to drive or to fly

Nik and I are off on holiday tomorrow, with a week booked in Sharm El Sheik. Sadly, no boats involved, this time, but I did manage to negotiate a hotel next to the sea. On the easyJet itinerary it gives the address of the hotel we're staying at, along with a link to "Get Directions"

Seems there's a lot of roadworks between here and there.

weather watching

Forecast for Sunday is now looking a lot easier. But Saturday has turned grim, with gusts in the afternoon of up to 42 knots and 3m waves. It looks like it's coming in from the west, so if we left earlier to avoid it, we'd get caught before we reached Fowey.

So it looks like it's likely to be a maintenance weekend on the boat.

Once this lot blows through, next week actually looks quite pleasant. I'm reminded again that if I wasn't restricted to only using the boat at weekends, we'd get much more sailing in. Unfortunately, short of winning the lottery (and for that, I'd have to remember to buy a ticket) retirement is still another good ten years off. 

And who knows what my health or the world will do between now and then. So we'll continue to grab the moments as we can.

The photos were from the beginning of August, on the way out from Plymouth to Fowey. We should probably have waited another day before leaving, but I was keen to go; we ended up beating into gusts up into the high twenties. The crew were not particularly impressed; it took 35.5nm and seven hours to cover the 20nm passage, and as a concession to the crew I cheated with the engine for the last hour.

Petrella managed it beautifully however, and the crew were more than happy once we got to where we were going. And dolphins are always a welcome treat.

forecasting

The forecast for this weekend. It's only Wednesday, so it may yet ease, maybe. I'm heading down to the boat with Dad, and would very much like a last trip out Fowey and back before the end of the year and this is my last free weekend before January.

On the other hand, if the forecast is gusting more than 20 knots, I'm not sailing. There's no point in trying to be clever, we'll only damage the boat or ourselves.

On which point, I'm recovering. I'm still limping around on a single crutch, but improving daily. I'd be confident about sailing this weekend if the weather turns kinder, and am hoping to get back to karate next Tuesday.

We shall head down to the boat anyway this weekend. If for nothing else, I need to deflate the tender and stow it below. Although there are no free weekends left this year after the next one, I still mean to pick a few Sundays with suitable weather and take Petrella out for a day sail. We won't need the tender for that, though.

Unrelated to my foot, the last course of antibiotics seems to have done the trick, as it's been ten days now since the course finished and there's been no sign of the infection returning. Because the infection was unexplained, and recurred after the first course, the GP referred me to the hospital for a CT scan. I saw the consultant yesterday and he confirmed that it had showed up nothing sinister, which after a two week wait since the scan comes as something of a relief.

Ironically, although the scan showed my kidneys and general waterworks to be fine, the consultant did point out that the scan had picked up that I had a herniated disc in my lower spine. Which would explain the occasional back ache that I just put down to getting old or sleeping bad and mostly chose to try and ignore when it flares up. 

A bit like the tendonitis in my left foot that's left me lame the last couple of weeks.

Because of that, I didn't race the Albacore last Sunday. Ironically, almost as soon as I'd made the decision to cancel on Saturday evening, my foot started to improve and by Sunday I'd cast off one of my crutches as was occasionally making my way to the kitchen and back without either to make myself a cup of tea.

We had a night out last night. I bought tickets for myself, Nikki and my daughter Tash to go and see  one of my favourite singer songwriters, Frank Turner, at the Guildhall in Gloucester, and left my youngest, Sam, babysitting the grandchildren for the evening.

It was an excellent show. We caught an Uber into town and back, so I might have had a few beers just to ease the discomfort of standing on my bad foot all night. That was the first alcohol that has passed my lips in seventeen days. Oddly enough, I didn't enjoy it as much as I thought I would, but the gig itself was fantastic.

It's a venue I've played a few times in the past with my own band, though not for many, many years, and we never quite managed to fill the venue as he did. I actually enjoyed standing in the crowd, singing along shamelessly to my favourites, but otherwise watching somebody else do all the work. 

It was a great night.

thank goodness it's Friday

The week appears to have shot by. The now complete second course of antibiotics continue to appear to have done their job, though the last time it took a full week for the infection's resurgence after the completion of the first course. So jury is still out, but I'm optimistic.

Meanwhile, I haven't touched a drop of alcohol since a week last Saturday, which is a source of some personal lament, but wanted to give the antibiotics the best chance of doing their job. Despite the lament, I feel strangely proud of what is actually a pretty irrelevant personal achievement.

The weekend looms and I find myself still hobbling around on a set of crutches. My foot is improving, but still hurts and won't bear my weight. Ironically, it's a little over a week since the fifteenth anniversary of my breaking it. As my Grandad used to say any time we used to injure ourselves as kids, "You'll pay for that one day, son"

Thornbury, Sept 2010

It happened the weekend before a planned trip up the Severn Estuary from Thornbury Sailing Club to Frampton Pill that I'd organised with friends from Frampton-on-Severn Sailing Club. The break saw me relegated, despite my protest, disappointment and ingeniously having semi-waterproofed the fresh plaster-cast by wrapping it in a bin bag and securing it with duct-tape, from helming Dad's Wanderer dinghy to a spot as cameraman in the rib that was accompanying the Frampton fleet up channel.

