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| The view from the cockpit at Bucklers Hard, Beaulieu River |
Crewing
The crewing arrangements worked quite well. The extra privacy afforded by the aft cabin is good for both crew and owners.
The first leg was a toughie and poor old Glen didn't enjoy it much at all beyond Dover. It was a a bit of an endurance test even for me and I had the incentive of a fortnight in the Solent to look forward to. For Glen, with a dodgy back, it was purgatory and I doubt he'll take issue with my conclusion that it pretty much rules him out of the reckoning as passage crew in future.
At the other end of the trip, in future I'll try to avoid overlapping crew changes or if it can't be avoided keep the overlap to a minimum. Whilst not a massive problem, it was inconvenient for the incoming crew to have to doss down in the saloon for a couple of nights and equally inconvenient for me as an early riser to have someone sleeping in the saloon. If it must be so, so be it but if it can be avoided all the better.
Life on board
Pagan proved the class reputation for being one of the best cruising boats ever built. Solid, safe, seaworthy, comfortable ... all the qualities you could desire of a boat built to cruise
The only snag, if it can be called that, was that with three crew on board the heads holding tank wasn't up to several days in port at a time. It was never intended or expected to be (the installation was designed and specified as a buffer tank) and more discipline in the use of the heads in port will be required in future
Sailing
We did far too little sailing for my liking! I'd been really looking forward to this cruise as an opportunity to get to grips with fine tuning the rig. I know I'm not yet getting the best Pagan has to give under sail as I've occasionally accidentally got it just right. However, the weather had other ideas.
Even so, the sailing we managed to do was very satisfactory. We twice put in good beats to windward and the couple of occasions when we went for the lazy sailor's option of leaving the main on the boom and sailing under reefed genoa and mizzen demonstrated just why the ketch rig should never, in my opinion, have gone out of fashion.
On the short leg from Portsmouth to Cowes, we were sailing very comfortably on a close reach at around 5 knots through the water in 20 to 25 knots of wind (top end of F5 to F6). A 30 odd foot modern sloop slowly overtook us under reefed main and reefed genoa and whilst she was indeed going a little faster, she was heeling right over in the gusts (at one point I could see her keel root!) whilst we were able to leave cups of coffee on the cockpit seats and not have them go walkabout.
The one area where Pagan doesn't sail well is in light airs. She is typical of her generation of British built cruising yachts in that she's canvassed for typical UK wind speeds and she needs at least 10 knots of breeze to get going.
A bigger genoa, the existing one is not generous, would help and I never got the opportunity on this trip to play with the prototype mizzen staysail. Nor did the cruising chute come out of it's bag. So there's as yet unexplored options in the locker. A bigger genoa aside, none of them will do much good when the light breeze is bang on the nose though!
Location, location, location
Given the weather, I don't think we could have picked a better destination than the Solent. There was always something to do on the days we couldn't put to sea and always somewhere reasonably close by to go for a change of scenery without spending long hours at sea in less than ideal conditions.
The highlight of the trip was without doubt Bucklers Hard on the beautiful Beaulieu River. It's a location to die for and it's not ludicrously expensive if your berthed on the river pontoon (which has water and electric) although that does mean a dingy ride to get ashore. We will be back!
Cowes too was an attractive location although we'd have been better berthed in Cowes Yacht Haven or Shepherds Wharf rather than East Cowes. Not that there's anything wrong with East Cowes marina, it's just a bit of a hike to the floating bridge and West Cowes is definitely more attractive than East Cowes. However, due to the upcoming Cowes week, the West Cowes marinas were pretty full.
The Folly upriver on the Medina from Cowes was perfectly acceptable. Cheaper berthing on the (unserviced) river pontoon, reasonable food and beer, etc. Whilst not a highlight of the trip we'd have no hesitation in going back. (Although it should be noted that whilst the water taxi to and from the river pontoon to the pub is reasonably priced, I'm given to understand that the water taxi from Folly reach down to Cowes is rather expensive)
Our feelings about Lymington were a bit mixed. Without a doubt, the facilities at Lymington Yacht Haven are right up there with the best. The showers rival Chichester Marina for the Pagan Best Marina Showers Endorsement. And the town is certainly pretty.
