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

Sunday 24 July 2016

The best laid plans.....

I was hoping to get three days sailing in Falmouth this week, unfinished business from last year! I wanted to sail across to Helford and up that river and the Percueil but fate intervened. For various reasons that I won't bore people with, we are having a new replacement car. Nothing to do with the  existing one we have which we are very happy with, but we need something with more grunt power and so we are switching it for a 4 x 4 diesel. And so this week we give up the old car and get the new one and the tow bar has to be fitted and so that scuppers most of this week where I have time. Hey ho that is the way it goes.

https://youtu.be/aGvr8vQ9fEQ



Yesterday was a lovely sail day, steady breezes, plenty of sunshine, warmth on the face. Arwen and I pootled around the sound, off Cawsand Bay, over to the OCR buoys and then back down the eastern side of the sound. All in all, several hours of just tacking about passed by. It was fun despite muppet man in the big cruising yacht who had no understanding of rules of the road or any basic courtesy out on the water! We covered 15 miles back and forth at an average speed of around 4 knots. Fastest speed was just over 5 knots. 

5 comments:

Anonymous said...

Matey was on starboard by the looks of it?

steve said...

Was on starboard side but came from behind and was over 500m away when I first saw him and he had 500m either side of me at least. As we were both heading almost completely downwind, I'd interpret this as he was overtaking boat and to windward off me and therefore should have stayed clear of me. Not deliberately closed on me to point of being way, way too close, so that he stole all the wind and therefore made my boat lose way and steerage ability. Whilst there is no right of way in sailing and all of us have a duty of care to avoid collisions, it is generally accepted that if you are the overtaking boat, you stay clear. He closed to an unacceptable distance and showed scant regard for my ability to steer or manoeuvre. If we had been racing, then fair enough but since we weren't...............

Lorenzo said...

Hello Steve judging from the video your assessment of the rules and the particular situation is faultless. The yacht was coming along to overtake and should have done so by keeping clear of the slower (and frankly much classier) boat. Keep on enjoying your time on the water, kind regards

steve said...

Thanks Lorenzo . I've calmed down now. I am normally really laid back and chilled but that made me so cross.........such bad manners and seamanship on his part

Stuart said...

Name and shame, Steve, name and shame! Looks like another skipper who thinks that size trumps seamanship and that Colregs (Rule 13 in particular)are for everyone else.
Unfortunately, the sea's full of them!
Stuart