safely back to her home in Beaulieu River. Pete took me down to the boat and showed me around. My first impressions were very favourable. Spacious and well fitted out below compared to our Clipper Race boat (or so it seemed at that time!!) and smooth on deck but quite cluttered around the cockpit (as you would expect for a vessel commissioned for a solo round the world voyage). The tiller would be a first for me, and the winches on the mast would present an interesting challenge I felt sure.
Bunk allocated, we then all went up to the restaurants for a drink and brought back a Thai takeaway to the boat for our evening meal.
I travelled down to Plymouth on the Saturday and walked from the station down to Sutton Harbour where the good weather had brought out a lot of tourists. Gipsy Moth IV stood out well from the dozens of other vessels moored there with her distinctive ketch rigging. I was just starting to look at how I gained access to the pontoon when I saw skipper Pete Rollason approaching from the boat with a couple of members of the crew. These turned out to be first mate Paul and my watch colleague Katie. We were later joined by Mike and Camilla who met on the 07/08 Round the World Race.
Gipsy Moth IV is a beautiful boat though much maligned by Sir Francis Chichester, who thought her too big and difficult to sail single handedly. But with a crew of six she was about to give us a most enjoyable voyage safely back to her home in Beaulieu River. Pete took me down to the boat and showed me around. My first impressions were very favourable. Spacious and well fitted out below compared to our Clipper Race boat (or so it seemed at that time!!) and smooth on deck but quite cluttered around the cockpit (as you would expect for a vessel commissioned for a solo round the world voyage). The tiller would be a first for me, and the winches on the mast would present an interesting challenge I felt sure.
Bunk allocated, we then all went up to the restaurants for a drink and brought back a Thai takeaway to the boat for our evening meal.
Day 2
Sutton Harbour has some of the finest facilities I’ve seen at a marina so a good shower and bacon butties set us up nicely for the day. With the running rigging laid out, we slipped lines around 10am and motored toward the lock. With the prop located behind the rudder, she can be a bit difficult to manoeuvre in reverse and has a tendency to drift to port so we had the assistance of the harbour master’s rib to get us there safely. Once through the lock we headed out toward Wembury Point and then east toward Salcombe. We got all four sails hoisted successfully. The Mizzen tends to stay up most of the time for stability and the running back stays are lever operated rather than loaded on a winch. Mike gave us a bit of a laugh raising the staysail. Two or three hard sweats on the halyard and the sail was fully up. Bit different from Clipper but the look of surprise on his face was classic. We barely needed the winch!
The sail throughout the day was tremendous fun. Good sunshine all the way. There were plenty of dark clouds over the coast but we seemed to pass them by quite easily. There was a stiff breeze from the South West which meant we were sailing downwind which created extremely comfortable conditions on deck although there was a tendency for the boat to roll a bit. Once past Salcombe the coastline bears north so our direct line for Portland took us away from land. We soon encountered a pod of Dolphins which gave us good entertainment for an hour or so. Paul (first mate) looked after us well with a constant supply of tea and cake, some lovely rolls for lunch and a nice chilli for the evening meal. It was only then that I retreated downstairs to replace my shorts with my clipper foulies.
That aside it was easy sailing with just the occasional gybe to keep us on our heading. We tended to rotate around the winches on different gybes so we all got a chance to do everything. I did find it amusing centring the mizzen sail in prep for the gybe. The skipper gave me a funny look as I reached for the winch handle - ‘try pulling in by hand’ he suggested and true to his word with the light weight of the sail, I made easy work of it.
Steering perhaps deserves a special mention given this was my first experience of tiller steering. I had read on someone else blog that the steering was quite heavy. It was probably due to much lighter sailing conditions but it responded quite well for us. Everyone had a different technique - sitting one side or the other and using the free hand to steer or straddling the tiller and using a combination of thighs and/or hand to steer. It took a couple of minutes from handover just to get the feel of the drift but soon found a straight line. We never used the automatic steering mechanism that Sir Francis Chichester relied on going round the world but it was still fitted on the stern.