Severn Estuary, Sept 2010

My son Ben stood in for me as helm and did a great job in my absence. The estuary is really just a big muddy river, but we were all just lake sailors, and any big muddy river with a 15m spring tide needs to be taken seriously.

Frampton Pill, Sept 2010

Once we were all safely landed in Frampton Pill and recovered to the sailing club, I did then steal a Hansa Access 300 from Sailability fleet, so did actually get some sailing in before the end of the day, crutches, bin bag, duct tape and all.

FOSSC, Sept 2010

This weekend I have a couple of gigs; a Bristol pub this evening, and then a beer festival in Stroud tomorrow afternoon. The need to be at the latter for about 1300 to load in would preclude me from karate tomorrow morning, even if my foot were recovered enough to train, and it's patently, frustratingly not.

However, if the rigours of being on my feet for a couple of gigs Friday and Saturday don't completely cripple me, assuming I can still pull a sailing boot over my ankle on Sunday morning (the swelling has definitely gone down a bit) then the plan is a race the Albacore with my young friend Alex. Getting the boat in and out of the water might be a bit of a challenge, but I'm sure Alex's dad will help. Once afloat, my theory is that with the Albacore I should be able to get from one side of the boat to the other through a tack or a gybe by way of a judicious hop, if necessary.

The photo at the top is, of course, Charlie. Laughing, I think, at his Grandad's plans for the coming weekend. The remaining photos were from three weeks ago, the last time I got out on the water. There was no racing scheduled, so Amanda and I decided to get a bit of practice in with the Lasers instead of sailing the Albacore as usual. It was a good day, still warm and a light wind with the occasional lively gust for entertainment; a fun bit of sailing.

Petrella: Salcombe, August 14th

In the end, we had a fine couple of weeks in August. The first week with Nik and Dad we made passage west, out to the Helford and back, via Falmouth and Fowey. Then I had to take Nik home for the second week, as she'd been unable to secure more time off work. 

Once I had her settled back at home, I returned to the boat and Dad and I found a gap in the second week's weather to head out east to Salcombe and back.

I'm not a huge fan of Salcombe town, though I admit as I grow more familiar, the town grows on me. But the pilotage to enter the harbour past it's sometimes formidable bar is engaging, and the harbour itself it gorgeous.

Although very popular, so you invariably end up rafted up on a mooring buoy alongside one or two other boats of similar size. Which I don't really mind.

There are options to anchor. We got quite used to anchoring with Calstar, but I've not done it with Petrella yet, although the previous owners did so a lot. That is, perhaps, something I should remedy.

We got back to Plymouth on the Friday evening, just ahead of some lively weather due in for the weekend. I retired to my bunk fighting fit Friday night, but Saturday morning I awoke to find myself unwell with, of all things, a nasty UTI.

Back home on Monday, the doc put me on a week of antibiotics. It knocked the infection on to the back foot but evidently didn't entirely clear it. The Saturday following the final dose of the first course, it came back with a vengeance. 

Another week of antibiotics, and a CT scan at the local hospital. The latest course of antibiotics are now complete and feel like they've done the job this time, but I'm waiting the results of the scan which I should have by next week at the latest. That I've not had a phone call in the meantime asking me to pop in to discuss them I count as a very good thing. No news has to be good news.

To top it all off, last Friday tendonitis flared up in my left ankle. I had two gigs over the weekend, so tried to show it due consideration and keep my weight off the foot as best I could, but the show(s) had to go on, so consequently it got quite nasty by the end of the weekend.

It's getting better now, but I'm still hopping around on crutches. I found myself sitting in the dentist's waiting room yesterday trying not to stare enviously at how easily people were able to just walk normally.

I'm optimistic I'll be fighting fit again for the weekend, another couple of gigs, karate Saturday morning, then racing at the lake all day Sunday. I haven't done enough of either this last month.

Anyway, I actually only intended to publish the photo of Petrella at the head if this post with a brief explanation, just to cheer myself up, and not the soliloquy of self pity that followed. But I'm going to leave it here, so that when I read back in a six-month or year or whenever, as I inevitably do, I can remind myself how lucky I am to still have my health and mobility.

I have the weekend of the September 19th free of gigs. Fingers crossed for the weather, my main ambition right now is to be fit enough to enjoy a final weekend away with Dad and Petrella before the winter really starts to close in.

Petrella: gannets at dawn

Petrella: departing Helford

Petrella: the difference a day makes

Earlier today, on passage from Fowey to Falmouth. No wind, so a day of motorboating, but this gorgeous creature was one of many to join us along the way.

Petrella: on passage to Fowey

Freefall: image over style

The weekend is finally all but here. Gig tonight, racing the Albacore with Amanda on the lake tomorrow afternoon, then down to the boat Sunday evening with Nikki and Dad. Weather permitting, sailing all next week. I actually haven't looked at the weather yet. Looking at it won't change it, and I don't want to disappoint myself unnecessarily early.

