30th May We decided that the best day to leave Ipswich would be Tuesday, 22nd May as the wind was forecast to stop blowing from the east and change to the north east. Our alarms were set at 04:30 to…
Start off 2018
We have been busy over the winter getting Seaduction ready for 2018. We had sent our sails off to be checked and cleaned by our local Sail Maker in November. However due to unforeseen events the Sail Maker could not…
Ramsgate – Home
24th August Despite not having to leave Ramsgate until at least 11 am, we still woke early and after our first cuppa we washed and dressed. While Chris sorted out a few work related calls, Carole walked up the hill…
Eastbourne – Ramsgate
23rd August We were awake before our alarm went off and Chris checked the updated inshore weather forecast at 6 am, with all looking good to lock-out at 7 am. Another yacht called Loon was planning to go to Dover…
Brighton to Eastbourne
22nd August We awoke just before 7 am to blue skies and warm sunshine. Perhaps summer has finally come! We had our first cuppa while Chris checked that we were still good to go around 8.30. After we had washed…
Gosport to Brighton
Monday 21st August We had set an alarm for 5.15 am, to give us ample time to get ourselves organised for a 6.00 am departure. As we gently left our berth, Chris had his eye firmly on the depth gauge…
Yarmouth – Port Solent – Gosport
Saturday 19th August We slipped our lines just after 6.30 am and headed east out of Yarmouth, with our destination being Port Solent. We were planning to enter the Marina around high water on free flow. The wind was a…
Yarmouth, Isle of Wight
Arrived: Monday, 14th August Departed: Saturday, 19th August We had originally booked to stay at Yarmouth until Thursday morning, but because of the deteriorating weather conditions (mainly strong winds) we decided to stay until Saturday which coincided with Sally and…
Newton river to Yarmouth
14th August We enjoyed a nice quiet, settled night on the buoy and awoke to sunshine and a gentle breeze. After a couple of bowls of cereal to fortify himself, Daniel was up on deck with Chris eager to get…
East Cowes to Newtown River
13TH AUGUST We all slept well and woke early to sunny skies and a peaceful marina. After lovely hot showers and breakfast, we all did our own thing for a couple of hours. After lunch we got ourselves ready to…
Haslar to East Cowes
12TH AUGUST We awoke fairly early to a warm, pleasant day. After our first cuppa and biscuit, Carole decided to clear the dirty washing pile and headed off with the trolley to the newer laundry room nearer the marina reception.…
Chichester – Haslar
Thursday 10th August Our plan was to leave at midday so we would pass over the Chichester Bar just before high water and pick up the tide towards Haslar. We radioed in to the lock for our place in the…
Itchenor – Chichester
SUNDAY, 6TH AUGUST – PORT SOLENT TO ITCHENOR We got ourselves ready to leave at 08:00 via the lock. Our plan was to be at the Chichester Bar just before High Water. We followed our water track back towards Gosport…
GOSPORT TO PORT SOLENT
FRIDAY, 4TH AUGUST – GOSPORT TO PORT SOLENT It was nice to see the sun out when we woke this morning, so after breakfast, showers, etc, we took down and put away the canopy, ready for our short trip to…
Gosport – 2nd August
WEDNESDAY, 2ND AUGUST – GOSPORT We awoke Wednesday morning to a grey, damp day so decided it would be a good idea to put up the cockpit canopy to give us a drying out area for our jackets, umbrellas, etc.…
Weymouth -Solent
Monday, 31st July, 2017 Passage Time 6.5 hrs Distance 38.5 milies Wind SW av 16 knot Gusts. 22 knot Sea State Moderate Weymouth to The Needles We awoke to a positive weather window and made our decision to move on,…
Studland Bay to Weymouth
Studland Bay to Weymouth 13th July We set off out of Studland Bay keeping Old Harry’s Rocks a mile to starboard, then continued past Swanage. We had both sails up now sailing for Anvil Point. We had to keep about…
Yarmouth to Studland Bay
Yarmouth to Studland Bay 12th July We decided to take the north channel out past Hurst Point as we have done before. Chris had worked out that the earliest we could pass Hurst Point would be at 13:30 when…
Newtown River to Yarmouth
Newtown River to Yarmouth 12th July 2017 Passage Time 1.5 hrs Distance 4 milies Wind av 20 knot Gusts. 28 knot Sea State Moderate We woke to another pleasant day, although after the heat of the last few days, it…
Gosport – Newtown River
Gosport – Newtown River 9th July 2017 Passage Time 2 hrs Distance 12 milies Wind av 5 knot Gusts. 9 knot Sea State Slight We did not have to leave early to go to the Newtown River as the…
Brighton – Gosport
Brighton – Gosport 6th July 2017 Passage Time 8 hrs Distance 43.25 Wind av 11 knot Gusts. 22.5 knot Sea State Moderate We were getting ready to leave Brighton when a Belgium yacht arrived attempting to come alongside the pontoon.…
Sovereign Harbour – Brighton
Sovereign – Brighton 5th July 2017 Passage Time 4.5 hrs Distance 24.25 Wind av 11 knot Gusts. 15.5 knot Sea State Slight When we visited Brighton last year, we could not get in at low water due to silting…
