Round Britain Adventure on Indian Runner

 Roger has drawn up a spreadsheet, showing where in the boat we have stored things.  On the list the ‘Port locker’ became the ‘Pork locker’, which has inevitably now stuck.  On Easter Monday we had a big surprise and found a little pig tucked away in the pork locker. He is now clearly going to be an important companion on our adventure.  Below we have Piglet sheltering under the sprayhood, happy in the cabin but not surprisingly, given the wind, seasick Piglet.  Do watch out for him in case he pops up again on our voyage! 

 We thought it was windy towards the end of March.  This was as nothing compared to Easter Monday.  Sailing and busy diaries don’t really match well. Ideally we should be able to look at the weather and hop down to the boat when it looks good.  In real life, we were coordinating five diaries for a final shake down sail with our crew, Rachel and Alan and their friend Andrew - a very experienced skipper who was kindly going to come out with us to give advice. Easter Monday was the only day we could all make.  We went down to Hamble on the evening of Easter Day and had a wonderful supper with Andrew and had the luxury of sleeping in real beds.  Easter Monday saw us rise early to contemplate the driving rain and wind outside the window - we were expecting it but had still hoped the weather forecast might be wrong.  We were on the boat by 8 and the expert crew had us leaving the pontoon by 8.20. As usual we motored down the river and then when we reached So...

 I can’t remember whether March came in like a lion but it’s certainly going out like one. The main sail and jib are not yet back on the boat but even if they were we wouldn’t be going out with such strong winds forecast.  Sailing (I guess like farming), reminds us that however many plans we make, events are not in our hands. We had set aside the end of the week for our ‘shake down’ sail but that is looking very unlikely.  Fingers crossed for next week.  I’m sure that on our round Britain sail we will experience this many times.  You can have all the schedules you like but if the weather is against you then that is that.  When we arrived last night we had a lovely surprise - our new spray hood and dodgers were already fitted (we had been expecting them today).  We are thrilled with them. I imagine on a windy, rainy night when we are out far from land we will love them even more. 

 We’re heading off to the boat this week to have a sprayhood fitted and canvas side panels for the cockpit, rather amusingly called ‘dodgers’.  We’ll be spending time with our fellow crew, Rachel and Alan and are all having a lesson on Wednesday on how to get best use out of the Raymarine satnav system. Our friends Bev and John will be joining us on Wednesday afternoon and we are hoping to have a trip on the Hamble river but the weather gods are not looking friendly and so even a river trip may not happen.  We had also planned a ‘shake down’ two day sail but this looks very unlikely for this week now.   When we first bought our boat we were a little puzzled by the name ‘Indian Runner’ but have been delighted to discover that it is the name of a rather beautiful type of duck. We were overwhelmed when last week Bev and John presented us with our very own wood Indian Runner, which we have called Grace.  

 This year the Old Gaffers’ Association celebrates its 60th Anniversary with a ‘Round Britain’ cruise.  Last May Roger and I bought a gaff rigged boat so we could take part in this adventure.  She is a Cornish Crabber 26 called Indian Runner and is rather beautiful. Most gaff rigged boats are indeed old, but my bottom line for our boat was that she should not leak, have an engine that is reliable and ‘heads’ that work.  This led us to Indian Runner who was built in 2011.   You can see the details of the Round Britain Cruise on the Old Gaffer website  https://oga.org.uk/oga60/rbc60.html  Strictly, we can’t say we are sailing around Britain as we are cutting out the far north of Scotland and going through the Caledonian Canal from Fort William to Inverness on the East Coast.  To our delight, our good friends Rachel Edwards and Alan Bennett will be joining us for most of this - this is fabulous as they bring both great expertise and good company We a...