Walton Backwaters - October 27-28, 2008

Circumnavigating Horsey Island, 28th October 2008

At anchor, Landemere Creek, 27th October 2008

Horsey Island.  This shows the landing stage where, earlier in the season, we went ashore on a Drascombe Association rally.

Sunset, taken from within the Cockpit tent.  Note the condensation...

Container ship arriving at Felixstowe Docks.  You don't argue with them...!

 Below, sunset at anchor in Landemere Creek.
This trip was an 'end-of-season' opportunity to stop overnight on board.  The plan, which pretty much came to fruition, was to sail from Pin Mill to the Walton Backwaters, anchor for the night, sail around the Backwaters, and return for the incoming tide mid-afternoon the next day.  The picture above was taken whilst anchored in Landemere Creek, in the Walton Backwaters.Another snap taken during the trip over to Walton, the Naze tower just visible.These images show the gps track, downloaded onto Google Earth.  Total distance, 28.5 nm.The tracks above and below show detail of sailing on the second day in the Walton Backwaters, including a circumnavigation of Horsey Island, of Secret Water fame (Arthur Ransome).  The track below shows particular detail of tacking up the further reaches of Landemere Creek, including a few careless moments where the boat grounded...

April and May 2009; early season manoeuvres

April 17th.  6.9nm.  The aim was an 'Italian tune-up' for the outboard which, somehow, was behaving poorly.  I'm pretty certain, retrospectively, that I had inadvertently managed to get water into the fuel, which is a bit daft straight after a service.  After several spluttering attempts at starting the engine, I decided to get any contaminants well and truly out of the system.  Fortunately, all has been well since.  This was the first track of the season.  April 26th.  4.3nm.  This was the first sail of the season.  Began by tacking in an Easterly direction, and then went for a run past Pin Mill, to Woolverstone.  Then motored back to the mooring (just to check on the outboard's functionality). 
May 4th.  11.4nm.  A busy bank holiday.  Sailed out through Harwich harbour and Felixstowe docks.  Anchored just beyond the Felixstowe docks for lunch.  The wind steadily increased all day.  A reduced rig of jib and mizzen, tacking back up the Orwell, with a final flourish of outboard back to the mooring.
May 10th.  6.7nm.  Sailed from start to finish!   Lovely North-westerly run down to the Orwell bridge, then superb fun tacking back to beyond the mooring, then backing round to the mooring.