Launch Day

 Today was forecast to be much calmer than Monday when we had first booked our launch, although more wind was due in the evening.

Alison agreed with the yard that we would go in the water at 1 pm.

My Gaelic class finished at 10:30 and we got Worm on the roof of the car and went to the yard. Robinetta was already on the hoist but her cradle was still taking the weight so we couldn't antifoul the patches where the props were holding her. We went on board and rearranged the cover and did engine checks.

We took Worm down and left her on the slip.

The plan had been to put Robinetta onto one of the yard's moorings until ours was serviced but they serviced it this morning so we could go straight there. 

The chap from the yard lifted her on the hoist so Alison could complete the antifouling and then went to launch another boat.

Then it was our turn. Robinetta was moved to the slip and I got on board while Alison went out in Worm. Our friendly yard chap asked if Worm was named because a robin eat a worm. Hardly anyone makes that connection!

It was all going fine until I tried backing out of the hoist. We didn't move. There was no prop wash. 

I went down and looked at the gearbox. The control cable had sheared. At least we knew what the problem was. 

After some discussion, it was decided to launch and put her on the yard pontoon while they looked for a new cable. The chap got on board and manually worked the gears from the cabin. Having a wireless remote for the hoist is super useful!

Getting the cable replaced took hours. The throttle cable is easy. I've done it twice myself, once in Cardiff and once in Brittany. The gear cable is harder to change at both ends and in the most inaccessible place. The engineer was great. 

But it was gone 6 pm before we were on our way. The wind was getting up and the tide had mostly run out but was still ebbing. By the time we got near our buoy, we were being pushed south quite strongly.

Of course the pickup was streaming to the south of the buoy. There was very little room between Carraig an Ròin and the buoy. It got really shallow and I was glad Alison was up at the bow with the boat hook and couldn't see the depth gauge.

We picked it up fine. 

By the time we had the covers on the wind was blowing hard and there were 10-20 cm waves bouncing Worm around as we boarded.

Tying the last corner of the cover on Robinetta from Worm as she bounced around was really challenging.

Getting ashore was fine with wind and tide in our favour but low tide meant a long trip across the mussel bed and beach with Worm. I went up to the house and got the trolley and Eleanor came to help.

Robinetta is now safe on her mooring.

Getting ready to go back in the water

The last three months have been pretty wet in Rosneath, making it a pretty typical west coast of Scotland winter. Julian ordered and fitted two replacement oil pipes, and we mopped out the bilges thoroughly, but that was pretty much all we could do until the weather changed. 

Last week we finally got the dry spell we needed for outside work, and I managed to prepare the underwater areas for antifouling, and give Robinetta a complete coat of Lauderdale Blue paint. I also arranged for an engine service (changing the filters e.t.c.). The engineer said he could do this today, although he had not appeared by 16:00 when the rain started and I put the covers on.

With the engine nominally ready to go I asked for a launch slot. It seems that this early in the season there is no need to worry about being in a queue, and my preferred date of 30th March was immediately agreed. I then went back to Robinetta and anti-fouled her with Alex's help before the rain began.

We should be back in the water in a week, relaunching within the 3 months ashore we paid for. Our mooring has not been serviced yet, but the yard offered us the use of one of their own moorings until they could service ours. Now I need to transfer my attention to getting Worm back into commission. She has spent the winter in the garage, and should be ready once the hull has been primed and anti-fouled.

Time for a new book

The last time I pulled the blog posts together and created a book was for our 2021-2 seasons, about bringing Robinetta round Cape Wrath to her new home in the Firth of Clyde. "Round Cape Wrath" is still available to purchase in paperback or electronic form, like all our books, but I thought it was time  to create a 9th book, about Robinetta's exploits from her Scottish home.

The electronic version of "On the Whale Road" is now available for pre-order for £4.99, with the release date being the end of February. The print version will also be available from Amazon on that date, but rather more expensive at £19.99. Unfortunately the cost of printing continues to increase and as the Robinetta books are print on demand I hold very little stock and price increases are inevitable.

Significant work goes into creating these books, which I hope adds value to the record in this blog. They should also contain no spelling mistakes, far fewer grammatical errors and have a more consistent style. They also contain maps to let you see our routes.

 Please have a look at the books, and if you decide to buy, then please leave a review.