A Simple Delivery Cruise Honest, piece of cake, just get Gwylan - our 33′ Westerly Seahawk from Portishead to the Netherlands. 10 days, in my sleep, round the end and up the channel, out of Dover and on the Continent before you can say ′knife′ Well maybe there is a touch more to it. We have to be out of Portishead by the end of March when the mooring runs out. And I have a 3 line whip from ′her indoors′ to be home for Good Friday! 06:00 Thursday 29th March So, back to my bit of Madeira. Cobble together are crew of the reprehensible, naïve and criminally insane and we are set. Technical reasons mean we do not leave until the dawn tide on Thursday 29th. Engine sounds a bit rough in the lock, but we persevere and we all feel a bit rough at 07:30. Then a brief examination shows no flow in the ′tell tale′ and worse still no water exiting via the exhaust - brief panic. Call the marina and have some problems making radio contact, but we negotiate a return into the lock and have a look at the problem. Having exhausted everything else we come to the obvious conclusion that it must be the impeller. And of course it was! Replace it, start up everything fine, no obvious damage and we are set for the off. Again problems raising the marina to get a lock out, but assume it is because we are very low in the lock. Leave Portishead 1,5 hours later than planned, but by now after the latest weather forecast which is not encouraging. The motley crew place all their trust in the captain and we decide to go for Lundy, on the way to Lands End or failing Lundy we will go into Ilfracombe. The wind moves steadily to the North, not good for Lundy or Ilfracombe. The radio continues to be a bit ′off′ This is a recently installed Icom M505 with command mike. Eventually via radio check with the ever charming people at Swansea Coastguard establish that we can transmit, but not receive. Since the radio was supplied via Marine Scene in Cardiff and that is on the way we arrange to go to Cardiff and get a replacement. Of course they do not have one in stock, but the nice people at Icom sort out to courier one down to be there tomorrow. 13:00 12 miles - sneak into Cardiff at the very bottom of the tide, the echo sounder chickens out but we persevere and get in. Doss around in Cardiff, the marina is very nice and run by those wonderful Crest Marinas, but it is not in the most exciting part of town. 14:00 Friday 30th Lunch time and the replacement radio arrives and inside 10 minutes is installed and working perfectly. We are off within the next 15 minutes. Problem is where to go. We have a crew member to deposit somewhere on Saturday so he can get home. There is no chance of us getting to Falmouth in time. The weather is not favourable and it would mean going around Lands End in the dark. Resourceful as ever and recognising the wind is firmly out of the North and makes the planned passage a non starter we decide to head for Milford Haven. Bang on through the night, have some good sailing and arrive at the mouth of the Haven before the bottom of the tide. We now face the massive outflow from the Haven combined with the Wind from the North. We are stuffed, we tack back and forth making no progress. The engine makes it a little easier, but we still make no appreciable progress. Saturday 31st - at sea Eventually the tide turns and we are allowed to sneak slowly into the Haven. Plan a] was to go and find the pontoon [is it out yet?] or anchor in Dale. But the crew cannot get to the station from there. So, plan b] head into Milford and drop him off there. Ah! But the tide is too low now and we have missed the last lock in and will have to wait until 18:00 14:00 111 miles. Not being short of plans we go to c] sail up to Neyland and get in there, drop John and await the tide to leave for Lands End, or Lundy, or St Ives, or Newquay. The north wind persuaded us to leave *** and the ′doom Bar′ out of the equation altogether. So, we are planned out right now and have an overload of alternatives. But there is always a catastrophe out there looking for a place to happen. Ours strikes now with the meanest blow and that sense of timing reserved for marine catastrophes. Surrounded by the makings of an overdue meal, the tin opener falls apart. All efforts to revive it or jury rig it fail and we are almost reduced to hack sawing the cans open. Then the weather forecast gets worse and not at all suitable for the experience and ability of the remaining crew. So, we decide to stay Saturday night at Neyland - I knew I should have brought a book! Sunday 1st Still no material change, according to the Met Office and any other site we can consult on the matter. Even the traditionally reliable AccuWeather threatens gloom and imminent doom to anyone approaching Lands End in the next 24 hours. Sunday is a beautiful day and in the sheltered surroundings of Milford Haven and especially Neyland Marina we could be forgiven for thinking we have ′wussed out′. We go for a walk, to Milford Haven, via the perfidious coast path and after adding to our supplies at Lidl we eventually get a replacement tin opener from Tesco. Hopefully it will outperform it′s ASDA predecessor. All this and real time product testing reports too! A taxi back to the marina seemed to be in order. 