Winter Outlook

I’m never sure if November is late autumn or early winter, one thing is for sure the season of long nights and cold days is upon us.

Gazing out of the office window, I realised that the trees had shed most of their leaves, to reveal the view down the valley, which has been obscured since the spring. As if on queue, the black horse, who lives in a neighbouring field, walked into view contentedly grazing.

Later a large dog fox walked, confidently and unhurriedly past in full view. I realised that it won’t be long before we see the deer darting out nervously from the woods, or coming into the garden to feed on the last of our acorns, as this one did last summer.

Erica has just ordered up extra bird food, so the garden is busy, the normal tits and finches have been joined but a couple of woodpeckers, a nuthatch and of course the squirrels.

We don't often get snow, being too far south and too near the sea, last winter however it snowed and settled, if only for a little while. Here's one of the local squirrels kindly clearing snow off the bird table!!

This seasonal visitor was a regular, we haven't seen him for a while, so we think he must have died, but he used to come every morning when we called his name "Fat Robin".

There’s a lot to be said for winter.

Local Boat in France

Well OK, actually she’s Plymouth registered, but since she’s a Warsash One Design I consider that local enough.

I’ve always thought of the Fred Parker - Warsash One Design as a Folk boat with a counter stern, which might make me slightly unpopular with the class owners.

Ondine had just arrived in Marseillan, John, her owner had sailed her down the Atlantic coast of France, from his home port in Plymouth, and then from Bordeaux made a transit of the famous Canal de Midi which exits into the Etang de Thau just to the west of Sete.

These 28 foot craft are undeniably tough, Sherman Wright sailed a heavily modified one, Andromeda in the 1996 Single Handed Trans-Atlantic Race (STAR) and again as an unofficial entry in 2000. Another WOD Vacuum with Junk rig, was prepared for the 2006 Jester Challenge but pulled out before the start.

Currently Ondine is laid up in the little local marina for the winter, while John gets her ready for some cruising around the Mediterranean in the spring.

Amble up the Hamble

I joined the HBBR - UK Home Built Boat Rally on Saturday for their "Amble up the Hamble". Setting off from Swanwick Hard, we rowed upriver past the moored yachts which characterise the lower Hamble.

Well most of us rowed, but it was good to have a support boat standing by. I was really taken with this Selway Fisher design "Penny" - I'm thinking she would make a really nice yacht tender.

And one of us had wind assistance

What contrast between the lower and upper Hamble, the upper Hamble features wooded shores which come right down to the water's edge. Here the fleet is making our way up to the Horse and Jockey pub, we were a bit early on the tide, so in the narrow confines of the last stretch we carried the flood, rowing seldom and grounding often.

Arriving well before high water, made getting ashore a sometimes tricky and sometimes muddy experience. Having gone to all that trouble, the pub was closed!

Undaunted by the pub with no beer, we rowed up the alternative creek which took us to Botley where the well stocked Co-op provided sandwiches and refreshments.

Rocket Ship!!

I spotted this rocket-ship while walking through the marina back in the summer. Essentially it’s a 35 foot very high performance, trailer day-sailor. Produced by CPY in New Zealand it’s constructed in high tech composite.

There are some really nice features, it has a retractable bulb keel, which lifts vertically much like a Laser SB3 making it a relatively easy boat to trail. The rudder is an especially neat solution, to make the balanced spade rudder removable, the entire rudder assembly fits into a well, set through the hull.

With a beam of 7’3”on a 35’ LoA, and an all up displacement of 2.4 tons, the boat is a flyer.

Moxie

It was one of those days, we were just having a cup of coffee down by the port, enjoying the sunshine. You look over and you see an interesting looking boat at the quay.

It's a slow day, so when you eventually finish your coffee, you might as well walk over to have a closer look.

These big trimarans were popular with the offshore racers in the 1970's and 80's, and that curved bridge deck looks very familiar.

The name on the stern is unmistakable, but is this really the same boat?

Moxie was and is a Dick Newark designed trimaran, which skippered by Phil Weld, won the OSTAR - single handed trans Atlantic race in 1980.

Dick has been designing fast sailing craft for more than a few years and is famous for saying "People sail for fun and no one has yet convinced me that it's more fun to go slow than it is to go fast".

To prove the point there's a great clip on Dick's web page showing Moxie doing 16 knots. There's also a great section with someone sitting on the steering quadrant (pic above) while she scoots along under self steering - fun but not reccomended!!

Currently she's based in the delightful port of Meze in the Languedoc region of France and operates as a charter boat.

Wet and Windy

The weather fax for Sunday was grim, it was clearly a day for staying at home in front of the fire.

The Solent was predicted to take the worst of the southerly winds as they lashed the coast. We opened the curtains to see rain streaming down the windows and the garden full of leaves and branches, blown down overnight.

Checking on line, down at the western end of the Solent they were seeing average wind speeds of 40 to 45 knots with gusts as high as 55 knots, this was a serious blow.

And of course our curiosity got the better of us, so it was on with coats and waterproofs. Waves were coming over the breakwater and flooding the road, over at Hill Head. Further east, the local authorities had actually closed the road down in Stokes Bay, not that a few traffic cones were going to stop anyone!

And of course there were a few mad windsurfers out!

More Jolie Brise

Ed Hughes A Silhouette Called Misty kindly sent me a couple more pictures of Jolie Brise under sail.