Briefly in Breskens before Blighty.

August 24th 2016

For those that like the pictures, sorry there aren't any on this page.

We visited Breskens Marina last year and knew it was a good jumping off point to go home. The club house has a good restaurant - it has changed hands since last year but we felt it was still a high standard. We had a good meal as we knew we wouldn't eat much the following day. As is often the case in the Netherlands, the portions are huge, sorry to say neither of us managed to finish our fish.

When doing an overnight sail, we prefer that we have the night bit in the middle of nowhere and reaching the coast line when it is light. We knew that we couldn't do this  on this trip as we needed to hit the tides at certain times.  From Breskens it is a very strong tide and you need it with you rather than going against it, likewise on the other side we wanted the tide with us going South.

We left the Marina at 7.30 am but counted the journey time from 7.45 am, which as when we were in the River and had the sail up. Although the sail was up, as it keeps the boat steady, we knew it would mainly be motor sailing as precious little wind was forecast.

On this voyage I was very bad at filling in the log - I had written all the way points and eta in my notebook and was annotating this. The tide was with us and we were making 6-6 1/2 knots with low revs on the engine. We did try sailing, but lack of wind made it impractical. Once we got out of the Zeenrugge system, we started the watch system. Although I had set a bunk up, neither of us slept. Whilst on one of my watches I went across the shipping lane ( at the required 90 degrees) on the second part of the shipping lane I knew that there was a ship that we were on a potential collision course with so altered our speed accordingly, John shot out of the cabin like a cork out of a bottle when he heard the engine revs change.

Whilst approaching the Gabbard we noticed a ship, which stationary, was bang on the line we wanted to travel, we thought it might we a Trinity House ship laying buoys. So we headed towards it intended to pass behind it. It was called Relume and it hailed us on the radio, apparently they had an underwater craft down and were using explosives and wanted us to keep a few hundred metres clear of them. Of course we obliged!

Approaching the Suffolk shore line we could see there was a storm over land with lots of sheet lightning, lighting up the sky. At this stage the wind, which had been non existent all day suddenly kicked in, to such an extent we had to put a reef in. (Make the sail smaller) Normally we are quite cautious and will put a reef in as soon as we think we might need it. This was a case of put the reef in now - and it wasn't quite as easy at night. We had to keep shining the light on the sail to check it was the shape it should be. As the sails are new they are also a bit stiffer than our previous sails.

As we knew we would, we arrived at West Shipwash when it was dark, this is a route we have done in the daylight and have found it easy to negotiate but learning from last years journey, I had made sure everyway point was in, as they can be hard to pick up in the dark. This was going really well, although you need to concentrate all the time. Just as we arrive at the crossing point at Harwich we had a minor mishap. Although the waypoints were all on the plotter, I was also spotting them and double checking they were the correct ones (they all have their individual series of flashes) which is very important. For non sailors, it is pitch black and you have to head towards a coloured light - either white, red or green - it is vital you get the right light. We had picked up the Pitching Ground Cardinal and this was where we were to cross over the shipping lane to a buoy called Platters. (red buoy) Basically we arrived at Pitching Ground and I thought that a different red buoy was Platters. I questioned John turning the boat which I shouldn't have as he had it on the screen in front of him. Basically I stood up as we turned and the boom moved. Luckily a sixth sense (or John yelling ) kicked in and I put my hand up so my head although getting a glancing blow didn't get the main weight of it. I ended up with a minor cut, seeing stars and bruised fingers.

On the plus side we arrived at Languard point at 02.45 (Dutch time) having travelled 104 miles. I was very pleased with our passage planning as I had us travelling 102 miles and arriving between 02.18 and 04.09 depending on our average speed.

All that remained was to drop the sail and continue up the Orwell - another two hours or so and a lock to negotiate. John did tremendous work bringing us up - the last two hours should have been me steering but I (and John) were both a little shook up by the near miss with the boom.

We were moored up in our own berth and in bed by 5.30 (Dutch time). I had to stay in Dutch time for the entire journey as our passage plan for the tides were all based around this. I am pleased that the tides worked perfectly on the English coast as they brought us down and up the Orwell.

That is the end of this journey - but we will be heading to London in September. More blogs then.