07:30 Monday 2nd Off again on our way. The plan is to get round Lands End early on Tuesday and then bang on to Falmouth, top up with diesel and get on our way. The targeted arrival time is looking increasingly unlikely. A long rolling very broad reach with not much wind leaves everyone a little queasy and not convinced that they do not really have much of the will to live. But we make good progress and get around Lands End with the rosy glow of dawn touching up the headland. We bash around Lands End in what we decide was the front edge of a gale that we were later warned about. It is quite lively and Gwylan compensates for our lack of bad weather experience and brings us through it. There is no obvious sign of improvement and we decide to cut our losses and head for Newlyn. 08:30 Tuesday 3rd 147 miles Into Newlyn, with the intention of seeing where the gale goes and when we can leave. We do not number or letter plans any more. It seems too restricting to the amazing creativity that is unleashed on occasions like this. Contact the Harbour Office on our fantastic ICom M505 - make a note of this, and in that special way they have there, we are recommended to look for a space and make ourselves at home. We do just that. Have some breakfast and decide to take on the joys of the town. Pass by the Harbour Office where we are relieved of £18,00 for the chance to spend 12 hours at the pontoon. We also have to pay £0,5 each for an alleged′ power shower′ We got water with more force and probably warmer as we were buffeted around Lands End. For me Newlyn has lost its charm and will not feature on any plans in the near future. 00:30 Wednesday 4th Out of Newlyn and off to Salcombe, or maybe further a field. 20:00 90 miles An uneventful passage and we arrive to take the tide over the bar and pick up a mooring. Quick supper and into bed - we have another early start 07:00 Thursday 5th Clearly arriving in the Netherlands on Friday requires properties better associated with the Tardis rather than the gentle performance of the Westerly Seahawk. But we plan to persevere and do our best to be there as soon as possible. Out of Salcombe with Brighton in our sights - well the easy access and the diesel are the real attractions. Diesel is becoming an issue as we are motoring more in order to make better time and buy some domestic harmony. We are sailing, with a little help from the Volvo and start to make really good time. This is a real novelty and spirits rise as we imagine an early breakfast in Brighton. As ever events work against us and we languish at the whim of the tide, off St. Catherine′s Head for what seems like a small ice age. Early Friday morning my mobile goes and its Rhys our eldest son announcing that he and Susana are making their way to Brighton to meet us. This is a small surprise, but we are a flexible team and can cope with the unexpected. Immediately issue instructions for them to shop for lunch stuff and meet us on the visitors pontoon 14:00 Friday 6th 170 miles Arrive in Brighton, fuel up amongst the rich and famous in their plastic palaces. This is to sailing what Sodom was to self control and good taste. But we pay £6,50, remember Newlyn, and get 3 superb showers too! Eat your heart out Newlyn!! Eat, shower, refresh ourselves, buy the chart that I have realised is missing from the set. Have a bit of a doze and realise that Rhys & Susana intend to sail with us to Dover. Life is never boring when they are around. 