Sailing Days

The RYA have been trying to encourage people to get into sailing and a number of local clubs have held open days and try a boat/get afloat sessions.

There's pretty much something for everyone, Fever's and Opi's for the kids.

And a whole mixed bag of boats whether you like racing or just pottering about.

Boats seen at Emsworth SC and Emsworth Slipper SC, Chichester harbour is a great place to sail.

Solent Way

Running along the western Solent between Lymington and Keyhaven

Interesting variation

Apologies for the poor photo but the boat was jammed in and difficult to get a picture.

Flush decked, around 21/22 feet, quite a wide hull form reminded me of an E Boat but as can be seen not a chine hull.

The unusual rig has twin unstayed aluminium masts, some google research revealed a Poacher cat ketch trailer sailer, but very little detail.

Sailboatdata shows the Poacher boat built by Parker Dawson in the US, but the drawing shows a raised section of the cabin rather than the flush deck. I'm wondering if it's the same boat, perhaps a few were imported or maybe UK builder produced a few?

That's what I call a fender

Seriously, I guess it's around 6 feet long, that's 2 meters in metric money.

Compared to the two normal sized pick up buoys it should make coming alongside a bit easier.

Above gives a better indication of scale.

Morning Vicar

I don't know why but this always makes me smile.

Boat is a Cornish Shrimper

Hamble River SC sailing camp pirate treasure hunt

A fantastic weekend camp included a pirate treasure hunt, with the gang of happy treasure hunters wading and riding through the winding upper reaches to Botley where a hoard of treasure included custard creams, iced biscuits and soft drinks courtesy of the priate queens, AKA Rachel and crew.

Checkout the video as the bunch of fearless pirates have a lot of fun on the homeward leg.

Setting out from Fairthorne Manor the going was quite easy.

Later with steep and deep mud on both sides as the river winds its way to Botley, a lot of the pirates thought it was easier to ride. You might think that the motley crew slept well after all the day's exertions but marshmallow toasting around the fire went on well into the night.

Who needs wind

Late afternoon high water, hardly a breath of wind and 25 excited kids. No problem, get them all afloat, chasing around and having fun.

They might not have learned much about short tacking and hiking, but they sure had a good time.

Motocomfort

I spotted this motorcycle outside a cafe on an island on the Loire in France, presumably either doing duty as some kind of object of interest or awaiting restoration, not sure about the bucket though.

Motoconfort and Motobecane manufactured motorbikes, bicycles and small vehicles in France, including the Mobylett moped, a very old one of which I owned when I was sixteen. The company declared bankruptcy in 1981.

No idea what model or date this one is from, I'm guessing it's one of the 125 cc or 175cc models from the 60's or 70's, very French in design. Sadly the cafe was closed so there wasn't the opportunity to find out more.

The Horse & Jockey

The Hamble River SC sailing camp began with a trip through the unexplored, upper reaches of the river to the legendary Horse & Jockey pub. Accessible only to those brave enough to ride the highest tide, past treacherous mud banks all the while keeping a keen eye out for basking crocodiles and the Hamble giant squid.

In the event, and after several groundings on the way up, the tide wasn't quite as high anticipated, but that may have been due to impatience on part of the boat driver to get to the pub early.

Between a few members of the party in dry suits giving piggy backs and the rest taking off shoes and socks, everyone was quickly and safely ashore and heading to the pub for food.

Within 10 minutes of our arrival the boats could float right up to the jetty.

Mud glorious mud

For some reason I've never got around to visiting Hayling Yacht marina on the east side of Hayling island, until recently when we dropped by to see a yacht which was for sale.

It must be a home from home for visiting east coast sailors, and needless to say the yacht we looked at was lifting keel, but as the saying goes it didn't  really"float our boat".

Hayling Island Elite

Hayling Island SC have been growing their fleet of RS Elite keelboats, the 24 foot keel boat designed to meet the requirements of the club by Phil Morrison.

There were about half a dozen at the nearby Sparkes marina when we visited recently.

The Solent has a long tradition of keelboats, XoDs, Victory, Sunbeam, Swallow, Dragon and Daring to name but a few. The older wooden boats while delightful and rewarding, undoubtedly demand commitment to keep and maintain, so it's not surprising perhaps to see a keel boat with modern design and materials becoming so popular.