Wednesday 16 June 2021

normalcy resumed


We are back safe and sound. Pulling the passage log together and will post it up here soon. Suffice to say for now that we were exceptionally lucky with the weather, everything went, more or less, spectacularly to plan, dolphins and a seal were involved, and it was an absolutely wonderful trip.

Calstar is back in Portishead, half an hour down the road. Neap tides and balmy weather this coming Saturday, so I think Dad and I are going to take a day sail up under the bridges. It'll be nice if we get a bit of wind, but the tide will wash us up there and back anyway.

Other indications that I'm back and normality has returned is that I went for a run Monday evening, and was back at karate Tuesday evening. 

The deity of metrics that is Strava reckoned our 10 hour, 40 mile passage from the St Maws in the Fal to Newlyn was almost as much relative effort as my 5k run on Monday and twice as much relative effort as last night's karate.

But clearly a different kind of effort. Today I ache. More so than I have in a long time. Two weeks aboard Calstar appear to have left me more out of condition than a six month lockdown. It's not enough to stop me from intending to race my Laser this evening, but I am definitely suffering. 

It's kind of amusing, and oddly, a strangely satisfying sort of discomfort.

Interestingly, my heart rate during yesterday evening's session peaked at 179bpm, which is a bit higher than I've seen either running or sailing. I think 172bpm is the highest I've seen on a run.


The bit that really amused me however, was over the course of the hour session, the gps (which I'd only activated by accident) tracked me covering 4.4km. I don't exactly know why it should have surprised me, but it did.

Self (inflicted) pity aside, in other news, our illustrious leader has delayed the lifting of Covid restrictions by four weeks. I'm not exactly his greatest fan, to allow myself a little bit of understatement, but I can't judge him on this; it is what it is. 

However, I had eight gigs booked between now and end of July. Four of them have now cancelled because of the extended restrictions. Three of them will go ahead subject to restrictions being lifted in four weeks time as currently expected (that's going to be a very busy weekend) and one is going ahead anyway, despite the fact that restrictions will still be in force. So seats will need to be booked in advance, strict limits on numbers, no more than six to a table and wear a mask if you're not sat at yours. No dancing. Unless it's in your seat, at your own table, I guess.

Table dancing meant something completely different when I was a young man.

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