7:08 PM, Jul. 6, 2009
Hi everyone, due to forthcoming changes to this website, we have gone back to our old blog site of www.travelblog.org - korora 4 on tour. We have posted two new entries and if you want to be added to the auto notification list just send us an email and we will add you, sorry for any hassles9:59 AM, Jun. 14, 2009
The Channel and beyond…………Crossing the
Well the long awaited time had finally come and Debs and I were up pretty early to get going. We had to wait for a bit of tide to come into the harbour so that there was enough water under the keel to get out. We had been put in between two pylons and at low tide we simply could not leave because the water wasn’t deep enough just beyond the boat. We had two other boats rafted up to us as well so it took a bit of work to get out but we did and we were on our way about 6.45am.
It was a brilliant morning and we were bloody excited to be finally heading off across the Channel. Because we had to wait for a bit of tide to fill, it meant that we had to work against the tide going through the channel at the
Once we got down through the Needles and turned to the south, we put up our sails and set our course for
Whilst we were so looking forward to new countries and new experiences, Debs and I both agree that the
We sailed south, the winds were reasonably light and it was quite fascinating to be steering a course on the compass and then see what course you were actually doing ‘over the ground’ as they say in navigation speak. People who have done this trip regularly advised us to just set the course you want to go to and as the trip progresses you will be pushed one way up the Channel for a few hours and then back down the other way as the tide changes and sure enough, that’s what it did.
We ended up motor sailing for a fair bit of the way because the winds just died off and rather than sit there and bob around doing a couple of knots, we wanted to get there and enter the harbour with good light and conditions. We had heard that crossing the shipping lanes was like trying to walk across a freeway at peak traffic times and we decided to have a bit of a ballot as to the number of ships we would see. The system they have is that northbound ships have to stay within a certain ‘path’ heading up the Channel and the same for south bound ships in their own channel. In between the shipping lanes is a transit area.
Slowly but surely we lost sight of
Maritime regulations mean that you can’t simply meander across the shipping lanes as you please but you need to cross them at right angles to the direction of traffic. From what we had been told, I was envisaging having to side step huge ships all through the lanes and I thought we would be seeing far more ships than we actually did. Nikki’s punt was between 20 and 40 ships and in the end I think we saw about 19 so she got the gong for the day. I think we were pretty lucky as we got through both the north bound and south bound lanes without having to divert course, or causing any ships to alter course to get around us, something I don’t think they really ever want to do. With their size and speed we consider it is best for us to stay right out of their way.
The girls just cruised along the whole trip. Layni spent her time playing Sims 2 on the computer, every so often coming up top to see what was going on and have a cuddle with Debs on the ever so comfy pet cushions that were turning into cockpit lounges. Nik read and chatted most of the way as she does, seeming very, very comfortable at sea.
As we were motor sailing, we could use the auto pilot so that meant not having to steer all the way but you needed to keep a bit of a sharp eye on the water ahead as every so often you would see bits of flotsam and jetsam that could give the old boat a bit of a knock if you hit it. Debs and I took it in turns to be ‘on watch’ at the helm and on lookout. Debs organised lunch on the way and she is becoming such a trooper on the boat, and is able to do things that not so long ago would have seemed a big no no.
Considering how crook she used to get to now being able to go below and prepare food and help the kids out is just brilliant. Debs also does the navigating during our passages and each hour she goes through the routine of plotting our position on the chart, recording those details in our log book, estimating the distance to go, the course we need to steer, records the barometric pressure reading and compares that to the previous hour to see if we have a rising or falling barometer, records the wind speed and direction along with our boat speed and course. So that means she spends a fair bit of time at the Nav table and of course every hour we also check our bilges to make sure everything is nice and dry. Might seem a bit over the top to some but we are happy with what we do and we just consider it sensible practice, plus it helps to pass the time!!.