Ramsgate to Sovereign Harbour
Sunday 2nd & 3rd July Ramsgate to Sovereign Harbour Passage time 10 hrs Distance 49.25 Wind av 13 knot Gusts. 22.5 knot Sea State Moderate When we awoke, our plan was to go to Dover, hopefully, for one night. Chris…
Ipswich to Ramsgate
Friday, 30th June Ipswich to Ramsgate Passage time 8 hrs Distance 44.23 miles Wind av 1.5 knot Gusts. 3 knot Sea State smooth We readied ourselves for our first leg to Ramsgate. The boat was fully provisioned and fuelled and…
Lowestoft Return
22nd May 2017 We had a very enjoyable weekend at Lowestoft, meeting up with some of our family and their friends on Saturday afternoon and evening. We had a reasonably early night as the 4 am start finally caught up…
Lowestoft Weekend
20th May 2017 We had originally planned to make our trip to Lowestoft on Friday, but the weather forecast promised strong winds, heavy rain and possibly thunderstorms, so not surprisingly we deferred our trip to Saturday when the weather forecast…
2016 – 2017 Winter
We took Seaduction out for the winter as usual in November. Engine serviced and winterised, Water tanks flushed and drained. This year we had decided to replace the Saloon upholstery and one of the rear mattress. The removal of the…
Home to Ipswich 2016
30th August – Tuesday We slept quite well, but woke early and were both up drinking tea well before our alarms went off at 7 o’clock. While Carole made the beds and wiped the condensation off the insides of the…
Dover to Ramsgate
29th August – Monday Our trip today was a relatively short one, but we still didn’t want to be pushing tide unless we really had to. Chris worked out that the best time to leave was about 9 o’clock, so…
Dover
Sunday 28th August We woke early Sunday morning and checked the weather. Not much change but we had the wind and tide with us and there were no major hazards apart from getting into Dover. We locked out of the…
Eastbourne
Saturday 27th August We were up and all ready to set off for Eastbourne at 10:00 so that we rounded Beachy Head near low water. We managed to put the sails up and were making good progress. As we passed…
Gosport – Brighton
Thursday 25th August We returned to Gosport on separate trains as Chris had some work to complete in London. Carole returned early afternoon and began preparing the boat and us for sailing to Brighton first thing in the morning. There…
Gosport
19 – 22 August – Friday to Monday As we tucked Daniel and Bobby into bed, we reminded them that we would be sailing across to the mainland the next morning so they would have to be up and ready…
Newtown Creek
18th August – Thursday We awoke to a lovely bright morning and after breakfast and showers onboard, we got organised for our short sail into the Newton River. Chris filled our water tanks and checked our charts and books as…
Yarmouth August
15th – 17th August – Monday to Wednesday We spent three days at Yarmouth, really enjoying our time with Sally, Tony and children. On Monday we spent the day at the Needles landmark attraction. We visited the Alum Bay Glass…
Poole to Yarmouth
14th August – Sunday We awoke to a beautiful, sunny morning and after showers and breakfast, Carole took a walk to the Tesco’s to buy milk, water, etc to see us through while at Yarmouth as the stores there…
Poole
12th August – Friday We left our berth in plenty of time for the 10:00 bridge opening. There were several others leaving with us so we had to jill about for a few minutes in a limited space. The bridge…
Weymouth
8th August – Monday The morning began dry, bright and breezy and as our trip across into Weymouth was very short, we had a relatively lazy morning. We had already called Weymouth marina and booked ourselves in for a few…
Portland 2
7th August – Sunday Despite the strong winds overnight we had a reasonable night’s sleep. The problem here is that although the water is protected by the breakwater, the wind just comes straight in over Chesil beach with nothing to…
Portland
6th August – Saturday Our alarm went off at 05:30 and we quickly got ourselves ready to slip our lines at 06:00. Chris checked the weather forecast which was a SW 3-4 increasing W 5 later with possible fog patches.…
Salcombe 2
4th August – Thursday We were awake before the alarm woke us, with Chris immediately checking the latest weather forecast and Carole putting the kettle on for a cuppa. All looked as expected and so we got ourselves ready to…
Plymouth
31st July – Sunday We woke after a reasonable night’s sleep on the mooring and after getting washed and dressed, we decided that we would take the dinghy over to the town and treat ourselves to breakfast before heading off…
Helford to Fowey
30th July – Saturday We were awake just after 7 am feeling refreshed after a quiet night. After we had dressed and had our first cuppa, we sorted out the dinghy and outboard engine so that we could explore further…
Helford River
