Well we did it, home at last!
An 05.30 start gave us the last of the ebb out of Pyefleet Creek, the Rivers Colne and Blackwater and across the Spitway with a minimum depth of 1.5m under the keel, quite a contrast to the hundreds of metres we we seeing in the Irish Sea not so many weeks ago.
On the way out of the Blackwater we passed the huge 49.7m yacht Meraki at anchor.
The light SW breeze was enough to fill the sails but not enough to get us back by HW, so the final leg was sailing with a bit of motor to maintain the speed. Gradually, first Shivering Sands and then Red Sands towers, followed by the Kent Coast came into view. It really felt like we were almost home. We managed to keep the sails filled as far as where the Yanlet And Medway approach channels split. Then a few miles passing the Montgomery wreck with the Genoa rolled until we were able to turn towards the Medway entrance and enter the river and pass Garrison point with full sail set. The point our circumnavigation of Great Britain ended after 78 days.
Rather fittingly Sheerness Lifeboat launched on exercise just as we were entering the river. Thank you to everyone that has contributed to our JustGiving page.
We continued on to be met by Charles and Roon in Molly Coddle who had brought out a bottle of bubbly. We continued on and rafted up on Foreness’s mooring and had a drink to celebrate the 2050 Nautical Miles, 2359 miles or 3797Km covered.
As we approached HW I brought Jeddo into the Jetty and was welcomed home by many more friends at the club.
The posts will remain on the club website and I will index them to make them easier to look back on. I haven’t forgotten the missing days that I didn’t get around to posting as we approached the North West tip of Scotland and the Orkneys. It was probably the most memorable part of the journey. I will write them up soon. At some point I will also try and caption some of the photos, that may take a little longer.
I hope everyone has enjoyed sharing our experience.
Thank you Dave so much for the really interesting blog. I’m amazed you managed to write all that and sail single-handedly round Britain!
Thank you also for the wonderful photos,some excellent, some a little far away!
A huge congratulations to you both for sticking at it and completing the round Britain journey!
WELCOME HOME!
Regards
Gill
Thanks Gill, writing was fairly easy on the calm days. I could put the iPad on the hatch cover and stand typing and keeping watch at the same time. Not so easy on the rough days which was the reason for some posts being a day or two late. The pictures were more of a problem. I had to transfer them from my phone and later on, after I had been lent a better camera as my SLR was broken, transfer from a SD card to the iPad and try and decide what I should upload. Uploading was quite a slow process over mobile data and picking the correct pictures was quite difficult, hence some too far away. Editing and cropping wasn’t easy at sea, so I often uploaded most of the pictures and hoped for the best.
well dune too you both , am so envy ,, i wish i had sails
congratulations
regards
paul
Well done ! Fantastic trip and thanks for the blog stuff