We had a little visitor two thirds along the way, a homing pigeon with a
Apart from our feathered friend, the only other thing of note that happened was our first little experience with tidal eddies. I was at the helm and we were under sail only with no motor. We had been going for about 8 hours and when I looked down at the compass, it was rotating and as I turned the helm, it continued to rotate. I looked at the chart plotter and it was doing the same thing, my initial reaction was there was a gear malfunction but when I looked and saw the sun going around the mast I realised we were in a tidal eddy and the boat was simply turning circles!!! We were still quite a few miles from the French coast but here we were doing the
We finally got some decent wind and were on a beam reach for the rest of the way into
Try as best we could, it was causing just far too many problems for our big girl and luckily for us, a space became available on an outer pontoon that we thought we might be able to squeeze onto. Another stroke of luck was some friends we had made in
Their hospitality skills had not waned one skerrick and no sooner had we tied the boat up than we were in their cockpit having a glass of French wine to celebrate our crossing. That continued and we ended up having nibbles with them, champagne was opened and then they turned on dinner for us. Have to say it was just the best way to end the trip across and I fell into bed about midnight, very tired and not having a care in the world.
Jim and Rhona and Matthew had to leave quite quickly the next morning to catch the tide to their next port of call so it was hasty goodbyes and thank you so much and still they managed to leave us a little gift, an electric jug suitable for boats as it doesn’t draw too much power from the genny: great people and so typical of so many of the Brits we met in the Solent.
So here we were in
We thought me might try and hire a car and do some day trips to the Normandy beach areas where the D- Day Invasions took place but with 6 out of 7 car hire places having no cars and Avis wanting to charge us over $300.00 for one days car hire we looked at other options.
We ended up catching a bus ($8.00 for the family thank you very much) to a village called St Mere Eglise which was the most strategic village that had to be liberated during the Invasion. Paratroopers were flown to the area while the invasion took place on the beaches and the intention was for the paratroopers to liberate the village and once the beachhead was secured, they could then have road access to head back north and take
Obviously the fighting was brutally intense as both the allies and the Germans were fully aware of what this stage of the war meant to all parties. We went to the Paratrooper museum and learnt so much about what when on during this famous period of the war. The village gets its name from the Church in the centre and there is another piece of history still attached to the Church to this day. There is a replica of a paratrooper by the name of John Steele who happened to land on the Church and his parachute got caught on the Church spire. He spent some hours there, being shot at and feigning his death before he was captured, only to escape some hours later and continue the fighting.
Obviously there is a fair bit of tourism about the place and there are American, French and other allied flags all over the place but it is very clear that the French have never forgotten that the Americans liberated their village and how proud they are that their village was the first to be liberated during the war. We had a very memorable and moving day there, made even more special by meeting up with some Aussies who were on their honeymoon, having been married in
We ended up spending a couple of days more in
Well the next part of our journey soon entered the planning stage and we were setting off to Guernsey in the
To be continued………………..
11:50 AM, May. 23, 2009
The Transition - from landlubbers to liveaboards!!
Well my friends, it seems that finally I am able to get things back on track and get this blog up and running. There have been distant rumbles from down under (and from the old dart) about the lack of blog entries so finally, the time has come to allow me to correct the errors of my ways and get stuck right into it.
So much seems to have happened in such a short space of time and I will do my best to recollect where we have been, who we have met, and the things we have done. As can be seen from the title of this blog, it really feels like we are on our way to making the transition from landlubbers to liveaboards. It may seem like the term liveaboards carries with it thoughts of carefree days, sunshine, and not a worry in the world, the truth be known, there are a few other little intricacies of life that accompany us as we embark on our new path forward, I hope I can set about in this blog just what life is like for us now.
Well it was Good Friday when I last blogged and that was back on the 10th of April. We were in
While we were in
We left 
We stopped at a marina called Gunwharf Quays at Portsmouth and to cut a long story short, Daisy ended up having a couple of nights sleep over with us.
There is a huge historical complex at
We then had the incredible pleasure of taking our time looking at examples of all of the artefacts that had been recovered and painstakingly restored. The remains of the hull, which are in fact quite substantial, are stored in this special type of building where liquid wax is pumped into the timber, literally by soaking it in a giant shower recess and that process has been going for some years and will continue for some years to come to ensure the preservation of the timberwork.