Night Sailing: Heads Down!
This is always the highlight of any trip for me and tonight was no exception despite the deteriorating conditions. The sail plan was pretty much the same although we had to drop the sails a couple of times as the wind picked up. The air and sea temperature was almost identical so with the dew point reached things did start to get a little damp! GMIV is fitted with an efficient paraffin heating system though we didn’t really need it in mid summer. However, the night sail was more like one you would expect in October or November!
We split up into two watches - Mike and Camilla taking the first watch at 9-midnight and then Katie and I taking over with rotation every three hours still 9am. It had been a long day so by 9pm I was ready to drop (I’m such a lightweight these days…). My bunk was the port side seat in the saloon which was so narrow I needed the lee cloth up all the time otherwise as soon as I fell asleep, my left arm dropped and pulled the rest of me onto the floor!! But fully refreshed from a little sleep we arrived on deck at midnight (just approaching Portland Bill) to be greeted by a spectacular clear sky that made it easy to steer when on the tiller or spot shooting stars when not. Paul and Pete rotated at 3 hours as well but 90 minutes different to our watches so we all saw each other through the night. The usual night games guessing star signs, middle names, etc kept us amused and sufficiently awake to carry out our watch duties efficiently. The other game that was shouting ‘heads down’ as a wave rolled over the boat though generally the wave had already hit by the time the cry came!
Sutton Harbour has some of the finest facilities I’ve seen at a marina so a good shower and bacon butties set us up nicely for the day. With the running rigging laid out, we slipped lines around 10am and motored toward the lock. With the prop located behind the rudder, she can be a bit difficult to manoeuvre in reverse and has a tendency to drift to port so we had the assistance of the harbour master’s rib to get us there safely. Once through the lock we headed out toward Wembury Point and then east toward Salcombe. We got all four sails hoisted successfully. The Mizzen tends to stay up most of the time for stability and the running back stays are lever operated rather than loaded on a winch. Mike gave us a bit of a laugh raising the staysail. Two or three hard sweats on the halyard and the sail was fully up. Bit different from Clipper but the look of surprise on his face was classic. We barely needed the winch!
The sail throughout the day was tremendous fun. Good sunshine all the way. There were plenty of dark clouds over the coast but we seemed to pass them by quite easily. There was a stiff breeze from the South West which meant we were sailing downwind which created extremely comfortable conditions on deck although there was a tendency for the boat to roll a bit. Once past Salcombe the coastline bears north so our direct line for Portland took us away from land. We soon encountered a pod of Dolphins which gave us good entertainment for an hour or so. Paul (first mate) looked after us well with a constant supply of tea and cake, some lovely rolls for lunch and a nice chilli for the evening meal. It was only then that I retreated downstairs to replace my shorts with my clipper foulies.
That aside it was easy sailing with just the occasional gybe to keep us on our heading. We tended to rotate around the winches on different gybes so we all got a chance to do everything. I did find it amusing centring the mizzen sail in prep for the gybe. The skipper gave me a funny look as I reached for the winch handle - ‘try pulling in by hand’ he suggested and true to his word with the light weight of the sail, I made easy work of it.
Steering perhaps deserves a special mention given this was my first experience of tiller steering. I had read on someone else blog that the steering was quite heavy. It was probably due to much lighter sailing conditions but it responded quite well for us. Everyone had a different technique - sitting one side or the other and using the free hand to steer or straddling the tiller and using a combination of thighs and/or hand to steer. It took a couple of minutes from handover just to get the feel of the drift but soon found a straight line. We never used the automatic steering mechanism that Sir Francis Chichester relied on going round the world but it was still fitted on the stern.
Night Sailing: Heads Down!