19:00 we sail away from the bright lights and worldly offerings of Brighton on our monastic route of penance to Dover. Altogether un eventful night except I discover that my 2 additional crew have not grasped their watch keeping responsibilities in the programme. Well, Susana was probably genuinely cold, but Rhys found it a bit difficult to stand his watch - we will be stricter next time! 07:00 Saturday 7th 65 miles Cleared to enter the Western Entrance of Dover and motor up to the Visitors pontoon below the Marina Office in beautiful sun. Allowed to stay, at no cost - gets better. Rhys atones somewhat by producing endless bacon sandwiches and we may get around to forgiving them. All the full time crew want to do is sleep - and we do this with an almost touching degree of commitment. The weather is fine, the forecast is good and we have set a departure time of 11:00 11:00 Cleared to leave by the Western Entrance for the bit of the journey I fear most. The Channel Crossing, we′ve read the pilots, the articles in all the magazines and think we are ready. Big sunny day and off we go, heading East with the tide in the right place and new batteries in the GPS. At the appropriate point we turn onto 90° to cross the main channel. It′s like playing chicken on the M25! Me, I′m used to the Bristol Channel, look out for the dredger, keep out of the way of the car boat and that′s it. Oh there is the 5 knot tide, but that′s always there. But not here, there are legions of boats all hell bent on running us down or at least frightening us. Anyway, we make it across without incident and nobody radioed us or hailed us, so we must have not done too badly. We may feature in a training video for our clear and unequivocal changes of course at times, but there was no doubt. So, we′re in French waters and making our way up the Channel. Past Nieuwpoort, Oostende, Blankenberge, Zeebrugge and into the Westerschelte. This is where things got interesting and all that training looking at lights and working out what it is and which way it is going goes out of the window. There are hundreds of them and it′s like Space Invaders they keep coming at you, from in front and behind. But you have only got one life and they all want to take it from you. We turn into the Westerschelte and move out of the channel as things loom out of the darkness at about 20 knots and illuminate us with their flood lights. Dawn arrives and we′ve made it to Breskens, on the South bank of the Schelte opposite Vlissingen. The home straight, we [I] decide to take the most southerly route inside some sandbanks and less likely to be frequented by these leviathans that had terrorised us earlier. But, as we are threading our way into the channel another phenomenon strikes. We have all the classic conditions for a morning mist. And we get one, in minutes we are unable to see anything. I say it′s my navigation skills but luck might have a lot to do with it. But we find the first in a series of port hand buoys - unfortunately it′s the last for a while too. We realise how bad things are when we hear the mournful hoot from the Breskens lighthouse. Suddenly the radio is alive with boats and Vlissingen Centrale and messages back and forth. We nudge something solid, like the bottom, back off and I decide it is prudent to get out of the channel and anchor. Well we have to assume that we are out of the channel for us to have had a close encounter and drop the anchor. Everything stops, there is complete silence except for the sea birds who sound to be awfully near and we suspect on a rapidly growing mud bank - about the size of Wales it seems in the gloom. A solitary seal looks at us as if we have arrived from Mars, nods his head and shrugs before swimming off for more interesting company. We radio Vlissingen Centrale and tell them where we are anchored and they assure us that this is fine and we are not a risk or in danger. Meanwhile the inshore rescue boats are busy on the other side of the river with any number of incidents. The sun is up and warming the air and the mist is moving, but not clearing. The tide in the channel is falling, hasty calculations suggest that we will not dry but could well touch. Decide on the assurance of Vlissingen Centrale that there unlikely to be any large vessels in this channel and with a deck watch armed with the fog horn we set to getting breakfast. Towards the end of breakfast the fog clears abruptly and the water seems to rise and Gwylan wants to be off. Everything, including the land is much nearer than we could have imagined. We weigh anchor, motor slowly back into the now clearly visible channel - about 10 m to starboard. We pause to wonder at just how near the beach we were and rejoin the main channel. 11:00 117 miles we motor in to Terneuzen and take up our new berth at B2. After 10 days, over 700 miles and some fun and a lot of experience what have we learned; Fog is frightening plans are for changing, all the stuff you learn on RYA Courses comes in useful sometime so its best to pay attention. Weather forecast tend to tell you what you want to hear. It gets awful cold at sea at night in April. Newlyn is grossly overpriced Leek & potato cuppa soup are fantastic! Comment on this article Tell us your story