We spent the day on site and took in a tour of Nelson’s ship, the Victory which is open for public exhibition. It really was a walk back in time, with the ship still maintained as she was during her fighting years. The ship has never been decommissioned and to this day is still the most senior of all Royal Navy Vessels. As such, every time a Royal Navy Vessels goes past her, the ships company must man the decks and salute the Victory. Tradition and honour still play a big part in today’s Navy.
We enjoyed
We left
The Solent became our cruising grounds for the next few weeks while we waited for various things to happen or arrive to allow us to cut our ties with
Our package we had sent from home had not arrived and as we were not sure how long it had been since the liferaft on the boat had been serviced, we sent that away just to make sure. We also decided to have the liferaft packed into a hard case and that had to be sent over from
We basically sailed in big circles around the area, going as far west as Poole to the south west and then taking in other Ports such as Lymington, which has great markets on Saturdays, Yarmouth, Cowes, and the Folly, all on the Isle of Wight.
We spent Debs birthday in Lymington, trying our best to make her day a bit special, Nikki and Layni prepared Debs a very special brekkie in bed and then we headed to the Markets where it is very easy to spend a few hours wandering the length of the High Street where stalls are set up on both sides of the road. We bought some herbs to see if we could make any improvement on our previous attempts at gardening, and so punnets of basil, mint, coriander, thyme and parsley were added to our boat acquisition list.
While we were in Lymington we also spied a piece of kit called a Creda Brand spin dryer. Now this little piece of magic is a stand alone spin dryer that doesn’t need to be wired in, you simply plug it into the 230v socket in the boat and you don’t need to plumb it in, it has a hose that leads from it and the water is pumped out. After spending far too much time and effort in
By this stage we had also purchased a Honda portable generator as an alternative power source and it was proving to be an exceptionally good bit of gear. We looked at other alternatives such as wind generators, solar panels, additional alternators and the like but overall this looked to be a cost effective alternative to our plans for this year. So instead of having to run the engines twice a day, we start up the genny and it charges our battery bank, quietly and very efficiently. It also allows us to run the spin dryer when we don’t have shore power which is most of the time because it is so much cheaper. The spin dryer works so well and Debs has developed a really effective system of doing the never ever ending routine of washing. To add to our never ending list of gear we have bought to make life easier, we bought three big plastic tubs. Debs soaks clothes overnight and then they are agitated by hand, sometimes by big flat feet and we spin the soap out, rinse and spin a couple of times and then turn the boat into a massive clothes line. The things we used to take for granted at home!.
Hot water for showers necessitates the running of the engine as the hot water heater just draws too much power on the genny to allow us to use the dryer and other bits and pieces on the boat at the same time so if we aren’t staying near on shore showers, we have to run the engine for half and hour or so for nice steaming hot water.
We had a couple of drinks that afternoon of Deb’s birthday at the Royal Lymington Yacht Club which is a very, very pukka place 
overlooking the river. This Club has produced many Olympic Yachting Champs and we felt very chuffed to be there. John and Daisy and Bev’s Dad Mick had sailed down to join us for the weekend and that evening we christened our new BBQ with some special venison and red wine snags from the local gourmet butcher, have to say the little barbie worked a treat. John and Mick had been pondering on how to open the emergency tiller hatch that we, and many other technicians had not been able to budge. This had been causing me a fair bit of angst as I did not want to be undertaking any serious passages with being able to access the emergency tiller should the steering give way. John is the ultimate Mr Fix It and lo and be hold, half a bottle of nail varnish remover later, the hatch was open; the man is a true genius!!
At the end of April we made a trip up to Southampton where we left the boat for three nights while we went up to
We took the girls into
Craig and Catherine also took us to Heavers Castle which was the home of Anne Boleyn and whilst not a big Castle it was a brilliant place to spend the day, taking the tour through the Castle and spending time in the incredible gardens. We also bought a little chilli plant at the Castle gardens, hoping to take it back to the boat to add to our herb garden and to later be able to add it to the home cooked meals we do on board the boat.