28th July – Friday We awoke to sunshine and light showers and after having our own in the marina facilities, we discussed over breakfast whether we should stay one more night in Falmouth or head in to the Helford…
Falmouth
26th July – Tuesday The weather forecast for the next few days did not look that good so we decided to spend just one night at Fowey or we would have been weather bound for two or three days with…
River Fowey
25th July – Monday We both woke early this morning, although Chris was up first putting the kettle on for a cuppa before we went across for a shower. The night had been a damp, cold one and Carole…
Plymouth and the River Yealm
22nd July – Friday We arrived back in Plymouth at about 4 pm after a tedious six hour train/tube/train journey from home. On checking the weather and tides, etc. we decided we would get organised to leave Plymouth first thing…
Plymouth
14th July – Thursday As our rafted up neighbours decided to stay in Salcombe for one more night, they moved off onto another space on the pontoon just after 10.00, leaving us free to go when we were ready. At…
Salcombe
12th July – Tuesday A good night’s sleep was enjoyed by both of us and we were up just after 6.30. We got ourselves organised and left Noss Marina at 7.30. The wind was just making a few ripples on…
Noss on Dart
10th July – Sunday After a reasonably quiet night’s sleep, we awoke to a grey day and a weather forecast of strong winds. As we had now been on a mooring buoy for three nights, we decided it was time…
Dittisham – Cont’d.
7th July – Thursday (contd.) Not long after we got settled on our mooring, we were paid our first of three visits by one of the Dart Navigation harbour masters collecting mooring fees/river dues. Since our last visit in 2012,…
River Dart – Dittisham
7th July – Thursday Chris inflated our dinghy (Tender to Seaduction) on the pontoon so that we could tow it to Dittisham. This is quite difficult if we have to do this out on the water. Once inflated Carole helped…
Brixham
6th July – Wednesday We sorted ourselves out first thing Wednesday morning ready to catch the 10:00 bridge opening. Chris calculated that we needed to be at the tip of Portland Bill at 13:00. If we got this wrong we could…
Weymouth
3rd July – Sunday We were up bright and early and left Poole Quay at 09:00 to be at the No 1 Bar Buoy off of Studland Bay at 10:00. We were joined by two other yachts heading the same…
Poole
1st July We checked the weather forecast and decided things looked OK to move on to Poole. We topped up our diesel here as Yarmouth have a good pontoon to come along side. We slipped our lines and left the…
Yarmouth
30th June We woke up to sunshine today which made a change from the bad weather we have been having. We prepared the boat for sailing and after breakfast and a shower we slipped our lines and left Southampton Quay. …
Southampton
29th June 2016 Southampton We left the boat at Southampton Quay Marina for a week to go back home. We had a good journey back via London by train and tube and it wasn’t until we stepped off the bus…
East Cowes and Southampton
17th – 19th June We left Haslar Marina in Gosport at about 10:00 and joined the channel to leave Portsmouth Harbour. All yachts must leave via the small craft channel. This was very busy just like the M25. Once out…
Gosport
16th June Thursday Passage planning for sailing is always difficult. You need to take into account many factors: wind, tide at departure and arrival, is there enough water when we arrive, etc etc. I had made my plan to leave…
Brighton Continued..
12 June Sunday We had tied up safely on visitors’ pontoon 11, starboard side to, facing shore. Our intention later, when the wind died down, was to turn the boat round, facing out. Evening time came and we were certain…
Brighton
12th June 2016 We set our alarms for 6 am and were ready to leave our pontoon for the lock-out at 7 am. All went to plan and we exited the lock. Carole put all the fenders away before we…
Sovereign Harbour Cont’
11th June We should have had a lie-in this morning, but our body clocks seem all out of sorts and we were wide awake at 7 am, so we got up and had breakfast, tidied up and washed and dressed…
Dover to Sovereign Harbour
10th June 2016 We had set our alarms for 06:00 so as to leave at 07:00, but stirred before they went off. We got ourselves organised and were soon out of the lock. We followed three other yachts out of…
Ramsgate to Dover
9th June 2016 Our departure from Ramsgate was at a more civilised time today and so we were able to sit and have breakfast at the table before getting ready to leave our berth. As usual for Ramsgate the wind…
Ipswich to Ramsgate
8th June 2016 We both woke early, around 3.30 a.m. a good 20 minutes before our phone alarms and after a quick wash and dress and more importantly, a hot cuppa and biscuit, we readied the boat and locked-out into…
Our plans for 2016
We have decided to revisit the South and South west of England this year. In 2012 we sailed these waters and enjoyed the varied ports and harbours. We are planning to leave at the end of May or first week…