Saturday 22nd July

Osprey
John Bowering
Sun 23 Jul 2006 11:53
Quit a day. The plan was to leave Portland early for Boothbay Harbour but
dense fog prevailed until about 1330 and we used the time to give Osprey a
good clean. The crew did a great job and we have some good pictures which
we will post on the diary when we can. We finally got away about 1330 on
the second attempt having abandoned the first because the fog closed in
just as we were leaving the Marina. We felt our way out of the harbour
which is a complex and narrow waterway and finally left the fairway buoy
at about 1500. Forecast was for a good following wind which had encouraged
us to leave but turned out to be completely the opposite and we were
quickly having to motor into a head sea and wind. Then the heavens opened
and we had the most incredible downpour the like I have not seen outside
of Hong Kong in the typhoon season. The crew progressively went down with
Mal de Mer until eventually only the skipper was left standing and at the
helm. This rain continued for four hours and at times it was difficult to
see the bow of the boat from the helm position. We abandoned trying to get
into Boothbay Harbour as even with radar the entry was too risky and we
opted for South Bristol which we now know quite well. Finding the quarter
mile wide Fisherman?s passage was very difficult and fortunately Rishi
bounced up and helped with the navigation.He has proved a natural mariner
and was only asleep offwatch - he says! The amount of moisture in the air
made using glasses almost impossible so Rishi did the chart reading using
his own very innovative words to describe what he saw on the waterproof
chart and calling out the courses. Even GPS is a little suspect in such
tight quarters but to both the skipper and Rishi?s relief we got through
passage and found the buoy that allowed us to turn safely for South
Bristol. We were lucky that our old berth was empty and more than that,
the boats mat which we had left on the quay by accident last week was
still there which really surprised us when we berthed and 1945. The
harbour side Café fed us though the girls ate next to nothing and only now
some two hours after we arrived have they started talking again which
seems to indicate they are coming back to normal! Anita declined food all
together which probably also an indicator of the overall day. The tumble
dryer is now going flat out so we are ready to go to Boothbay tomorrow.
Only a two hour run but will need some visibility to negotiate the
channels. It would be nice to have a decent wind both in strength and
direction as the crew have now become pretty good at winding the boat up
with the main and Genoa and are keen to get a third sail ? the yankee
staysail ? flying as well. The boat sails very well and we have had
slightly better than ten knots out of her so far. We hopre we have got all
the gremlins out of the engine at last but a post passage check tomorrow
will give a better idea. Unfortunately most of the problems have proved to
be man made during the work done over the winter and for example we
finally pinned down the oil leak to the the almost innaccessible old tacho
drive housing which had not been capped when converted to electronic
drive! We also found that three of the injector housings had not been
torqued down correctly and were leaking.