I had a very short weather window the following morning. I needed to be at the entrance to the river Arun as close to high tide as possible. And I wanted the morning high tide, not the evening one because then there would already be too much wind again.
That meant getting up at 2:30 a.m. and casting off at 3:30. And … you guessed it…. Going against tide and wind.
The waves were still up and it was soon clear that sailing was no option. I would never make it in time. But motoring turned out not to work either. So we were tacking our way against the weather and the tide with sail and motor and were very much delayed at first but fortunately the waves diminished and we were able to go in a straight line.
It was only a 15 mile trip but it too a little over 5 hours. When I got into the river the tide had already turned which was no big deal but it made mooring (against a 2 knot current) all the more interesting. John from the Aruncraft Boatyard had already told me I could moor alongside this beautifully built classic Brixham trawler. This was no easy feat because there was nowhere to hold on to and no cleats. I had to actually jump up the side of the trawler with my lines while Amy was already going downriver with 2 knots speed.
I made it without scratching or hurting anything. The weather was supposed to turn bad towards afternoon and the wind was already picking up. But I had made it all the way to the place where my brother and I had bought Amy nine years earlier. This felt incredibly good.
The weather was supposed to turn really bad for at leats a few days if not a week so I was making myself comfortable.
The next day the sun was out all day and I could finally get everything dry. I worked on a few small projects and also inspected the boat as best I could from the inside and with the dinghy from the outside. Everything looked ok.
While I had the dinghy out I felt like trying out the electric outboard against the relatively fierce tide in the river. Very slowly we made progress against wind and tide but we did make progress and it was a lot of fun cruising around the river in the dinghy.
Later I went for a walk to west beach and cooked some pasta. Tomorrow I will see Andrew (Amy’s former owner).