We left the company of our friends and went back into
We left
Well the good news is that during this heart stopping process, liquid was finally able to be seen flowing from the inside of the holding tank to the outside of the hull. I thought Debs was going to burst into tears with relief – finally our crapper was cleared!!!.We ended up staying a night or two in the marina and found the little
We left that area and were planning on sailing back down to Lymington to pick up some more cushions that we had bought at the markets. We try and dodge the Ned Kelly Homesteads a.k.a chandleries as much as we can and Deb’s eagle eyes had spotted these big cushions at the Lymington Markets being sold at a Pet stand as pet cushions – Simmy would absolutely love them. The cushions are made out of gortex and are waterproof and they fitted our cockpit seats perfectly. They cost a fraction of the price that anything similar in the chandleries would cost so we wanted to make sure we had enough to fill the cockpit and increase our comfort factor.
It started to blow dogs of chains when we left the
The place lived up to it’s reputation and sure enough, after about 9.00pm, the tables are cleared and just about everyone in the place gets up on the table and dances away to their hearts content. The place is an absolute hoot and everyone has the time of their lives, us included. To top it off, the food is great, it is excellent value and we had a brilliant time.
You park your boat next to pontoons which are secured in the river and as things get busier, other boats are rafted up next to you and other boats next to them until the whole river is a raft of yachts. The little water taxi’s do a roaring trade taking patrons to and from the pub. We opted for the water taxi rather than our little tender to make sure we all didn’t end up in the drink after a big night.
We loved being up the river, it was quite rural around the pub and in fact that was about the only thing on the river. There is a large town upstream called
We ended up spending about 10 days in that area, taking day trips around the
Our little stay on the
The weather started to improve and the time came for the official unveiling of Debs hammock that had been gathering dust balls since we gave it to her for Christmas some years ago. Our package had finally arrived from
One whole Saturday was spent walking about two miles up to Newport, then an hour on the bus to Yarmouth and then catching the ferry to Lymington and then another long walk just to get to the markets to buy the remainder of the cushions we had been waiting to get and then back again but I have to say, the comfort factor they have created was totally worth the hours of travel just to get them. No more ducking in the car and down to Homebase.
We left the Folly and had a couple of more days down at Cowes, restocking and recycling books from ‘That Shop’, and having some work done to fix our diesel heater. We also took the plunge and bought two fold up push bikes. We had seen these about a lot and most cruising yachties we spoke to who had them raved about them. We had considered them for some time and we found a couple that were well priced and we haven’t looked back since we got them. They are a hoot to ride and are actually really handy. They fold up, basically in two and they only have 20” wheels so I look a bit like bozo the circus clown when I get on them but hey, they work!
We headed back to
We use a program on the internet called Passage Weather which gives very good weather forecasts for up to seven days for designated areas all around the world. We had used it extensively for the past couple of months, testing their forecasts against actual weather and it proved to be very accurate. The forecasts include wind strengths and direction, barometric pressure and wave height and directions. We analyse all this data together with tidal information we obtain from a software program we bought some time ago which gives us data regarding tide heights and the direction and time of tidal flow.
As the tides in this area are so strong, it is really important to be able to work out all the tidal and weather factors as this can mean the difference between getting somewhere easily or, at times, not getting there for hours later. It was also very important to be able to get used to doing these exercises as when we head across the Channel, the tides get much bigger and the tidal currents much, much stronger and in areas such as the
It used to fascinate us when we were sitting in the marina at Yarmouth, watching yachts heading through the narrow channel in that area between the Isle of Wight and the mainland of the UK. The tide used to run so strongly through there. We used to watch yachts going with the wind, some of them with full spinnakers up, full mainsails up, trimmed to perfection, heeling slightly and going absolutely no where, being stuck in the current against the tide. Yachts going the other way would be absolutely screaming along, setting all time speed records with hardly any sail up at all.
We used the tide to our benefit on most occasions that we could, particularly on our sail across to
So we checked passage weather and the forecast looked very good for the weekend of the 23rd and 24th of May, calm conditions for our maiden crossing of the famous
We went back to
The good part about going back to
We headed over to Lymington with a fully functional heater which works a treat, running off the same diesel tank that we run the engine from and it makes the boat sooooo warm and toasty. Our main aim of going to Lymington was to be able to catch up with John and Sue Alison and have dinner with them before we headed off and so off to the pub with them on the Friday night to say our goodbyes, hoping that we might be able to cruise with them for a while when they head off a bit later in the month, heading down our way.
