The importance of local knowledge

Not really a log, but Robinetta related.

We were in the West Country last weekend. The trigger for this was Robinetta's launch on the Monday. This meant we needed to take the halyards down.

I wanted to explore the possible harbours from Bristol to the Scillies by land. We've done that a little before and it really helps.

Of course coming in to a port for the first time by sea is very special too.

So we came up with a plan to stay near Bristol Friday night, in Padstow Saturday night and then in Bristol again Sunday night so Alison could help with the launch. I had to fly on business Monday so I bought a train ticket from Bristol to Gatwick.

We planned to spend Saturday and Sunday exploring harbours.

Then the 'Beast from the East' and 'Storm Emma' made their presence felt. Those reading from a place distant in time or space from the UK in March 2018 will need a little explanation. The 'Beast' was a persistent east wind that brought blizzard conditions to many parts of the British Isles. Emma came up from the Azores and put further energy into the system.

The weather warnings for the south west got up to a Met Office Red Alert which means danger to life and we would have thought twice about going in a Yellow.

I looked at the web cams on the M4 late Thursday night and early Friday morning and it all looked passable. There were no real problems reported on the M25 either. So we decided to go at least as far as Bristol.

It was fine. Every stage looked just as it had on the cameras.

We set the car radio to pick up BBC local radio traffic reports. We could hear really bad things going on on in Wiltshire and adjoining parts of Somerset, and in south Devon but where we wanted to go we heard nothing.

So we headed on west to Burnham-on-Sea where we had a hotel room booked. They rang to say they couldn't feed us dinner but that otherwise it was fine.

On Saturday morning we had another look at the weather and decided it was safe to try for Watchet. It was also fine, until we got to the marina where we got stuck, but the locals got us out again. It is a really friendly place.

We hadn't heard anything on the radio about Porlock but the road towards it was closed so we did a big detour to Bideford and then up to Appledore and then another big detour around the roadworks on the A39 between there and Bude.

Not having heard a reason not to we snuck down to Boscastle before heading in to Padstow. Now we did hear traffic reports about Lynmouth and the terrible problems they were having there. We were glad our Porlock detour had also bypassed Lynmouth.

So we got to see four harbours on the Saturday and learned things about each one that one would not get from the pilot book or their website.

We struck really lucky in Padstow and got to the harbour at high water which meant the harbour master was on duty. So we had a great chat to him and got instructions for coming in, recent news about the state of the Doom Bar and a proper understanding that we will be able to leave Robinetta there in May.

On Sunday we went to Port Isaac and Bude and Ilfracombe. We met some sailors in Bude who gave us heaps of local knowledge about Bude itself and other places. They confirmed that the only really safe place to be if the weather gets up and you are out is Lundy Island.

This little car trip felt very much like a sea voyage. We had to plan and re-plan every step of the way and react to changing weather conditions. We had to make sure that we never went past a point of no-return without knowing what the conditions would be like. We got to places when the official advice was to stay home.

We've seen boats coming in to harbour because they'd heard a gale warning. We've passed them on our way out because we'd looked at the weather in detail and knew the bad stuff was further south.

The devil is in the detail. But so are the calm seas and fair winds. Local knowledge, whether from personal observation, local radio, seasoned sailors or harbour masters is absolutely vital and making good use of it is the key to going places and arriving safely.

Or we could just stay at home. I don't think Robinetta would appreciate that.