Easter shakedown cruise, March 31st to April 3rd

Dried out on Saturday evening off the western shore of Osea Island.  It's a little rocky this close in, but I took a chance and was lucky.  The wind was strengthening from the east, with overnight rain forecast; this tiny cove off the west side of Osea provided perfect shelter.

As is the way, these days, a window of opportunity for the first cruise of the season arose during the Easter holidays.  In fact, an early Easter combined with the lack of need to antifoul the hull enabled a launch in March - that's never happened to Daisy II before!


Thursday 31st March - launch at Bradwell Marina, trip to Osea Island
Being unencumbered by a mooring this season, different launching venues beckon, so it was good to visit Bradwell Marina for the first time since 2011.  It is pleasing to see that little has changed.

The slipway at Bradwell Marina

The slipway is just as long as it always was, but it is pleasingly accessible and they obviously take care with maintenance, in particular by keeping the lower reaches relatively algae-free.  £19 for launch, recovery and parking over four days represents reasonable value for the east coast.  It's also refreshing to note that they take the trouble to check launchers possess basic safety equipment such as VHF, flares and life jackets but then they leave you to get on with it - a no nonsense, fuss-free approach.

Cruising in March - a first for Daisy II

Launching at Bradwell Marina, a quiet sail to Osea under jib and mizzen drying out close to the south western shore of this delightful island.

 Friday 1st April - River Colne to Colchester

As is so often the way at this time of the year, a thick sea fog greeted me in the morning.  The night was very cold and frost had formed on the deck.  HW was around 6am, so I moved to deeper water for breakfast, with the somewhat forlorn hope that the fog would clear.

Unable to distinguish between sea and sky!

 The sun was trying to poke through, so I pulled in the anchor and, under motor, made my way with the tide north east past the island.  The sun doesn't always help in the fog, the bright rays glistening on the fog as the following picture attempts to show.

A panoramic view under way! 

 Finally the fog lifted opposite Stone Sailing Club.

The fog finally clears

Sailing out of the Blackwater to the end of the Colne, I stopped at Mersea Stone for lunch and, after a brief trip up Pyefleet Channel, sailed up the Colne past Wivenhoe to the more welcoming Rowhedge with its visitor's jetty.  

Approaching Wivenhoe.  It looks a pretty place but it's disappointing they haven't made shoreline access easier.  A 2 hour jetty, such as many other seaside towns offer, is all that would be required.  I'm sure visitors would spend some money in your town!

Rowhedge - a welcoming visitor's jetty.  The two hour limit is sufficient to visit the local amenities.  Neighbouring Wivenhoe could learn something from this.

Following a welcome pint in the Albion public house at Rowhedge, I motored along to the end of the navigation (at least, without having to lower the mast) at Colchester, just a few miles further on.   For the record, there is another visitor's jetty here, although little to suggest a stay and exploration would be worthwhile.  I turned round and returned to Pyefleet for the night.

 Saturday 2nd April - Blackwater to Maldon

I called into Brightlingsea briefly before setting on my way.

At Brightlingsea

I motored out of the Colne in steep pitched 'wind over tide' waves.  Then set sail bound for Maldon.  On the way, knowing that I needed to wait for the tide to reach the head of the Blackwater, I called in to  Lawling Creek.

Seals along Lawling Creek

I've not had a huge degree of success in the past reaching Maldon.  Today, I sailed in under jib alone - the tide was still 2.5 hours before HW and I wasn't sure of depth.  Today wasn't for stopping although it looks like an interesting place so I will call in again for a longer visit.

Approaching Maldon

Finally, Osea beckoned, as explained in the opening photograph in this posting.

Pyefleet to Brightlingsea, then out of the Colne, up the Blackwater, via Lawling Creek to Maldon, finally retiring to the west side of Osea.

 Sunday 3rd April - return to Bradwell Marina

Dried out off Osea

Sunrise over Osea

Breakfast

After breakfast, a quick trip back to Collier's Reach, off Heybridge, lead to a wonderful reach back down the Blackwater, returning to Bradwell Marina for hauling out.

From Osea, to Heybridge finally returning to Bradwell

 In summary...

72.5nm, top speed 7.2kts (with tide!)

Drascombes and Cobles

Coble at Newbiggin-by-the-Sea

I was in Northumberland this weekend, visiting my son who is at the university in Newcastle.  Whilst waiting for him to discover the meaning and value of mornings, my wife and I took a breakfast trip to Newbiggin-by-the-Sea.  Amongst the many things which make a visit to this charming seaside town utterly worthwhile, I happened upon a yard of Coble boats.  Native to the north east, these historic boats are very much the spiritual antecedents of John Watkinson's Drascombe design.  It's not difficult to see why when observing that familiar rake on the stern transom.  Further discussion can be garnered from this thread from the Drascombe forum.

Today seemed a good opportunity to take some snaps of these fabulous looking boats.

Another coble, with the distant view out to sea.