After going to the markets and buying a tomato plant and a pot of ‘busy lizzy’ or as we know it back home, ‘impatience’ we spent the Saturday going over everything on the boat to make sure she was ready to cross the channel and see us on our way finally. We headed back over to
The boat was checked and double checked, including my first trip up to the top of the mast to check the windvane that appeared to be a bit out of kilter, bloody hell it is a long way up there. Our passage plan was done, final weather checks were done and all looked good.
The transition from landlubbers to liveaboards was a physical feeling that I think we were all experiencing and it was like the whirlwind fog that we had been enveloped in since we had decided to buy the boat was lifting. Our daily lives have changed so incredibly since we left home and of course there are routine and mundane things to do but the boat has become so much a part of our lives and we, so much a part of the boat. It is a very special time of our lives. We are living on board our boat and we are landlubbers no more
Tomorrow we set sail on our long trip back to
To be continued…….
9:35 PM, Apr. 11, 2009
About 40 years ago, I was living in my home town called Cumnock. We had a creek that ran through the back paddock and as kids we used to play in and around the creek, swimming amongst the barbed wire, old tin and broken bottles, catching crayfish and now and again build rafts. I have a very clear recollection of one day, sitting on my raft in the middle of the creek which was only about 4 metres across at most. The raft was made from 12 gallon oil drums and pieces of timber I had been able to scrounge up. I also had a wooden crate on top and that was my ‘cabin’. The raft was only about 2 metres by a metre in size but to me she was the best boat in the world. As I was sitting against my cabin, I had a thermos of tea with me and I sat back, basking in the sunshine, closed eyes and started to dream, a dream that has lasted 40 years; to one day be sitting on my own yacht, basking in the sunshine, having a cup of tea.
How much life has changed over those years and I think I have more memories than there are stars in the skies. Memories that reflect on so much life, a life I believe that has been full of so many good times and one in which I have been very, very lucky. I guess we all share the same path at times, when opportunities are presented to us. We can do something about them or we can let them pass us by. As most of you who have known me, I have always been waiting for that one particular opportunity that has eluded me for all those years. Last year that opportunity came my way and also for my family.
Every day for who knows how long, the daily trawl of the internet was undertaken, looking at boats, reading sailing blogs and sharing some great sailing times with Debs and the girls, and good friends, on charters or out sailing with mates, kind enough to share their boat and time together.
In December 2009, my life and the life of my family was about to change like it had never done before. We saw our boat, ‘Sunboy’, advertised for sale on the internet. When we first saw her, we thought the price was a mistake so Debs and I rang the broker to make some more inquiries. The price was confirmed and we literally sat there in shock, realising that an opportunity that I had waited all those years for was now open to us. We discussed options with Nikki and Layni, very openly and very honestly and at the end of the day, the decision was unanimous, lets try and buy the boat.
Hey, it wasn’t much to ask, lets just take the kids out of school, sell off most of our material possessions, close down a business that I had spent 10 years building up, put ourselves into debt and go half way around the world and live on a boat, away from all of our cherished friends and family and start to live a life that we had never done before: well not for any real length of time anyway. That’s not too much for a husband and father to ask for, is it? The fire did burn very deep within.
Deb and the girls wanted me to do whatever I could to seize this opportunity. We were so fortunate to have a friend, John Allison who worked near wher ‘Sunboy’ was berthed in England and he was able to head down and do a preliminary check of the boat and he confirmed that I needed to head over and not waste much time doing it. Debs and I looked at the option of both of us heading over to inspect the boat but the earliest we could both get over on frequent flyer points was late January and I was not confident, no matter what the world economy was doing, that the boat would not be sold by then. The window of opportunity, I believed, was closing. It was a bit like Haley’s comet in a way, the opportunity had arrived only once in all those years and it might be that amount of time or even more before it arose again and I was not going to wait anymore. I remember going to bed one night, tossing and turning everything over in my mind and I woke Debs and told her that if I didn’t go now, the boat would be gone. At 2.00am in the morning, my Darling was on the phone to Qantas frequent flyer staff and two days later I was on a plane heading for
I had a week to inspect the boat, do the sea trials, arrange for an out of water survey and negotiate a purchase. The combination of what I was embarking on and the life changing decisions Debs and I were making, over the phone to each other, coupled with a hefty dose of jet lag made me feel totally devoid of reality. Within 4 days the deposit had been paid, the noose around the opportunity had begun to tighten.
