I should add, last time Hels said "I think I'm going to faint", it was in similar conditions but deep in the depths of winter and the boat was swamped after our fifth or sixth capsize. She'd been coping quite well until then, so I just grinned and set to it once again. We had a race to win.
And then I had to turn her face-up to stop her drowning in the swamped hull, and manage the boat single-handed back to a gusty lee shore, swamped and belligerent, whilst keeping half an eye on her inert form to make sure she didn't invert in the bilge and start drowning all over again.
She's a fantastic sailor. The best crew I've ever sailed with, but sometimes proves a little more delicate than me.
But she's game. Very game. No matter how many times I tip her in or bash her with the boom, dunk her or half drown her, she always comes back for more. And she knows Buffy and her whims as well as me, if not better, from the perspective of the front seat.
It currently feels like taking second best whenever I'm relegated to sailing Buffy at the weekend, at least at the moment. Because it generally means it's too rough to risk taking Calstar out, and I'm currently head over heals in love with a certain Griffon.
But when we do take Calstar out, the thing I then miss is sailing with Hels as crew. Though Dad's a pretty neat replacement, and I wouldn't swap him for the world. Especially out there. He's utterly invaluable and totally bomb proof.
Will have to work on convincing Hels to trade up. We've room for a couple of extra bodies and a whole summer to come. We'll get there.
Though perhaps not next week. Springs. Low tide is around noon. Possibility of revisiting the Holms on Saturday, if I can convince Nik to let me go sailing. And a down-channel race with PCC on Sunday in any case, weather permitting.
Down channel is fun, but long hours. Not a good introduction to sailing out in the Bristol Channel.
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