A boat buddy is a wonderful thing. In some ways.
Well; down the estuary and back. Or upriver and back.
Let's face it, you're a little apprehensive. What you need is a boat buddy. Someone with experience, to keep you out of trouble. Someone with compassion, to forgive or ignore your mistakes. Someone with patience, to overcome your ignorance. Someone with fortitude, to keep you going in the darkness of fear.
The Skipper's friend had recommended his own father as just such a paragon of sailing. The candidate buddy had been to see the yacht, ashore in the yard; her bottom freshly antifouled, her bilges cleaned, one or two seacocks jammed, her engine untried; and had admired her (a wise and politic move from a buddy hoping to sail with a doting new skipper. In this case, the admiration was genuine; this buddy has no concept of dissimulation or ingratiation; friendly social discourse is a stranger to him.).
And so they met, at Burnham Yacht Harbour, on a cloudless day in August, for that first voyage. The buddy accepted the offer of coffee, and the kettle was embarrassingly slow to boil. The yacht was now trim and smart. The monel wire was found, and two shackles were moused. The lines were surreptitiously examined; none was frayed and all were whipped with twine and needle (no American whippings here, and no butane backsplices either!).
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| Contessa 26 |
Coffee over, the engine was started, the lines cast off and the skipper moved her out into the river. The buddy hoisted the mainsail, the skipper unfurled the genoa and the yacht set off upriver on a fine reach on the port tack.
The Contessa 26 is derived from the Folkboat with few changes. She is fine-lined; an excellent compromise between a plank-on-edge and firm bilges. Her keel is long and straight, with the smallest of gaps between her deadwood and a rudder hung on the raked transom. Although mostly fibreglass, she is not a modern caravan-cruiser.
When he took the tiller, the buddy was astonished and delighted. To have said (which he did) that she sailed like a thoroughbred (which she did) was a cliche, but they were the only words to emerge through the pleasure. Upriver, with the flood, the log showed 7 knots (which surely was wrong) and the GPS said 8.5 knots over the ground (which couldn't be denied; satellites don't (often) lie).
The passage plan had suggested a leisurely sail with the flood up to Fambridge; lunch while the tide turned; and then down with the ebb as far as seemed reasonable: perhaps even as far as the Swin Spitway. But with S'Westerly F3, and less than 2 knots of flood, this yacht would easily overcome the tide. Skipper and buddy had decided that they could tolerate one another. So they turned downriver.
The boat buddy was old, and old-fashioned. His pilotage plan had been prepared with rule and pencil on a chart 9 years old. When new, it had served him well in his little Seatrekker on the Crouch. On this voyage it became clear very quickly that the buoyage in the estuary had nothing in common with the old chart. Strangely, it agreed exactly with the Navionics charts on the skipper's iPad.
The buddy adapted immediately (what else could he do?); they took turns navigating with the iPad plotter and helming the yacht. He did say later that had he been alone with an out-of-date pilotage plan he would have turned back; "pilotage on-the-fly is not safe." quoth he.
The afternoon, and a broad reach starboard tack, took them between the Buxey Sand and the Shoal, and then between the Buxey Sand and the Buxey Bank, with its curving line of yellow Specials. And then, under the towering turbines, exactly where it should be, was the Swin Spitway SWM. A bigger yacht, coming from the South under genoa only, showed them the way through the Spitway. At the gybe, the mainsail was handed for the run North; a small Bermudan main is just a nuisance when running downwind.
At the Wallet Spitway discrete dark dots in the distance were identified as the Knoll, the Eagle, the N Eagle, and the Bench Head buoys. The route to the Colne was as clear as an empty motorway.
Under genoa only, the buddy hove to while the skipper set the main again. Although the course lay to the N'N'West the ebb leaving the Crouch and the Blackwater turning N'East toward Clacton meant that the heading would be W'N'West. At about 7 o'clock the little yacht made the Inner Bench Head. With the ebb flowing out of the River Colne, the SSWesterly wind kicked up a chop in the channel, but she still made 3 knots over the ground.
