Have you been out today?

[Dennis]

I have finally managed to get on the water sailing this spring(?).
The weather has been grim (but I suspect you knew that), however, last Sunday (8th April) the forecast proved correct. It was dry, intermittently sunny and a steady gentle F1 westerly.

Full sail plan all-day, Full mainsail, staysail and yankee. 15 Nm covered at an average of 3.0 Kts and a max. of 5.1 Kts. Towed my tender all day as well.

Most enjoyable, it is good to be back on the water.

Here is the evidence:

IMG_1957.jpg

Photo courtesy of Adrian Langford.

[Andy Yates]

Nice one Dennis,

We are usually on the water by the first week in April but the weather has indeed been grim and with "Our Audrey" needing some TLC it will be the end of the month until we are afloat. I'm currently varnishing the mast and a new gaff spare I've had made. The mast is just a rub down and 2 coats but the gaff is 7 and counting ! I will stop at 10 !
I've still got to re-fix the rubbing strake I took of because of a leak and sort out the "fixed" woodwork. Fingers crossed for some decent weather.

Happy sailing

Andy

[erbster]

Good to hear you've got afloat, Dennis.
Although I've done all my varnishing, several of the winter repairs didn't get done, so I suspect Aurora will first hit the water this season on the Clyde

[Dennis]

Hello Charles

It is good to be on the water, although I am currently unable to sail as I am in my caravan in Scotland. However, I do hope to get a couple more outings before I haul her out for her Scottish outing.

[Greybeard]

I finally got the Whammel (still un-named and I know it's not a CC19 ) up to Kielder last week. Thursday was a belter of a sailing day though started off as a flat calm. About 9.30 the wind started to pick up and gave us some very pleasant sailing and a relaxing picnic moored up in warm sunshine. It eventually got to around a F5 by mid afternoon and the old barge managed to show 6.5 knts on the GPS even with a reef in. Needless to say, the summer lasted just the one day, as is the norm at Kielder, and Friday began both cold and very grey. Good job it was time to leave for home.
Thanks to Adrian Langford for the picture under sail.

Steve

[Chris Wicks]

Steve, As our volunteer CC19A treasurer thank you for continuing to support us. Your Whammel looks great and we really enjoy ours. We last launched on 27th December for a day sail, but Kaliope CC19 67 will be launched for the summer on Monday!

[Greybeard]

Thanks, Chris. Its something Im happy to continue with unless anyone else wants to pick up the abacus

Steve

[Dennis]

No problems gentlemen, look at the heading at the top of this page.

Maybe we should start a Whammel section.

[Malcolm Sadler]

May I put in a plug for the Norfolk Broads?

I was recommended to launch at Martham which gives acces to Hickling Broad and Horsey Mere without bridges, and the area as very quiet due to Potter Heigham ‘s (in)famous bridge deterring many of the hire boats.

I took a mooring at Martham Boats (bank side) for 3 weeks which covered both the recent heatwaves (back today). Mid April provided some strong winds which required a reef or two for single handed sailing which is not ideal in the Broads Rivers as reed banks mean you need high sail profile when you are not in the open waters.

The indigenous Broads boats are very lovely and carry an enormous sail area on very high masts (nearly all gaffed). The excellent local sailors go under sail alone up tiny rivers. What skill!

This last four days Rondo was not reefed of course and when there was some breeze the Cape Cutter’s high peak gaff worked well. Not as fast as the sleek shallow hulls of the white boats, but very creditable. I made a point of sailing, in the best order I could muster, with yankee and staysail pulling well, past the club houses of both main clubs (on Wroxham Broad and Barton Broad), just to show that a sea going boat can also be at home in the Broads!

So many people commented favourably on the Cape Cutter - I was very proud of Rondo.

Incidentally, I heard of a Cape Cutter based on the Broads - was it sail no 29? - and apparently the owner is not a member of the Association. Hearsay was that he joined some years ago and found it a bit moribund. Does anyone know him? We should reach out and perhaps tempt him to organise a Rally on the Broads in a future year?

But Rally or no, I recommend the Broads (out of high season) as a good combination of challenging sailing, superb bird life, and some fine East Anglian ales!

All the best

Malcolm

[bellalistair]

Definitely another positive for the Norfolk Broads

We've now been for a week in two years and ranged widely,

North Broads we launched at Wayford Bridge
South Broads at Giffin Marina.

Unless launching as Malcolm did if in the north it is well worth dropping the mast to head through Potter Heigham for the peace and quiet!

Free moorings (no facilities) are plentiful, many nights we had the location to ourselves by picking the more remote spots. The only place we really had difficulty was approaching Wroxham where we ended up dropping the mast to go through the bridge where space was plentiful. This is all avoiding school hols of course! We were first week of July both trips.

A steady breeze makes for good sailing even tacking the rivers, light airs make for ghosting along creeping up on unsuspecting wildlife, we hardly used our engine at all. Minimal tidal flows in the north, more attention needed in the south. Watching the hire boats matching your tacking coming towards you is always fun, a quick hail when near enough and almost all do as they are told!

I have thought about the Broads as a rally location after our visits but lack of reliable group moorings and imagining what a hire boat would do when faced with a fleet coming towards them mean I'm not sure it is practical unfortunately.