I arrived home, with a truck load of emotions going on and I wasn’t alone. We were all so excited and happy but also, and quite naturally, we were also just a tad anxious. Debs had been able to secure 4 frequent flyer flights back to the
Christmas and New Year came and went, and time started to tick down. Finally the papers came through. We had our boat, the money had arrived and the papers were signed over. SY Sunboy was ours.
The weeks started to fly past, we organised Nikki and Layni into Distant Education Schools, Nikki at Camden Haven and Layni at Port Macquarie. Furniture and household goods were being sold like there was no tomorrow and of course our ‘voly’ went as well. Emotions were starting to run a bit, especially when it came to find new homes for our dog Simmy and our cat Micah. Every second of time spent with friends and family became so precious for we knew that very soon we would be leaving and not knowing when we would see you all again. You mean so much to us, more than you could ever imagine.
I have to be honest and I think I speak for all of us when we really questioned what we were doing, not once or twice, but often. Was this really the right thing to do? Only time would tell. It was not only my life that was going to change but also each and every member of the family and we were collectively and individually feeling emotions that none of us had ever felt before. Through all this time, the bonds of friendship became even stronger and no one suggested that what we were doing was wrong in any way. The love, encouragement and support from all of you has been incredible.
Before we knew it, we were at
The adventures of ‘Sunboy’ the Sailing Boat had begun…..
Being honest, it was cold, we were all so very tired and all a bit drained from the 36 hours of travel, little sleep and the emotional upheaval of leaving home. Having said that, we were also very excited and for Debs and the girls, I was their first view of our boat. Layni literally squealed with excitement from the time she first saw Sunboy from the marina office to the time she was able to step on board.
Our boat was berthed at
As this was our first ever boat, Debs and I had anticipated a very steep learning curve but did not expect it to happen as fast as it did! The second day on board and Debs uttered those words you just hate to hear; “Alsy, the toilet isn’t working” “That’s alright Darling, I’ll call a plumber”. Well that’s what I would have said when I was back home. But that’s not what ‘boat owner’s do. Alsy, it’s only some screws and some plastic pipe after all, get in and have a go son. Those of you who know me well completely understand that my level of technical ability only extends to being able to put batteries into things and that is when the + and the – sign are clearly marked, both on the batteries and the thingamajig that I have to put them into. I bought my first ever tool box loaded with bright shiny tools and gizmos only about three years ago and that was just to make Paddo, our neighbour at the time, think that I knew how to use it!! Of course he knew better and saw straight through the ruse. The thought of having to take a manual flushing toilet apart was way out of my comfort zone.
Well fortunately, the previous owner had left an absolute plethora of tools and gadgets on board when he sold it to us so into the aft head I went. The problem was that the manual pump was not working so whatever went into the loo could not be pumped out of it, fortunately this break down had occurred after morning ablutions so it was just a matter of sea water used to flush the system was not able to be pumped in or out.
I felt a bit like a bomb disposal expert sitting down, pondering my fate, wondering whether or not an explosion was about to take place! Give me shrapnel any time rather than the contents of this system. Slowly but surely the whole thing was taken apart, rubber seals reset (now there is a technician’s term), a bit of lube here and there and time to put the whole thing back together again. Now that’s another story but I am very happy to report that not long after, Alsy was doing whoops and hoops throughout the boat while Debs very proudly stood over the porcelain idol, pumping away to her hearts content, testing and retesting to make sure the whole repair job had not been a figment of her imagination! Avid readers, you have to realise just what a momentous occasion this was in my life, I had actually fixed something. Well thank goodness that was all that was going to go wrong. We were lucky to get away with that weren’t we? And so life on the boat was quickly going to turn into nirvana: no more problems: Sunshine, warmth and lazy days reading over charts and pilotage books planning a very nice summer cruising program.
