Sovereign Harbour Eastbourne

Spectra
Paul & Norma Russell
Wed 15 Jul 2015 20:25
Sovereign Harbour Eastbourne
50:47.45N 000:19.66W
75 mile run today
12697 miles run since Ramsgate 
 
    So we have crossed our outward path again and turned up at Sovereign harbour Eastbourne where we first took possession of our boat Spectra in 2010. The plan today was to leave Yarmouth at 0500 to catch the tide and travel up as far as Brighton, like all good plans that didn’t survive first contact with reality. Well we had a bit of everything on the way down here. We popped out of the Solent doing 9 knots over the ground as we passed the Spithead forts giving a cruising catamaran a damn good thrashing along the way only to lose the wind and drift for an hour with the tide. Eventually I called it quits and we motored for the next hour, then the wind came up and we soon had the spinnaker flying and the boat speed was up to respectable levels again. As we came up on Brighton I realised that we still had a lot of day left and so put it to the vote, do we carry on to Eastbourne? All agreed and so our fate was set. 30 minutes later the wind went fluky and stayed that way for the rest of the trip leaving us alternately sailing or motoring as the conditions changed, and they changed a lot! To top it off we ran into thick fog as we approached Beachyhead and were soon down to 1/2 mile visibility. That was it until a couple of miles outside of Eastbourne when as if by magic we were in clear skies and no wind. We were greeted at Eastbourne with their usual professionalism, welcoming us back and pulling all of our details from the computer  so that we felt really welcome.
    That leaves us all safe and sound snugly moored in Eastbourne at 2000 having completed 75 miles in the last 15 hours hardly a blistering pace but at least we have now broken the back of the return leg.
 
Next stop Dover on Friday and then back to good old Rammers by 1400(ish) on Saturday for tea and medals in the club.