Passage Plan 8 Apr 2016

The weather forecast is looking promising. F4 or just into 5 Westerly or Sou'westerly, not much in the way of gusts. Good as it's going to get

The sea state may well still be showing the effects of the gales but we can only judge that when we get outside Portsmouth

We are all set up to go!

We plan to depart Haslar Marina approx 04:30 local time (03:30UTC)

If the sea state is OK once we're out, we'll press on Eastwards, if not we'll turn around and come back in.

We may, if it looks like we'll have to motor a lot, dive into Brighton to top up the diesel tank - we used more than I expected yesterday and we may not have enough to motor the whole way back if it came to that

We plan to start standing watches as soon as we're out and sorted

We may decide to stop at Brighton, Newhaven, Dover or Ramsgate but if we make good time and as long as we don't get too cold or too tired we're going to try and go straight through

If we get that far, we'll make a decision on whether to head for the Crouch or up to Ipswich as we pass through Fishermans Gat

ETA Brighton app. 12:00 local Friday
ETA off Eastbourne app. 16:30 local Friday
ETA off Dover app. 02:00 local Saturday
ETA off Ramsgate app. 04:00 local Saturday
ETA Fishermans Gat app. 08:00 Saturday
ETA Fox's (big if!) app. 16:30 Saturday

Reality is I don't really expect to make it to Fox's (Ipswich) but we're going for it

Rik has hit the sack already, I'm for my berth in a few minutes.