We left Shamrock Quay for Lymington on 22 May. Berthons kindly gave us a really easy berth to get into, C51 which we could go straight into - assisted by a whole racing boat crew who were unloading their stuff on the pontoon. Being right next to the fuel pontoon also made it easy to get our fuel canisters refilled - first red diesel we have used since I cleaned out the tank, but since we won’t be going to Belgium on this trip it doesn’t matter.
Berthons was fully booked for the bank holiday weekend so we moved to the town quay. This was really good, it’s fun rafting with other boats and meeting and helping new people. We also met up with Mark again, whom we had first met when we got engaged. He told us that Lymington Town Quay is going to be redeveloped in 2019 - sadly the new layout will mean we can’t go there any more in Marelle, and no more rafting.
On 29 May we left for Dartmouth at 1:30 a.m. to make sure we got the tide right to get through the Needles, and arrive in Dartmouth in daylight. It was very dark leaving as it was cloudy and quite poor visibility too, so a bit spooky, with flat calm water. Going through the Needles we reached 9.4 knots! The water was swirling around too like it does going past a ferry - a bit disconcerting steering through that. We motor sailed to Dartmouth with the jib out occasionally. Martin steered when we got to Dartmouth as he knew the entrance from previous sailing trips, and we moored up on a deep water mid river pontoon (“Deep Water 3”).
In Dartmouth I realised I had been over zealous tidying up the boat before we left, and had taken home too much paraffin. We ordered some more, after an unsuccessful search in the Dartmouth chandlery. We also ran the wiring for the solar panel, and ordered a new 100W panel. We used Dartmouth Yacht Club for showers, that was really good, and found a great pub The Dolphin that did really good food and had a good atmosphere too, with lots of locals. Martin helped a couple on a boat moored next to us on the pontoon to make a boat cover, so we ran out of shock cord hooks and I ordered some more from Kayospruce. We walked up to Dartmouth Castle and looked around, then got the ferry back. There are some amazing houses on the waterfront in Dartmouth, most seem to be holiday lets.
We spent a few days sorting out the steaming light, which had failed as we came through the Needles. I changed the circuit breaker from 15A to 5 A, and we got a new bulb, and called a local rigger (Petersen Rigging) as I wasn’t sure how to undo the light fitting. Of course, the new bulb didn’t fit - so later armed with a new LED bulb I went up the mast and changed the bulb! A bit scary at first, especially having to use both hands to do the light and holding on to the mast with just legs. The new bulb flashed once then went out, so we wondered if I had put it in the wrong way round, but after swopping the connections at the base of the mast it was still not working. We tested a bulb at the wiring at the base of the mast which was fine, so decided to replace the mast wire, and got Petersen Rigging out again. Olly was superb and ran the new wire through for us and connected it up, while I connected the wire at the base of the mast. All fixed! The old wire that came out was ordinary household wire and had burned through.
Meanwhile the new solar panel arrived and I fitted an 8A fuse in the solar panel wiring (positive feed to the CTEK D250). It works great - 2.5A vs 1A from the old panel. We can’t really use both together though as they are different voltages. Martin wants to sell the older one, even though it’s easier to store as it’s more flexible.
On Friday 8th June we sailed to Falmouth. There was a Westerley rally that had the deep water 3 pontoon booked, and we wanted to get to Falmouth before the winds changed to the south west.
We arrived in Falmouth and picked up a visitor mooring buoy on the first attempt. We had arrived just before the Golden Globe preparations which had the Falmouth Haven marina booked up. We made contact with Susan, and she texted me from the Royal Cornwall Yacht Club to say she could see Marelle on the mooring. The next day she came by in a motor boat.
We have some delignification of the wood around the hull anode, so we disconnected it and washed it with fresh water. I ordered a hanging anode kit from ASAP Supplies, and some thick (4mm) wire to extend it. We ran the new wire through the pushpit.
After the Golden Globe, we arranged a lunch with Susan’s help at the club, for the people who used to sail with Ben. It was great to meet people and hear their stories.
On Friday 15 June we moved to the Falmouth Haven marina, after the Golden Globe boats had left. As we were mooring up, one of the marina staff told us we couldn’t stay for a week as the Falmouth Classics had booked the marina. We decided to enter the Falmouth Classics as the website said mooring was on a first come first served basis. Mark from Falmouth Haven explained that we would have to leave if the Falmouth Classics berthing manager didn’t have us on his list, “or there would be repercussions” when Mark got back from his week off.