My brother, who also doubles as the bassist in my band, spends a lot of time viewing and editing all the video Dad takes at our gigs. Every so often, he'll send me an image he's clipped from one of them, then stylised in some way, probably using one of those AI tools that seem so prevalent online these days.

I'm typically pretty ambivalent about such things. It's long been very easy to apply a canvas / paint like effect to a photo or an image using various image processing tools. It might have been fun back in the late 90's, but the novelty wore off some years ago. I usually prefer the original image.

I quite like the latest he's sent me though.

SCSC: redemption

Twenty-two boats met on the start line for last Wednesday's race. Within my own fleet were seven Lasers, but with my usual nemesis Monty absent there were only two that offered serious competition that I had to beat; Bruce and Kean. The wind was gusting into the high teens, so the conditions would favour them both, as both are significantly taller and a little heavier than me.

The race officer laid a well considered course with two good legs beating to windward and a slightly port biased start line. I played for a conservative start, middle of the line amongst the pack, and immediately lost out to Kean who, as I'd half guessed he would, pulled off another port flyer. Although not as clean as the previous week's as this time he had an accompanying Solo cramping his style, they both made the best of the clean air and rounded the windward mark well ahead of the rest of us.

I, on the other hand, followed about a dozen places back, although still somewhere in front of Bruce, trying hard not to get swamped by the rest of the Hotdogs fleet.

photo: william gardiner

The first beat was followed by a quick reach across to a gybe mark on the other side of the lake, then a deep run down to the leeward mark. Kean's luck ran out. He sailed quite a direct line for the leeward buoy, which let the pack of closely following Solos and Aeros ride roughshod over him, sucking the wind out of his sail, whilst I, following behind, took advantage of the space and sailed high in cleaner air.

Kean appeared to stall, whilst I was pushed higher than I actually wanted to go by a Solo to leeward. I later discovered that, to compound the misery of everybody fouling his air, he'd also picked up a hefty lump of weed around his rudder that he was slow to notice.

Unfortunately, I wasn't the only one to take advantage of position on the downwind leg and Kean's unfortunate tangle with his clump of weed. As I was pushed up to windward by the Solo, Bruce snuck through the middle of the pack, somehow finding a clean path through the crowd of boats and rapidly catching me up.

I made a good mark rounding, claiming water on the inside of a stack of boats, wide in, tight out, hardening up neatly onto port on the second beat, forcing the Solo that had dogged me to leeward and was now tight on my stern to tack off quickly, leaving Bruce to follow us around still a couple of boat lengths astern.

A few more boat lengths, clean air, and I tacked off myself, looking for stronger, clearer air towards the middle of the lake. It was a mistake. Gradually, over the course of the beat, Bruce slowly inched ahead of me, and Kean persistently closed the gap from behind.

By the time we made the windward mark, I'd consolidated my lead over Kean, albeit not enough to be safe, but Bruce was now clear ahead.

photo: william gardiner

And that set the scene for the next couple of laps. Kean gradually dropped further back as I doggedly held on to Bruce, waiting for him to make a mistake that never came.

Until the very last leg. The committee boat had signalled the end of the race with the shortened course flag, we rounded the leeward mark and Bruce, still comfortably three or four boat lengths ahead, held onto a starboard tack out towards the edge of the lake. Seeing no advantage in simply following him, although not holding out much hope for a miracle at this stage, I tacked quickly onto port.

The wind shifted, giving the port tack a significant lift, but Bruce was blocked from tacking off the header by a Cadet to windward, I guess forcing him to sail on further than he'd have wanted until either they tacked, or he could tack and clear their bow.

Either way, across the short beat that we had left to the finish line, I slowly edged ahead, whilst he struggled to make up for the ground he'd lost to the adverse wind shift.

I was hiked out hard on a port beat, so both Bruce and the committee boat were in those last moments out of sight behind me as I closed in on the pin end of the finish line. The gun signalled somebody's finish and then, six seconds later, signalled a second boat crossing the line. At which point I finally glanced back, our race over, and saw to my delight and relief that the second boat had been Bruce.

So not a bad result after such an indifferent start: first in my fleet, and fifth out of the entire Hotdogs fleet of twenty-two boats. I almost felt bad for Bruce, as he'd sailed a fantastic race, only for me to clip his win from him in those very final few seconds.

He had some compensation however. The Hotdogs series, which includes all the boats on the water, inflicts a penalty to your handicap number for successive races for winning. I was carrying a 30 point penalty for a win much earlier in the season, whereas Bruce only had 20 points against his boat, which therefore gave him first place out of the entire fleet once, the timings had been corrected by our respective handicaps.

Interestingly, following a forty minute race, after corrected time there was only six seconds of difference between the first five positions. But more than a minute and a half between my fifth place and the boat following in sixth.

seventy-nine candles

It's Dad's birthday today, as he begins the last year of his eighth decade. Still haven't decided what to get him for a gift, but we're popping over to see him later so I'll need to have decided by then.

I don't really do cake, so in place of seventy-nine candles, here are seventy-nine photos, along with plans, hopes and wishes for many more adventures together.