How naïve and innocent we were!!! It seemed like every other day something else would stop working and at any time I was expecting Debs to throw down the tools and say enough is enough but never, at any stage did any words of regret or anger come forth. The problems were all relatively small but they were just not what we had anticipated. But in reality, the boat has had such little use since she was launched and had been through such a harsh winter when things freeze up and break, things were bound to go wrong.
The girls all tucked up in computer land
some more cleaning of our new baby
All in all we have been able to repair, fix or replace all of the problems presented to us, the grand finalist being the porcelain cartridge in the tap of our bathroom off our cabin. A tiny little piece of plastic that formed a collar for an ‘O’ ring had broken off, it was only about 4mm long and about 1mm high but it meant that our basin tap continually leaked significant amounts of water when we turned the fresh water pump on. A replacement tap was going to cost about two hundred pounds until I came up with the brilliant idea of building our own little collar for the ‘O’ ring. A plastic pen was sacrificed, a small collar was cut off it and superglued into place and voila!! Tap fixed.
Things were starting to smoke along, problem arose, problem fixed, was there no end to the skills that Debs and I were acquiring. Well then, oooohhh yes, the dreaded blocked holding tank. For those of you who don’t know, which would be me and maybe one other, a holding tank is a stainless steel tank on a boat that the contents of the toilet are pumped into and you then have a leaver on a hose that lets the contents be released into the sea when it becomes full. Well that is what is meant to happen. When one of these things gets blocked and people try to pump waste out, a thing called a vacuum is created and that means the contents of the said holding tank are then being stored under great pressure and that pressure has to be released or the said holding tank could, under extreme pressure, rupture.and empty the said contents into the bottom of the boat – i.e. the time that Debs and the girls say bye bye Alsy and I would be left with a boat full of s*$#t.
Armed with some trusty thin wire, for the unblocking of the blockage in the pipe, caused by what we suspected was a carelessly discarded baby wipe (thank you Alsy) was simply going to be the case of put thin wire up through the hole that is under the water at the side of the boat and all is good. Well that just didn’t happen and I am not sure if I was imagining things but I swore I could hear the holding tank start to growl and rumble, seeking immediate release.
By this time, I was standing in the inflatable dinghy at the side of the boat, the water was about 10’ Celcius and I was confronted by a small screw down cap on the top of the deck where you can also have a very heavy duty pump placed into the tank to pump it out. All I had to do was release the cap, very carefully of course, and let some pressure out so we could travel to the pump out facility and have it pumped dry and the blockage sucked out. Well I think the contents of the holding tank must have had enough of their entrapment and as soon as I started to release the cap, it erupted like
We spent the rest of the afternoon, cleaning the boat(s) and myself and whilst we had emptied the contents of the holding tank, we still didn’t clear the blockage. So off we hopped up the river to another marina that had a pump out facility. We got up river and radioed ahead and they explained that when we saw the three green lights the lock was clear to enter – Lock – hang on a minute, aren’t they those things you go into on the canals of France. Wait a minute mate, we have only owned the boat for a week, we can’t go though a lock. Well yes you can and yes we did and we tied up in the Hythe Marina and engaged a very serious bit of kit called a holding tank pump out facility. This thing could have sucked up the Titantic from the ocean floor I think and when we heard a very loud thud and saw a lump go through the pipe, Debs and I both thought, ha ha, got you, you bastard. We cleared the girls holding tank for good measure and headed back out though the lock thinking our blocked head days were a thing of the past.
So after all the time packing the boat, getting up to Southampton and getting some great storage goodies from the biggest IKEA store we had ever seen, repairing and replacing things, we just about had time to catch our breath. Well that was after John Allison helped us transport some very nifty wooden bed slats from IKEA to our boat. These slats are joined together and are curved so they allow the foam mattresses we have to be raised up of the bed frame to allow ventilation and also provide a nice touch of comfort thank you very much. We spent some time, cutting each of the slats to fit into the unusual shape of our bed but it has been well worth it, so much so, we are going to get some for each of the girls beds.
