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

Saturday 2 May 2015

Missing the DCA rally

Life is full of little surprises.
I was looking forward to attending my first DinghyCruising Association rally this weekend. The plan was to launch at Mountbatten ,sail up the Tamar, overnight at Forder Creek and then leave the rally to sail home Sunday morning. I needed to do work bank holiday Monday. 

As it was, OFSTED put pay to that. They descended on us on Thursday and Friday. No sleep Wednesday or Thursday night. A fair and human inspection team but is still an extraordinarily stressful process.

I've slept most of the day. I can't believe how tired I feel. So I've missed the rally. 
Unbelievable really but there we are.
I hope they have a good sail but I fear it will be a damp one

4 comments:

Alden Smith said...

I agree about how stressful these visits are - In a career spanning 40 years continuous teaching I have endured a large number of these things.
In New Zealand the Inspection Teams were originally called 'Review And Audit Teams' RATS for short!!! so that was changed pretty quickly to the 'Education Review Office' ERO.

I just used to call them 'Those pack of bastards' LOL.

steve said...

All our inspectors wee lovely. Most were serving heads and deputies and very humane.

Alastair said...

You missed a great rally, though it was a bit wet if you aren't used to such things. Hope to see you at another one.

steve said...

Hi alistair
Sorry it was wet....never worried me as a mountaineer....quite used to it.
Glad you had a good time. Look forward to reading about it
Steve