This is always the highlight of any trip for me and tonight was no exception despite the deteriorating conditions. The sail plan was pretty much the same although we had to drop the sails a couple of times as the wind picked up. The air and sea temperature was almost identical so with the dew point reached things did start to get a little damp! GMIV is fitted with an efficient paraffin heating system though we didn’t really need it in mid summer. However, the night sail was more like one you would expect in October or November!
We split up into two watches - Mike and Camilla taking the first watch at 9-midnight and then Katie and I taking over with rotation every three hours still 9am. It had been a long day so by 9pm I was ready to drop (I’m such a lightweight these days…). My bunk was the port side seat in the saloon which was so narrow I needed the lee cloth up all the time otherwise as soon as I fell asleep, my left arm dropped and pulled the rest of me onto the floor!! But fully refreshed from a little sleep we arrived on deck at midnight (just approaching Portland Bill) to be greeted by a spectacular clear sky that made it easy to steer when on the tiller or spot shooting stars when not. Paul and Pete rotated at 3 hours as well but 90 minutes different to our watches so we all saw each other through the night. The usual night games guessing star signs, middle names, etc kept us amused and sufficiently awake to carry out our watch duties efficiently. The other game that was shouting ‘heads down’ as a wave rolled over the boat though generally the wave had already hit by the time the cry came!
Day 3:
By morning we were well past Old Harry Rocks and as I took the helm around 0630, the needles appeared in front of me giving me an easy heading on the tiller. The tide was against us and although we tried to keep sailing, it proved impossible once we turned into the needles channel and found the wind right on the nose. So we dropped the sails and motored into Cowes before mooring right opposite the Red Funnel berth at lunchtime. A good shower and clean up was followed by a bit of a deck snooze before we explored West Cowes. A couple of pubs (including the 60’s bar and we finished at Murrays fish restaurant for a glorious meal (Seared Scallop salad for me) and a nightcap before heading back to the boat.
Day 4:
It was just a short hop across from Cowes to Beaulieu River and the intention was to sail west and then pick up the southwesterlies for a good run back. In the event, winds were so light it was hard to make any headway against the tide and after a few attempts to hold a course, we eventually ran out of time and motored into the estuary. Although only motoring, it was a nice trip up the river. As a local, I know the land either side reasonably well but to see it from a boat you tend to appreciate the beauty that much more. We passed lots of other boats - most of whom knew Katie (who works at the local Harbour) or expressed their pleasure at seeing GMIV out - before arriving and mooring in prime location at the Master Builder. Here, we had one last drink before departing our separate ways. All sailing is good but I have to say this was as enjoyable as other longer voyages I’ve been on and my fellow crew made excellent companions over the four days.
By morning we were well past Old Harry Rocks and as I took the helm around 0630, the needles appeared in front of me giving me an easy heading on the tiller. The tide was against us and although we tried to keep sailing, it proved impossible once we turned into the needles channel and found the wind right on the nose. So we dropped the sails and motored into Cowes before mooring right opposite the Red Funnel berth at lunchtime. A good shower and clean up was followed by a bit of a deck snooze before we explored West Cowes. A couple of pubs (including the 60’s bar and we finished at Murrays fish restaurant for a glorious meal (Seared Scallop salad for me) and a nightcap before heading back to the boat.
Day 4:
It was just a short hop across from Cowes to Beaulieu River and the intention was to sail west and then pick up the southwesterlies for a good run back. In the event, winds were so light it was hard to make any headway against the tide and after a few attempts to hold a course, we eventually ran out of time and motored into the estuary. Although only motoring, it was a nice trip up the river. As a local, I know the land either side reasonably well but to see it from a boat you tend to appreciate the beauty that much more. We passed lots of other boats - most of whom knew Katie (who works at the local Harbour) or expressed their pleasure at seeing GMIV out - before arriving and mooring in prime location at the Master Builder. Here, we had one last drink before departing our separate ways. All sailing is good but I have to say this was as enjoyable as other longer voyages I’ve been on and my fellow crew made excellent companions over the four days.