We took the boat out for her maiden voyage on the 30th of March and had a little sail over towards
maiden voyage
maiden voyage
The following weekend was spent with John and Sue Allison and had a brilliant time with them. They live in an area called Sway just near the New Forrest and they have horses and chooks and dogs and are just the best guys to pal around with. Layni just loved collecting the fresh eggs from the chooks and the taste of them for brekky in the morning was just the best.
John and Sue also have a Hanse yacht the same size as ours and they have travelled over 30,000 miles in theirs and their knowledge and experience base is just incredible. We had a great weekend in their home and came back to the boat full of enthusiasm and inspiration.
Not long after we got the terrible news about the floods in Coffs and what had happened to our home. To be so far away at a time like that was just horrible and thinking we had lost so much was just devastating. We will never know how to adequately write the words to say thank you to all those who helped through that time, saving our very, very treasured possessions and we cannot express how much we appreciate what you did for us. I am simply not able to explain what it felt like when we got the news that so much had been saved. It was, in so many ways a real turning point.
People over here have been incredibly friendly and helpful to us, taking us to shops to buy essentials for the boat, giving us tips and advice and making life so much easier in our new little world. Our berth buddy at Hamble Point, Mike Lilley has been of great help. Debs measured up the cupboards in our galley and Mike cut some shelving to fit and all Debs and I had to do was fit the mounting brackets and screw them into the cupboards and hey presto, double the storage space. We have also cut and fitted some ‘fiddles’ (wooden slats) to go across open storage areas to allow us to store even more stuff, especially all the great books we bought from a fantastic second hand book store in Cowes for 99p each.
Debs has started a little bit of school work with Layni and it is compulsory for her to wear her school maam hat each time she does. Layni found this old tartan hat on board and it suits the job to a tee, we only hope that Layni pays the same attention and respect to her ‘new’ teacher as she did to her previous ones.
We have left Hamble Point Marina and been out and about on our boat, starting to enjoy all that we had hoped our new life was going to bring. We haven’t gone very far but it has been so good. We sailed from Hamble Point over to
When we arrived in
We explored
Layni at Yarmouth Castle
Another day was spent walking about 4 kilometres up to a village called Freshwater and wandered around the old church and graveyard, fascinated by all the hundreds of year old headstones and inscriptions. A quick drink in the Red Lion Pub and off we headed back to Yarmouth via a nice walking track, through the meadows and fields, even spotting a couple of pheasants, bringing back the words of that old rhyme about some pheasant plucker and his pheasant plucking son who spent his time plucking pheasants, for reasons yet to ever be discovered. Personally I thought the pheasants were far to nice to even conjour up the idea of plucking out their very pleasant looking pheasant feathers.
On the way to the village of Freshwater
Yarmouth Marina
We sailed back to
The last week has been just so good. Well except for the night before my birthday. I was lying in bed reading when I smelt impending doom. I opened the door to our bathroom to see blackwater overflowing from the toilet bowl into the bathroom floor. Yes, you guessed it the blocked holding tank was seeking revenge for having her insides sucked out some days before. Suffice to say we cleaned up the mess, didn’t cause another geyser of misery and released the pressure that had caused the back flow build up.
We had arranged to meet John and Sue over at their marina base at Lymington on the mainland for my birthday but I was determined to get this problem sorted. So we postponed our get together with them and stayed at
Overall though, I did have a good birthday with my girls. Deb, Nikki and Layni kept up traditions by making me a sponge, cream, jam and chocolate cake. It was very similar to the one they made last year (although this year made with a packet of brioche rolls) so I think that will, I hope anyway, be a ritual to be undertaken every 8th of April.
reading has become a very popular pastime
We have met so many really nice people on their boats and learnt so much from them and when we explain our plans they are all very excited for us as most of them have sailed into the areas we propose to go to. Were are now in Cowes Yacht Haven Marina, it is the afternoon of Good Friday and the weather is, how would you say, typically British old Chap, bloody cold and raining. Debs and I walked into the village and bought some goodies for dinner, a nice big bucket load of Scottish mussels. I have to say, they were the best mussels I have ever had in my life and we had heaps!!!.
favourite food for me....
and Nikki!
The girls are tucked up in our bed reading away to their hearts<