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| Mouths of the Blackwater, Crouch & Colne |
A little after 7.30 in the evening, with the entrance to Brightlingsea in sight, the crew decided that they had exceeded all their hopes and expectations, and could turn back to Burnham with some pride.
With the last half of the ebb, and the SSWesterly wind against the tide, the beat out of the Colne was hard work.
The close reach past the Bench Head, the Eagle and the Knoll was exhilerating.
In the Spitway the daylight began to fade. Shore lights appeared on the Essex coast to the North, and the wind farm began to sparkle with warning and working lights.
At the Swin Spitway they made a decision to sail on to the Whittaker Channel, and then use the young flood to tack Westward. But they were too early. By the time they reached the entrance the night was dark, the buoys were lit and the ebb had not ended. The first quarter of the moon was sinking through scattered cloud into the Western horizon. The freighter which had been loading at Burnham that morning (was that really 12 hours ago?) was making its way down the channel. They saw it first as two white lights and one red, so knew they were safe. As the ship turned to starboard, South of the Contessa, the white lights separated and the red was aft. As she moved past, half a mile to the South, her accommodation and working lights masked her side and stern lights, and she rumbled away to the S'East.
The wind had veered, and the Whittaker Channel became hard work, tacking from one side to the other. The light in the echo sounder had failed, and it became clear that the Foulness Sand to the S and the Buxey Bank to the N were very steep to. At the end of one fast board the alarm sounded, with less than half a metre under the keel, prompting a sudden change of tack.
By now, both the buddy and the skipper had learned that long keels do not tack quickly; they must be sailed through. If the sheet is let go too early the Contessa would slow dramatically in mid-tack, head to wind. The working jib sheet must be held, genoa aback, until the main boom crosses the boat; the backed sail pulls the bows around onto the new heading. The sheets can then be changed; when the new working sheet is hauled she accelerates away on the new tack with no pause.
The Whittaker Channel was hard short-tacking up to the West Cardinal, and then it became harder: the wind began to fail. They consulted the electronic chart, and decided to cross the shoal betwen the North and South Cardinals; was it too early on the flood?
Yes, it was. When the depth alarm sounded, they changed their minds and tacked to the South. A few very short boards took them clear to the West. The wind fell again, and lightning began to flicker to the South and West.
The blinding flash, the deafening crack of thunder and the sudden deluge of rain killed the dregs of the wind and blotted out all of the lights. Finally, reluctantly, they started the engine, furled the jib and began to 'feel' their way Westward with the plotter.
The skipper was worried about the iPad's batteries (paper charts don't have that problem!), and its exposure to the rain (paper charts do have that problem),
(They say that the Esquimeaux have thirty different words for snow. We have several different words for rain. None would have described the ferocity of that cloudburst.),
so he took it below, plugged it in, and navigated from the cabin. Unable to see its beloved satellites, the GPS in the iPad sulked, and refused to show the course. Now it was blind navigation with the unlit depth display.
Then the rain eased, the buoy lights could be seen again and the electronics could be reunited with their artificial stars.
At a quarter past two they found the Yacht Harbour, and by half past they were moored and safe.
The skipper seemed happy and content. The buddy had enjoyed his best sail for years. They had both learned so much.
A boat buddy has a wonderful time, in some ways.
Often, the responsibility bears heavily on his shoulders. If he makes a mistake (who doesn't?) he must laugh it off, and correct it. Equally, if the owner makes a mistake, he must laugh it off, and correct it. He must accede to as many of the owner's wishes as he thinks safe, and be prepared to learn from the owner. He must not take offence: he and the owner must live together for the next 3, 6, possibly 12 hours through sun and rain, light and dark, calm and storm, afloat or aground, alert or tired.
If you need, want, can tolerate, a boat buddy get to know him on and around the boat, before you sail together. Asking him to help with a few minor repairs, or to varnish a toe rail, will show the way.
You don't need to be friends, but you do need to trust.
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| A dinghy at the Yacht Harbour |
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