David Penn of the local SSOA was hosting a Bar-B-Q in the Yealm River on the evening of the 17th of June, we decided we would like to go and the weather forecast was looking good.
I finished my work late on Thursday having worked non stop for the last eleven days, Vicki had packed the gear for the weekend and we left home at 8pm to stay aboard that evening for a early start the next morning. We had booked a table at the Ship Inn in the Yealm River for the Friday evening.
I raised the main and dropped the mooring at 0545hrs and we sailed out Gillan and headed for the Yealm 44nm to the east. I had a play with the radar which had only just been made to work after since we bought “Elektra” we had found the negative wire was off behind the main switch panel. We sailed for about 1.5hrs at 3 to 4kts before deciding we needed to motor as the chart plotter was telling us we wouldn’t arrive before 2100hrs, the table was booked for 2000hrs. This was a downwind sail which was showing about 2-3kts of wind speed. We continued to motor east until about 1200hrs when the wind had picked up enough for us to sail again. We sailed right into the transit for getting into the Yealm river before starting the engine again. We motored in near low water with 0.9m under the keel. Moored to the higher pontoon at 1530hrs having logged 43.5nm.
In the afternoon after I had a sleep I managed to get the tiller pilot working at last, this was another until which had seemed not to be working. Both Vicki and myself love helming when sailing so the tiller pilot was not top of the list of needed items.
In the evening after blowing up the roll-up dinghy, Vicki and I set off to the Ship Inn for a great evening meal (we think the best pub grub in Devon and Cornwall) or maybe just the best we have found.
Love Sailing 