Later the same day, my son did surface and we took a trip to Kielder Water which is the former stamping ground of Daisy II in her former guise of Aquarius prior to my purchase of her.  Indeed, my only previous visit to this place was in November 2006 at the invitation of her previous owners, in response to their advertisement, viewing Aquarius before discussing terms.

We didn't find much boating going on today - it would have been cold and wet, albeit a pleasant northerly breeze - but, after a pleasant shoreline walk, we popped into a pub for a very welcome mid afternoon meal.  It's remarkable, in the bleakness of the surrounding countryside with so few people around, to find such an oasis: The Boat Inn at Leaplish Waterside Park.  Recommended!

Coaster winch servicing

Serviced winch reassembled.

 Most, though by no means all Drascombe Coasters include a sailing winch mounted on the bridge deck, so positioned to ease the strain when tensioning jib sheets.  In reality, it is rarely used in its complete form (with a winch handle); a quick tug on the sheet followed by a couple of clockwise turns around the winch with the jib sheet, then cleated off is all that is invariably required. 

Daisy II's winch was well overdue a good service since the thing was becoming more difficult to turn and had never been touched by me in nine seasons of ownership.  Consequently, I had little idea what to expect when taking it apart.  

Yours truly in winch servicing mode...

As it happens, the winch is mounted on a base plate which is attached to the bridge deck by three bolts which can be found just aft and on the starboard side of the centreplate housing.  Fortunately, these can be left well alone since it's always fiddly working in this area. To detach the winch, all that's necessary is to undo the central bolt from above and then lift off the winch drum from the base plate.

Winch drum removed and turned upside down.  The two 'pawls' and their associated springs can be seen.  The one on the upper right looked to have been disconnected although I subsequently found that this could have happened as it the drum was removed.  

This shows the main spindle (centre) removed.  In this picture, the drum (l.h.side of picture) is now turned the right way up revealing two further upper pawls. These were particularly caked in and the associated springs had no effect at all. Inside the l.h.drum, a white plastic bearing can be seen which needed removing and cleaning.  On the upper rh side of the picture, the base can be seen, inside which is a second, smaller white plastic bearing, along with two washers one flat, the other barrel-shaped.

In this picture, drum, once again inverted is on the l.h.side foreground.  A large diameter metal washer is removed from this and can be seen at the top of the picture.  Once this is removed, the central white plastic bearing can be removed and cleaned.  This picture also shows the smaller white bearing removed from the base plate - this one, strangely, had a diagonal cut from top to bottom.  The two washers mentioned in the previous picture can also be seen.

I rather 'followed my nose' when cleaning it all.  The four pawls needed removing - care is required here, since each includes a tiny spring which could easily escape!  I used 3-in-one and an old cotton tee-shirt to clean off the dirt and grime, and then regreased everything and reassembled it all.  Reassembly took three or four goes to get right and, each time I pulled off the winch barrel to have another go, one or both of the lower pawls disconnected.  So it was all a little fiddly.  I have no idea if I used the right cleaning stuff and subsequently find, on the web, that Harken sell proprietary cleaning fluids for pawls, winches, and the like.  I'll see how mine goes and have another go if necessary.

A slightly odd thing was that there was some inconsistency in the way it had previously been assembled since, when I first observed the lower pawls, one of the springs was housed the opposite way round to the other.  The two ends of each spring are not shaped symmetrically, one end including an angled bend and the other simply looking tangential.  Either way looked as though it could technically work, although each would worn slightly different.   So, when reassembling, I decided to go with way three of the pawls were initially assembled, rather than the inconsistent one, but have no real idea which is correct.  

The reassembled winch is a bit of a revelation since the grey central drum now turns independently of the black one - which it's obviously supposed to do when winching properly, but the top two pawls were so caked in dirt and grim, the whole was stuck fast!  Now, everything in general turns so much more easily and I'm looking forward to pulling in those jib sheets with comparative ease!  Roll on the sailing season!

Where it all began

I happened upon these pictures of my late stepfather in his Drascombe lugger, Alouette, returning to his mooring in Minehead harbour, with my late Grandfather as crew.

My guess is that these pictures were taken in the early 1980s.  Prior to this, he owned a Dell Quay Fisherboat followed by a Dory.  After the Lugger, he went into inland river cruisers.  Whilst the Fisherboat, with its fabulous Saab diesel, was a wonderful boat, the Lugger was easily my favourite.  She had a dark blue hull with red and white boot stripe.  Dad always cared well for his boats and this one was in fantastic condition.  I wonder what became of her - he'd certainly sold her by the time I went to university in 1984.

Dad was at the helm.  As it happens, my Grandfather's birthday would have been today, 13th January 1914.  Both gentlemen were founder members of Minehead Sailing Club.  These pictures would have been taken from the end of the harbour wall, as they returned to port.

Without any doubt, it was the wonderful experiences I had sailing this boat which lured me into Drascombing.