And then there was Covid 19

With the UK government ordering every one to stay at home we have decided not to get Robinetta out of the water this spring tide. Why not? Because there is no way to know when she would be ready to go back in. Hopefully it will "all be over by Easter", but realistically it might be a lot longer than that before we can get the work done. The last thing I want is for her to be on the hard and drying out, with no way to put her back in, so for now she is staying in the mud....

Unluckiest Boat in the Saltings

Went to Robinetta today, hoping she would be coming out. Paul did manage to get the boat that came out yesterday and was blocking the slipway out of the way. Unfortunately in the process he discovered a couple of problems with his tractor and trailer that need major welding. This will happen tomorrow, but by the time the essential repairs are done the springs tides will be over.

It will be nearly a fortnight before he can try again.

The only good thing is that there are no other boats left to come out, so Robinetta has priority, but who knows what the weather will be doing then? The way things have been going there will be another gale!

Delays and more delays....

The winter is always a quiet time for us, but we generally have a maintenance schedule and post regularly.  This year is is the exception.

We decided we wanted Robinetta out of the water as soon as possible in October so we could get the rudder pintles sorted out, a new rudder built, and some caulking done. Here we are, middle of January, and she is still sitting on her mud berth. There are reasons for this, but it is still frustrating!

1) As we discovered over the summer Robinetta can only get out of this berth for at most six days a fortnight. Most of the time the yard only works for 4 of those days since they are closed on Sunday and Monday.

2) With no way of steering the work boat is needed along side to move her, so the tide needs to be really high for the channel to be wide enough. Down to 6 days in the month...
3) Tollesbury is so tidal that the yard is lucky to get 3 boats out on a tide. Our first scheduled haul out was in December (other people booked first).

4) The weather. High winds on the available haul out days in December meant is would be unsafe to move. Date changed to January.

5) Strong winds again, plus the yard manager is sick. Looks like the earliest we can hope for is first spring tides in February....

We don't know how long it will take to make the new rudder, and Paul Drake who will be making it can not give a cost estimate either until he has a good look at it (and the pintles it will hang on). Our sailing season might start late.

Rudder woes

When Alison visited on Monday she saw the rudder broken. We went today to fit a new float switch and bring the gaff home to make a new one for next year and took some pictures.

The rudder has completely sheared. It was last rebuilt shortly after we bought the boat. Everson's at Woodbridge build a new head-stock onto the existing rudder and it looks like the break is roughly at the join.

We believe the original rudder was damaged in a fire at Beaumaris during the Second World War. By 1946 it looked like this, and the shape is roughly the same as the drawings in the 1937 Yachting Monthly:

We don't know when the current rudder was fitted, but as it is GRP over a scrap wood core we think it must date to the 1960s. It is a very different shape but it worked really well.

So we now need to decide whether to go for another repair, a replacement more in keeping with the original, or something different.

Stuck on the berth

I went to Tollesbury on Wednesday to put things aboard Robinetta ready for the weekend. I had been told that the owner of her current berth was coming back soon, so I also needed to check out the new berths available. In the end I moved her round to a new berth that would be hers in the long run, with the only question being would we be able to get out at neaps?

This morning, at 6am we unfortunately discovered the answer to be no.With high pressure, and only 4.1m forecast for the tide we were stuck on the berth. We tried to move Robinetta for about half an hour around high water, and we could not get away, although we did carve ourselves a bit of a channel by aggressive use of the engine....

When I looked at this berth on Wednesday the bottom was completely smooth, but Robinetta has already carved herself a hole, with mud piled up in a cushion around her, and we could not push ourselves out of it.

Back to Tollesbury

After looking at the tides we decided to leave Burnham around 8 am to head home. Many of the OGA boats had further to go, being based up the Wallet, so set off much earlier, and some based in the Blackwater decided to take the Raysand channel rather than the Spitway, so were leaving later.

The wind direction looked good for sailing once we were in the Blackwater, so we decided to make for the Spitway. I thought we would be motoring down the Crouch and had planned my timings accordingly, but Julian has the sails up and the engine off while we were still in the middle of the Burnham moorings! We did manage to sail for a couple of hours, while the tide was with us, but by the time we reached the Outer Crouch buoy (no2) at 09:50 the tide was against us and with the light winds were were hardly making anything as we tacked.

Motor sailing brought us within a cable of the Swin Spitway buoy by noon, and I began to cut across the sands on the Buxey side, watching the depth gauge carefully. We never had less than 3m beneath us and on this heading we could reach, so I soon turned the engine off.

We had a gorgeous sail across the Spitway and into the Blackwater, only dropping the main sail once we were at the entrance to Woodrolfe Creek. Even then we did not turn the engine on, but headed up Woodrolfe on the tide, using the staysail to give us steerage way. We wanted fuel (the first of the year) and sailed all the way into the marina. Once there we did need the engine for maneuvering!

Having been away for over 3 weeks we were very pleasantly surprised to only need 15.3 litres to refill the tanks. This shows the difference between local cruising without an agenda and an occasional race, and cruising with a purpose as we had been doing for the previous 5 years.

By 15:05 we were back on our berth in the Saltings, after a lovely holiday.

Racing cancelled

After spending Friday ashore, visiting Battlesbridge by train from North Fambridge, today was supposed to be the Crouch Race. It has previously been held in May, but last year the weather was so bad that no one turned up to race. This year there were plenty of boats ready to race, but no wind for them to race with.

Titch and Snoopy

After postponing the start for two hours in the hope that some wind would come up the decision was reluctantly made to cancel, and have a parade of boats down to Burnham where there were moorings booked instead. We were supposed to leave together at noon, but this did not really happen and the boats straggled down stream, with some trying to sail.

Julian "dressed" Robinetta on the way downstream to try and make a bit more of an event of it, and we left the flags up as we caught the launch over to the Royal Burnham YC for the final event of the Summer Cruise, the prize giving dinner.

We did not win anything (we did not expect to), but we had had a really lovely week sailing with like minded people and beautiful boats. The East Coast OGA Summer cruise remains a great week of sailing and socialising.