Christmastime

Monday 12^th December…  Well it’s that busy time of year again, but we’ve still made time to visit Thesee.  No need to rush today though so we didn’t start out until 9.30am. After last visit’s escapades we’ve managed to take back control of the Blog from Saffy Dog, and she has had all her privileges removed including being barred from blogging, facebooking, and tweeting !!

It’s rather dull and grey down here in Gosport, but the water is very calm, virtually mirror-like. The fairy lights are going up the mast to brighten the place up…… The Cockayne family have arrived everybody! So we took a walk to view our pretty fairy lights from afar, and in the darkness on the way back down the gangway onto the pontoon Linda put her hand right in the fresh pigeon poo on the handrail. How lovely!

Tuesday 13^th December…  Today started with rain showers and whilst we waited for these to pass Dean gave Linda a spontaneous lesson in changing two diesel filters in the engine (a pre-filter, and a main filter). She also learnt where the diesel shut off tap was, and how to bleed the system. Mmm interesting…. Then we took a stroll to the Chandlery in Gosport to buy an anchor chain bag.

After coffee, biscuits, and then lunch we spent the day doing jobs around the boat, Dean finishing off his security grill fittings for the hatches. This job has been ongoing for a few months now, and I think he is glad to see the back of it. Late afternoon Linda took Saffy for her afternoon walkies. In the marina there is now one pub, one restaurant, and one coffee shop. They all looked very welcoming with their Christmas decorations and candlelit tables.

The weather forecast looks decent for tomorrow, so we are planning to take Thesee out for a sail about.


Wednesday 14th December...  My word what a wonderful day for sailing. The sunny weather forecast lived up to expectations, and we departed our berth at 11am as per Linda's passage plan. The wind was South East Force 4. It was high tide, and after leaving the harbour we sailed our way along the Inner Swashway, and across the Solent to Osborne Bay on the Isle of Wight. At first we found ourselves almost drifting due to no wind, but about half way across the wind filled in and Thesee's top speed was clocked at 9.4 knots, wow! 

Here we are at anchor

Dean wanted to re-calibrate the anchor chain counter and so we headed into Osborne Bay (a very popular anchorage in the summer) and dropped the hook. We ate lunch outside in the cockpit and watched the cargo ships coming and going for an hour or so.

APL Temasek bringing cargo into Southampton

Sometimes it can be uncomfortable and bumpy here, but today was perfect conditions for anchoring. Here's a photo of Dean and Saffy enjoying the December sunshine. Today was one of the best sailing days we've had this year, we cannot believe it's Wintertime. 

No hats and coats today, ho ho ho

The return journey was just as good and as it was nearing low tide we took the Outer Swashway back into Portsmouth to be on the safeside. (It's deeper than the inner one). Time was getting on and the sun was setting, so whilst Dean was helming, Linda took the chance to get this lovely sunset photo. You get a thing about sunsets when you're a sailoress you know....

Sunsets at sea are the best

As it happened, a warship was following us into the harbour. Our mainsail was still up and we couldn't get the opportunity to go head to wind in order to drop the sail. So we had to just keep going until the warship turned off into the Naval Dockyard. 

Once back in the marina we wanted to put the fairy lights back up, as one of our neighbours had commented how nice they looked. Well everybody knows how tangled fairy lights can get and ours are 50 metres long! It wasn't an easy job getting them up the mast in the dark and Dean had one or two (...maybe more) temper tantrums during the process. Oh no....more rum and cokes needed quickly.

We'll be back soon Thésée....you can't keep us away for long xx