The Big Move - part 1

We decided last year that a change of scene would be a good plan. Shotley is a great base, but expensive and we tend to repeat ourselves a lot on day sails. Also, the Old Gaffers have lots of events in the Stour and the Orwell and we miss out on the passages to them. We'd also like to venture across and up the Thames, so a more westerly base seemed to have a lot going for it. We'd looked around and decided on West Mersea. It's nearer home than Shotley but takes about the same amount of time as the roads are not so good.

So the plan was hatched to move on Easter Monday after the OGA Easter Rally at Shotley. By Good Friday it was clear that the weather window was on Sunday and the Saturday weather made us want to stay at home so we went up for the meal on Saturday afternoon.

Our new mooring is quite a way from the jetty at West Mersea so we have invested in an outboard motor. A hard dinghy is under construction but more on that another time. We spent Saturday afternoon at Shotley working out how to fit it to our unusual flubber and running it in.

It we had a fine dinner and a nice chat and a good send off from the local Shotley gaffers and not too bad a night on the boat - just a little chilly.

The forecast was holding for Sunday, WNW 3-5 most of the day. Good for a reach down past Clacton.

The plan for the day was for me to take the boat to West Mersea while Alison took the car. I had our younger son Alex with me as crew and Alison would fetch our other son Ben and his fiancé so we could all have afternoon tea at West Mersea.

We had worked out the tides and low water was 09:30 at Harwich so we planned to lock out around 8 to catch the ebb out to Pye End and then pick up the flood all the way to West Mersea.

Less predictable was the wind.