However, the place is eye-wateringly expensive. Happily, as Yacht Havens Group berth holders, we had up to 14 free nights in the haven at Lymington, Berthon next door would have been £42 a night, the Yacht Haven £38.50 a night on weekdays and £40 a night at weekends. Ouch!
And we weren't greatly impressed with the eating and drinking options either. Pricey, no lunchtime light menu or sandwiches in one pub and no smoking area outdoors in another. The bar at the haven proved to be the best option in the end but £10 each for an OK sandwich, compared to £6 each for a superb sandwich at the supposedly expensive Master Builder at Bucklers Hard, didn't impress.
Had it not been for our good friends Andy and Caroline, who live in the locality, twice picking us up and taking us to a good old basic proper pub, the three nights in Lymington would frankly have been a bit of a drag. We'd go back but primarily because free berthing is not to be sniffed at.
Haslar, where we spent an awful lot of time, is what it is. It's well run with good facilities and very convenient for the Gosport ferry. It can get a bit rolly polly due to all the river traffic and it's not, by a long chalk, the cheapest option in Portsmouth. Hardway Sailing Club is inviting provided you can get onto the pontoon (it's both busy and semi-drying) and definitely begs a further visit.
And as far as the "delivery" legs were concerned ...
As already mentioned, Glen would certainly have been happier if he'd jumped ship at Dover. The run down channel is almost always a battle against the prevailing Sou'westerlies unless your unusually lucky and we were the opposite.
Dover lived up to it's surprisingly high esteem in our eyes. The new marina development looks more promising than I originally feared so it's likely Dover will remain our preferred stopover
Sovereign Harbour is a bit of a pain to get in and out of due to the lock and is what it is. Indifferent food and not very good at all beer in the "pub" didn't impress. Eastbourne does at least have the fact that it is not Brighton to it's credit. (Brighton is a dump as far as I'm concerned)
On the other side of the coin, Rik would have liked to spend more time at sea and less time in port at the other end of the trip! The weather again intervened putting paid to my tentative plan to have a blast up the French coast rather than back along the English South coast.
The weather also put paid to tentative plans to try somewhere new along the South Coast. Littlehampton was out due to the tide times, ditto Shoreham. And whilst we could and would have gone for Rye as far as tides were concerned, the predicted F6 plus from the South by late that afternoon dictated otherwise (and arrived bang on time and closer to F8 than F6. The entrance into Rye would have been untenable in those conditions and we'd have had four hours or more to get to the nearest safe haven which would have meant arriving off Dover in the dark in seriously tricky conditions to make an entry. We made the right call to get into Dover early)
Summary
It was a much better cruise than the weather suggested it would be. I found the extra time available very relaxing as I wasn't thinking about the need to get back within days of setting out.
Jane coped with the journey down by train despite constant problems with her ticket and getting lost on the London underground (which, as Maire and I pointed out, both being seasoned underground users, we've ALL done! And she realised her mistake and got herself back on the right track. If the staff on the gate at Waterloo had been helpful instead of pig ignorant she'd have still made her train too). Getting a lift back was much easier though. It was a proof of concept that, for the time being, it is feasible for us to undertake longer duration cruises with Jane joining for part of the trip. Roll on the day when she doesn't need to work full time any more though.
We might, perhaps, have been better off if we'd been a couple of weeks earlier in the season but then it's hard to tell because the weather affected everybody's plans and who knows who would have been where if it had been a decent spell of warm, sunny weather with a nice steady F3 from the North West!
It was a bit of a shame we didn't manage to get beyond the Solent to Poole or Weymouth as originally tentatively planned but we'll get there another year. We'll have to start planning next season shortly as Jane will need to get her holiday bookings in before long. Lots of food for thought there.
In conclusion, for me this was our best cruise yet despite the weather. It was the first time I've felt truly relaxed and completely un-pressured from the beginning to the end of the cruise. And, barring Glen for the reasons already mentioned, everybody seemed to enjoy it. Especially my cousin Maire who I rather think is well on the way to becoming hooked on this sailing lark!
