Rascal's Odyssey: Weymouth here we come. 9th July 2017

An 08.30 set off today so a leisurely start. It looked a lovely day and we were still in shirt sleeves. Three weather forecasts had been consulted and all looked well, we were booked into Weymouth and although we knew we would miss the 1800 hours bridge we would be there in plenty of time for the bridge at 2000 hrs. The last job is to 'oil up' as both of us don't want to get burnt. I also attached my 'gig strings' to my prescription sunglasses, having lost a pair a few years ago I always take care.

After John finished oiling up, he went to put his glasses on but couldn't find them. We hunted high and low but they had disappeared off the chart table. We knew they couldn't be far away as he'd taken them off to put the factor 50 on. As the glasses proved more elusive, we were getting a bit worried as he can't see without them. I did comment that I was pleased it was him rather than me for once. Still we hunted , John could see mine, I though I ought to put them on so they didn't get lost as well. Only to discover I already had John's round my neck! Whoops.

So we finally left the mooring at 08.34 to a glorious Sunday morning. It was nice to just have one rope to put away rather than several ropes and all the fenders. We moved quickly away from Alderney and were on our way.

At first the sky was wonderful and we had superb visibility and very suddenly the sky to the left changed. It was a sky we'd never seen before and it looked like a black wall coming towards us, after a quick discussion we felt it might be fog and discretion being the better part of valour we thought we would turn back to Alderney. This was at 1005 and having covered 7.94 miles.

No sooner had we turned round and we were enveloped in the thickest fog I have ever seen and I mean thick. At times like this you are thankful for the electronic aids. Although I was marking on the chart where we were we actually couldn't see anything. Our nav system left a trail from where we had come and John stuck to that exactly. I was keeping look out but couldn't see a thing. We knew we were nearly back and suddenly John told me we were in the harbour. We had actually got into the harbour but couldn't see it. The fog did lift enough for us to see the mooring buoys and for us to safely moor up. We were back at 11.30, our round trip had taken us just less than three hours.

We decided that a cup of tea and well deserved chill out was deserved. What amazed us was the fog lifted as quickly as it came and the day was once again glorious. By late afternoon we decided we needed to get to shore for a work so the water taxi was called. As we got to the end of the village we could see a train. I then remembered that a small steam train runs to the lighthouse. The train pulls old underground carriages. Sadly when we got there they had finished for the day so we didn't get a train line. But we followed our noses and the road and found the light house. We came back via the coastal path and there were some glorious views. There were also loads and loads of fortifications built by the Germans in the second world war. They are in pretty good nick and we could look round them. The States of Guernsey are sensible, basically they say explore but the risk is yours.

After much studying of the weather we realised a low was now coming in so we would be in Alderney for a few days. We decided we wanted as near perfect as we could get to go back after this mornings experience. We knew it was going to be bad when all the charter fishing boats also stayed in the harbour for a few days. It also meant we would get the dingy out s the water taxi would prove expensive on a daily basis. However the outboard was not happy, we think the fuel had gone off, I didn't know that could happen. This meant unless the choke was out it wasn't running well so John was doing more rowing.

I must say whilst we were in Alderney we had a lovely meal at Cantina 6, which is a rather nice tapas bar. As we like walking we managed to get lots of walks in we planned on one day to walk round the island but the weather forecast was not good. That was rather an understatement as it really rained and was very windy. We bounced around all night on the mooring buoy.

I didn't move while making this video, it's the boat that is moving.

On out last day we did walk all around the Island, 11 1/2 miles but really enjoyable. Again we were struck by the fortifications, the amount of time effort and money spent on the channel islands by the Germans was amazing. Our time in these islands made us both realise what a hard time the people of the Channel Islands had during the war. As did the people bought across as slave labour. Until our visit I didn't realise how many people had been deported to various concentration camps.

At the end of the walk we decided to stop off at Braye Chippie rather than have to cook when we got back.