Arwen's meanderings

Hi everyone and welcome to my dinghy cruising blog about my John Welsford designed 'navigator' named Arwen. Built over three years, Arwen was launched in August 2007. She is a standing lug yawl 14' 6" in length. This blog records our dinghy cruising voyages together around the coastal waters of SW England.
Arwen has an associated YouTube channel so visit www.YouTube.com/c/plymouthwelshboy to find our most recent cruises and click subscribe.
On this blog you will find posts about dinghy cruising locations, accounts of our voyages, maintenance tips and 'How to's' ranging from rigging standing lug sails and building galley boxes to using 'anchor buddies' and creating 'pilotage notes'. I hope you find something that inspires you to get out on the water in your boat. Drop us a comment and happy sailing.
Steve and Arwen

Friday 13 September 2013

Salcombe tomorrow

It is looking ok for Salcombe tomorrow I think. High tide is around 13.05pm at 4.2 m; a neap, this means that tidal currents will be minimal in the confines of the fairway channel. The weather is looking as follows

0700Medium-level cloud11 °CNNW6 mphVery Good
1000Sunny intervals13 °CN10 mphVery Good
1300Medium-level cloud15 °CN11 mphVery Good
1600Sunny intervals16 °CN11 mphVery Good
1900Sunny14 °CN9 mphVery Good
NightClear Sky8 °CNW6 mphGood

This comes from the Met Office website. Wind direction may be an issue. If I want to head up river it will be a direct beat into the wind requiring lots of tacking but I am guessing most visitors boats have moved off moorings and the may well be some space in the channel and with neap tides the mudflats won't be so much of an issue first thing in the morning. If I launch for 10.00am then I can go up on the flood and come back down on the ebb. I will have a chance to explore one or two of the tributaries and may even beach on one for a week picnic break before getting off fast as the ebb begins.  I won't take fishing gear; you need your wits about you the upper channel although lower down towards the wolf rock you could get some reasonable drifts set up I suspect.

I had to buy some new flares and here is a lesson for us all. I suddenly discovered mine had expired by a year or so. Very careless seamanship. My orange buoyant float and the red a parachute flare still have two years on them but all the handheld orange smokes were well out. Now I face the irritating task of finding somewhere to dispose of them. The chandler didnt want to know. My nearest MCA coastguard station which might take them is Brixham, an hour away and around a one and half hour round trip. I want to dispose of them safely so I wonder what others do. If you have any ideas let me know via the comment box.
I ordered some more sheaves to finish the wooden blocks I have been making and irritatingly they haven't arrived either and the chandler I ordered them from didnt bother to tell me he was waiting for the, to arrive. I do hate sloppy service or lack of courtesy....a quick email just. Letting me know and offering me the choice of a refund or waiting goes a long way. Sufficient to say he has now lost my buqsiness and next time I will go elsewhere.
I wonder if I am beginning to suffer "victor Meldrew" syndrome in my older age? (Overseas readers, Victor was a character in a long running and popular comedy series here in the Uk...a retired man who was grumpy about everything and who had a very patient, long suffering wife...a very funny series......his catch phrase which for a time entered the English language as an idiom was "I can't believe it"...... Said in an an extremely exasperated tone!)

Anyway, moving on. Tonight I am making a new extension handle for my GoPro hero 2 camera. The idea is that it will give me some shots of Arwen from outside of the boat......I hope!
I have bought a cheap telescopic handle for a paint rush which extends to Round 8 feet. I will flatten the end with a hammer and drill a five mm hole into which I will secure a 5 mm bolt. Onto that will be screwed the tripod adapter for a GoPro camera and I'll superglue it on. I'll drill a hole further back down the pole through which a thin but tough safety lanyard will be tied , so hat sould the tripod mount untwist by some obscure method, the camera will still be securely attached.
We'll see how it goes but hopefully some footage will emerge along with some timed photo shots. I have so few shots of Arwen from a viewpoint of looking at her on the water.

I suspect tomorrow 

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