‘Honey I shrunk the Scilly Isles’ trip – 17-20 May 2021  - Report by all involved

Skipper: Jerzy Wieczorek  . Crew: Alex Barry  , Don Hirst  , Mick Hewitt  and Nigel Alltimes 

Bavaria 36 ‘Sea Shanty  ’ from Plymouth Yacht Charter

Our plans were affected by the Plague – probably not the first mariners to experience that. The trip dates veered from June to September ’20 then backed to 17th May this year. There they steadied.

Similarly, the trip’s scope reduced as it was felt that aiming for the Scilly Isles, none of us having sailed for a very long time, would have been, well … you’ve guessed it … silly. Last but not least, Jeff Woolmer, one of the original co-skippers, had to drop out because of working away

in Turkey. Thanks to the club for absorbing the additional cost of his place. Meanwhile fingers remained crossed, months passed and finally, at last, it happened!!! Sailing!!!!!

Sea Shanty was very well presented, the boat had been maintained to a high standard. David met us in the QAB bar and stood us all coffees while potential sailing plans and the weather were discussed. The handover briefing was very comprehensive and knowledgeable. By the time we’d stowed everything and got ready for some sailing it was 1630. Nevertheless, we set off and headed out of Plymouth Sound to meet lively conditions which were well matched by our two reefs. After a few miles of sailing beyond the breakwater we headed back to berth. Everyone had had a turn at the helm, and we’d started to remember what it was all about. Supper was on board – an excellent vegetarian chilli pre-prepared by Alex.

Tuesday presented us with the expected showery/sunny weather, a South-Westerly F4 and a lively-ish sea. We headed westwards. There was sudden drama when the gas alarm went off, but no gas leak discernible. The cooker supply was off at the tap. David was phoned and advised replacing the (brand-new) gas sensor, but the spares could not be found, so the boat electrics were turned off to stop the noise. There was definitely no gas leak! We were navigating traditionally, had an up-to-date weather forecast and could see the changes in the weather in front of us. We tacked before Looe Island, took out a reef, tacked again onto the making tack, put the reef back. Talking through these manoeuvres before doing them helped a lot. Before entering Fowey, we gritted our teeth and turned on the electrics so as to have a depth sounder. Alex brought us alongside the lifeboat quay accompanied by the sound of the gas alarm. In the calm of the harbour, the spare gas sensors were located and a new one tried, but to no avail. Eventually we realised that the noise was not coming from the gas alarm, but from the bilge-pump-can’t cope sensor which had been accidentally knocked into test mode. Peace and calm at last!

We went to the Lugger. Yes, we did. We sat inside and we drank beer. Again. A meal was had back on board. Plenty of good conversation and fun, mostly fuelled by contents from a bottle or can. As befitted the boat we sang sea-shanties. You’ll be glad to know there’s no record of this, but it was reasonably tuneful. Mindful of the oncoming storm forecast for Thursday and another low predicted for Sunday going further West did not seem prudent. But Wednesday dawned sunny with a SW F4. We aimed straight for the Eddystone with a fabulous run, on genoa alone without the constant need to check for a gybe. Once we’d rounded the lighthouse, we put up the main and with the wind still South-Westerly beam-reached gloriously all the way back to Plymouth, touching 9.3 knots at one point. At this point Nigel had to leave us, having heard that his daughter was undergoing elbow surgery after an accident.

The following day brought the expected storm and it looked like there wouldn’t be much sailing for a couple of days. David very kindly offered to bank 3 days of the trip against a future booking if we wanted to leave it at that, and after some discussion his offer was accepted. So, we packed, cleaned and left. During the handover briefing we’d had a slight twinge on being told a vacuum cleaner was included in the inventory, most crew go sailing to get away from those. However, a dustpan and brush could not be found, and the vacuum cleaner was deployed. It did the job very well in a fraction of the time – an excellent piece of kit.

Some final thoughts:

It was a good sociable trip in the best BSA tradition. We did depart from tradition to good effect: instead of going to the first pub in the Barbican we went to the Greek restaurant a few metres further on and were treated to excellent meals with very good service.

The joy of sleeping on a waterbed after 2 long years.

Thanks to Mick for his driving and to Nigel and Don for kindly shopping and to Jerzy for skippering us safely there and back. And to Alex for keeping the sails in trim.

It was very important to see how quickly the weather and conditions can deteriorate and surely that is the test of our character that we all came through stronger for it and bonded together as a crew.

I finally made use of that sailing jacket that I bought off Alan’s mate at the December 2019 meeting.

We had loads of food left over and decided to donate most of the non-perishables to a food bank. While asking about that at the marina office, Simon Beeby of Liberty Yachts kindly offered to do that for us. Many thanks to Simon!

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Postscript – Your secretary has just returned from the Scilly Isles, where Wally has taken up residence in the harbour at St Mary’s. Last Wednesday he spent the day on a pontoon preventing the couple who had chartered the boat whose bowsprit you can see from sailing.