As you can see the passenger trip boats that normally ply around the bay are still not working - the Welsh lockdown rules being way tighter than the English, Norn Iron and Scottish ones. Out in the bay, we were treated to two lockfulls of boats coming inbound with two of the bridges lifted:
Heading out was much more civilised, one other little motorboat joined us. The trip is a simple enough one, taking just over 13 hours:
staying well offshore as we approach Milford to avoid some shallow areas that get bumpy and confused in the tides. The start of the run was fine, wind and waves on the nose as usual for a westbound Bristol Channel trip. Very few commercial ships about, all pretty quiet. It was an overnight job so the FLIR got some good use again and we had fun watching dolpins jumping and playing in our bow wave on the screen. Like an old black and white TV willife film really. We missed Mr Attenborough's commentary though.
Later on, as we cleared the shelter of the English coast and the wind swung around to the SE and freshened it got bumpier with the residual swell coming from the west and the wind induced waves from the SE on top of them. It was messy and for a while the stabiliers were very busy, going from full deflection one way to the same in the opposite direction. That is VERY rare. The mix of pitching in the oncoming swell and the waves on the stern quarter made an "interesting" ride during the last leg to Milford Haven entrance. The crew did not find it that interesting, trying to sleep in the saloon with lots of noises coming from the cupbards as things moved around.
As planned, we arrived just off Milford at daybreak and headed to the anchorage off Dale. It was busy and there was no space to tuck in behind the land to get shelter from the SE'ly wind and the waves it was creating. We anchored futher out but as the boat is pretty heavy, the motion was not at all unplesant. Breakfast and a sleep were in order
The original plan was to anchor up until around midnight then head off to Whitehaven where they would lift us out for the well overdue underwater maintenance fun. We checked the forecast to see that it had worsened, looked at the confused seas outside the harbour (visible from the anchorage) and thought better of it. The next weather window would be three days away and spending them anchored off Dale where it would only get bumpier was not ideal so we called the nice folks at Neyland. The lady who answered asked for the boat details, heard the name and said "that is my favourite boat". We must visit here too often - anyway, they found us the last big enough slot!
Near high water we retrieved the anchor and took a lot of kelp and mud and stones with us. This is on arrival in Neyland after pulling off the weed and letting most of the mud fall off on the journey there:
We were spotted upon arrival and two of the dockmasters came to help with the lines - nice of them. Then one confessed that they saw us and came to help because he wanted another look at the boat. We seem to be becoming slightly infamous here. Later on, after washing the salt off (there was lots of it) and whilst topping up the water tank, a bertholder came to enquire about using the hose and said "trust me to decide to top up my tank when the biggest boat in the marina is doing the same". We start to feel large and important here. That will all change when we get to bigger harbours.....
Just to close the loop on the recent Furuno updates - the new version of the software on the equipment worked perfectly. Maybe saying that is brave but so far so good. For anyone contemplating an upgrade to v7.1 - on their TZT2 system this information might be useful. For non boating / non Furuno equipment owning people, sorry to have wasted your time. Nothing else on the maintenance front to report.
No comments:
Post a Comment
Thanks for your ideas / cheek / corrections / whatever! They should hit the blog shortly after the system checks them to make sure they will not put us or you in jail.....