26th October
The end of the season has arrived, with strong east wind forecasted for next week it was time to move Elektra onto her winter mooring.
In the morning I took the anchors and the mooring lines down to Carne Creek to set up for later using thigh waders. We have two 15kg Bruce anchors for this job with chain and mooring line attached. The Creek is mostly stone with a little mud on top up by the road but nearer the channel is deep mud, the bottom of the channel and the streams running into it have solid bottoms and can be walked on. I picked up each anchor in turn and dragged the chain via a steam bed to the channel, once at the channel with the anchor I pulled the chain and mooring line to the channel, then working my way along the channel to set each anchor in turn for aft mooring lines. Then setting up fore lines from trees by the side of the road, linking all these lines together makes it easier when we come to moor up Elektra later.
Seems easy but all the time I was setting up the lines it was tipping down with rain, I had a waterproof top on and thigh waders, there was a gap between the waders and the waterproof top so the rain was running down the inside of the waders! The river was full of rain water coming down from the hills and so the channel was deeper than normal.
After going home for a shower and lunch, Vicki and I set off again for St Anthony and out to Elektra’s mooring in the punt and then motored her up to Carne slowly watching the depth but with the low pressure the tide was higher and the least depth was 0.9m. Mooring up was easy, then we set about emptying some gear out. Normally we would dry her out on St Anthony beach but the east wind stopped this. We will be clearing more gear tomorrow over the high water.
Love Sailing 