Over the weekend Martin said we should look for a Walker Bay sailing dinghy for sale on the internet, and we found one! We put in an offer which was rejected, but then with 3 minutes to go we decided to bid anyway and we won it, for £190 less than we had offered! Only snag being we needed to hire a van to pick it up from Bournemouth.
Since we were so close to home we called in to reset our router and pick up the light genoa, and sewing machine. After a long day of driving we had a new dinghy and were still a bit shocked to have got it!
Thursday, the day after the lunch with Susan at the RCYC was the start of the Falmouth Classics booking. We were asked to leave and told we hadn’t entered, despite Susan saying that the Falmouth Classics treasurer had emailed her to say that we had entered the Friday before, and the money having been paid and an email confirmation. Unfortunately, there were also 20 knot winds pushing us on to the pontoon, and we had a 15 ton steel boat outside of us too. The Falmouth Haven marina staff arranged a launch to pull the steel boat out, which hit the steel boat’s anchor on the way in, not inspiring confidence. The club bosun came over in another launch and took a line from the steel boat’s stern, which saved the day as otherwise it would have drifted back on to Marelle.
As we were getting ready to go, the Falmouth Classics berthing manager directed two large boats with bowsprits to moor up behind us, and rafted 5 boats in front of us. The wind was still blowing 20 knots on to the pontoon, and now we had no way of getting Marelle out. We tried with the assistance of the club bosun’s launch, but the wind was still too strong, and during the third attempt Marcus Pomeroy-Rowden the skipper of Grayhound, one of the large boats with bowsprits blocking our way out, came over and interfered with our lines, shouting and swearing at Martin and when Martin explained we couldn’t spring Marelle off due to our rudder/prop configuration (prop above and behind so unlike most boats we have no prop wash), Marcus started throwing punches at Martin. At this point we called the police and gave up on getting Marelle out. Of course the police took some time to arrive, but we were both so shaken up that we couldn’t have done anything anyway. The general manager of Falmouth Haven, Barry, came down with some people from the office and Martin asked his advice on if we could use our ground tackle or a mooring buoy to winch ourselves off, but Barry said this was not ok as the buoy was not rated for Marelle’s weight and there were too many chains to foul the anchor.
By the time we had given a statement to the police, it was late afternoon and Martin offered to the Falmouth Classics berthing manager to have boats alongside, but he did not put any there. The pontoon party was spent with people coming over and asking why we hadn’t left, and telling us we weren’t welcome. We were also wary of a repeat attack by Marcus whose boat was still next to ours on the pontoon.
One or two people were nice, including one of the annual berth holders who used to be a Channel pilot, manoeuvring big ships for a living. We asked him if he had any ideas or suggestions how to get away, but he didn’t have any solutions - just prayer! We also saw Robert who we know from the Cowes Classic regatta - it was so nice to see a friendly face.
The next morning when the boats had gone out to race, we moved Marelle to the next pontoon and then off to the mooring buoy we had been on while waiting for the Golden Globe boat’s to leave. While we were still in Falmouth Haven, Fraser and Sue came down and we had a succession of visitors who knew Marelle from Ben’s ownership of her in Falmouth.
We took part in the parade of sail on the Sunday, so Susan could see Marelle from Pendennis point.
Afterwards, we checked with the Falmouth Haven marina staff if the marina was reserved again and they said not till Falmouth week in August, so we moved back to the marina again. The next day they put out reserved notices for the RCYC blind week. When we moved to a space on the pontoon that wasn’t reserved, several people shouted that the harbour master had reserved that space for another boat. We tied up and Martin checked with the harbourmaster, Steve, who said it wasn’t reserved, but Martin offered to move alongside the boat in front of us, which we did to get out of the way.
We paid for 7 days in the marina office. That night, the people on the boat who had told us they had the pontoon reserved switched their engine and really bright floodlights on at 22:00 and ran the engine till Martin asked them to switch it off at 23:30.
The next day Steve said that Mark wanted to see Martin in the marina office, and we were told to leave. We moved straight over to Pendennis marina, and the staff there were fantastic. We saw Scott there, another friend from the Cowes Classic regatta, who skippers Saskia and a very smart motor boat Kestrel of Lorne, and spent a great evening drinking a few glasses of wine on board Kestrel with him.
